Teresa Reviews “Dead Man’s Folly” (1986)

Teresa reviews Dead Man’s Folly (1986) and found it a remarkably faithful adaptation.

Fidelity to text: 4 drownings

Aside from the date change, adding Hastings, and the usual compressions needed for film, it’s amazingly close.

Quality of movie on its own: 4 drownings

I liked it and not just because there were boats galore. It flowed, it was amusing, the acting was first-rate, and — very important — it played fair with the audience.

Read more of Teresa’s Agatha Christie movie reviews at Peschel Press.

Also, follow Teresa’s discussion of these movies on her podcast.

After I watch an Agatha adaptation, I search about the film online to see if there are interesting tidbits I missed. I can’t help but see other opinions. In this case, as with The Man in the Brown Suit (another maligned film), I disagree with the consensus.

I liked this movie and not just because I like Peter Ustinov as Poirot. From the opening scene in Harrods food hall with Ariadne Oliver (Jean Stapleton) until the ending when Amy Folliat (Constance Cummings) is confronted with her own negligence and complicity, I enjoyed myself.

A major reason is the movie played fair. This doesn’t always happen, either with Agatha adaptations or with mystery movies in general. Movies are art by committee, so it’s easy for important points to get skipped because someone else was supposed to make sure they got addressed. It starts with the script, the most important part of a movie because if the script doesn’t provide the clues, you, dear member of the audience, are left throwing popcorn at the screen and ranting about how a vital clue was hidden on a newspaper artfully folded and left on an end table in the far end of the room and the camera spent less than one second of screen time panning across said room.

That would be David Suchet’s Peril at End House. We went frame by frame with that film, looking for that clue. That film was riddled with similar errors where something important was either completely glossed over (not exactly playing the game) or omitted entirely (unfair to anyone who hadn’t read the book).

I don’t expect to be spoon-fed my clues but if I’m paying attention, I should be able to spot them during the second viewing of the movie.

Clues in Place

Dead Man’s Folly put in the clues. I didn’t shout at the screen and rant afterwards about bad writing and being cheated. Actually, the film should have been longer, since there’s plenty of story to go around. Alec and Sally Legge in particular got short shrift, yet they’re a major red herring.

This version didn’t significantly rewrite Agatha, another frequent flaw. Yes, Hastings was added, yet it worked. He stayed in the background, letting Ariadne Oliver shine, but when Poirot needed him, Hastings sprang into action. This was necessary because of time compression. In the novel, the fake Hattie Stubbs vanishes. Months later, she’s still vanished and her fate is never explained. She probably got away with murder. The film compresses the action from months to a few days, so Hastings captures her and drags her back to Nasse to face Poirot, the police, and justice.

Similarly, Hattie (real and fake) becomes American as does Etienne De Sousa, Hattie’s cousin. He’s now Eddie South, from her hometown. But, like Etienne De Sousa in the novel, Eddie South is very much a fish out of water in England. Like Etienne De Sousa, he’s got the kind of foreign hair, wardrobe, yacht, insouciant attitude, musical tastes, and earring that sets Inspector Bland’s teeth on edge.

Jean Stapleton is Ariadne Oliver. Although she’s become American, she’s still clearly Agatha’s fictional counterpart. She filled the role beautifully, being intelligent, intuitive, and scatterbrained in equal measures. However, if you’re of a certain age, you might hear her voice and think Edith Bunker, her most famous role. I watched All in the Family back in the 1970s but it didn’t bother me. It did bother Bill. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you’ll enjoy seeing Ariadne Oliver hold her own with Poirot.

The movie was filmed at West Wycombe Park standing in for Nasse House. What a stunning mansion with equally stunning grounds. You can understand why Amy Folliat would do anything to keep Nasse in the family.

As Merdell tells Poirot (and anyone else who’ll listen), there will always be a Folliat at Nasse. Amy Folliat is a Folliat by birth (second cousin) as well as by marriage so she’s got even more reason to want to hang onto the property. The fête scenes really showed off the property and that house! Wow. You’ll get a great tour during the film.

Class System in Action

The English class system was on full display, too. Throughout the movie, you know who’s on top and it’s not Inspector Bland investigating Marlene Tucker’s murder. Despite onerous death duties and the collapse of the landed gentry, England hasn’t changed much. This was also a subtle clue to Sir George Stubbs’ true identity. He’s a parvenu, with no apparent reason for being a “Sir” other than his money. Yet the locals accept him as “Sir” because Amy Folliat does. If Lady Folliat thinks he’s acceptable, then who are they to disagree?

Compare this to other Johnny-Come-Latelies in Agatha’s novels where the locals never accept that social climber getting above his station.

There are boats. Lots and lots of boats. I counted at least seven, from a variety of rowboats to a ferry (on which Poirot and Hastings meet the foreign girls hiking from youth hostel to youth hostel) to a police boat to Eddie South’s yacht to a Zodiac used by police divers to retrieve the body from the river. For added nautical flavor, there were sailboats in the background.

After Poirot and Ariadne Oliver, the most important character in Dead Man’s Folly is Amy Folliat. She’s the heart of the novel. She was once the most important and grandest lady in the district. By the time of the movie, she’s old, alone, widowed, poor, and renting the lodge from that parvenu, Sir George. Her husband died an alcoholic and lost most of the family fortune on horses and gambling, her older son died of fever, and her younger son, Jamie, was a wild one who disappeared during the war. The death duties she paid forced her to sell Nasse House. The only thing she has left is pride. Yet why does she accept Sir George when she accepts so little else? Why did she discard family portraits and mementos, when aristocrats never throw anything away that proves they date back to William the Conqueror?

It’s her pride and her unwillingness to recognize her younger son for what he is that led to the multiple tragedies at Nasse House. Poirot confronts her, forcing her to see her guilt. Amy Folliat was unable to accept the world changing around her. She was willing to do almost anything to keep a Folliat at Nasse. Compare her to Dolly Bantry in The Body in the Library and The Mirror Crack’d who accepted that the world had moved on. Dolly Bantry let go of the past. Amy Folliat could not.

Give this version of Dead Man’s Folly a try. You may not watch it twice, but you won’t regret it.

Read more of Teresa’s Agatha Christie movie reviews at Peschel Press.