Teresa Reviews “Murder with Mirrors” (1985)

Teresa reviews “Murder with Mirrors” (1985) and finds it the best of the three versions, but not the best of all.

Fidelity to text: 3 guns

I expect characters in adaptations to disappear and be combined, simpler plots, and name changes. I don’t expect fiery deaths of nonentity characters who suddenly become criminal-minded zealots.

Quality of movie on its own: 3 1/2 guns

It’s a pleasure watching old pros like Helen Hayes, Bette Davis, and Leo McKern strut their stuff and show the kids how it’s done. But there were questionable choices.

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

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

This film is — in some ways — the best of the three adaptations of They Do it With Mirrors. Most of the simplification worked, to the point that if you don’t know the novel, you won’t notice the change.

The first major change was to Carrie Louise’s sister and, my, did Joan Collins chew the scenery with gusto in the 2009 version. She’s gone, so Christian Gulbrandsen, Carrie Louise’s stepson, urges Miss Marple to investigate what’s brewing at Stonygates.

Carrie Louise’s family menagerie was vastly simplified. Former husbands vanished and stepsons disappeared, taking their fates to be murdered with them. That made Gina’s love triangle with the Restarick boys (Alexis and Stephen) simpler and less creepy. They’re no longer kids raised as brothers and sister. Alexis doesn’t exist so Stephen’s got a clear field with Gina.

That is, as long as Gina’s husband Wally doesn’t care. In this version, he does. He punches out Stephen’s lights for hitting on his wife. Wally’s no longer a cowboy from out west, but he’s still an American fish out of water. He’s also still the only practical, capable-with-his-hands male at Stonygates.

Gina is made even more of a flighty, self-centered, high-maintenance princess, and if she does go back to the U.S. with Wally, she’ll make him earn that happy ending. Liane Langland plays Gina as needing desperately to be under some man’s thumb and fighting him every step of the way until she submits for the moment. There will be fireworks.

The show got modernized to 1985, with ’80s hair, clothes, cars, recording equipment, and so on. Thus, Gina and Wally’s backstory got altered. They met while she was at school in the U.S. and not during a quickie wartime romance. He’s also a medical student.

Since Alexis Restarick’s gone, Miss Marple is the one who nearly gets killed by stage lights being dropped on her head. The Shakespeare play the delinquents put on is a better choice but not the best. Stephen Restarick chooses The Taming of the Shrew instead of Romeo and Juliet. It’s clear that the people producing these films (all of them) have no idea which Shakespeare teenage boys would choose: something bloody like Richard III rather than a play involving dressing up in women’s clothing.

The financial shenanigans and embezzlement plot involving placing former delinquent students into respectable banking positions got disappeared, but then, it always does.

The other embezzlement plot was changed as well. Dr. Hargrove (the creepy shrink in charge of the juvenile delinquents) gained a new name, a motivation for murder, an assault on Miss Marple, and a fiery death while attempting to escape in a Ford Pinto Pony. For you kids who don’t read fifty-year-old car litigation reports, Pinto Ponies became notorious for exploding gas tanks resulting in lawsuits and recalls. The car Dr. Hargrove roared off in didn’t look like a Pinto Pony (I used to own one and never had a problem) but it sure acted like the ones you saw in cartoons when he rammed through a barrier and into a closed gate. The car exploded in the kind of fireball that usually happens only when a gasoline tanker is set on fire.

The ending changed too. Lewis Serrocold didn’t bother rescuing Edgar from drowning. He stood idly by and watched. Lewis is only a father-figure to Edgar, not a biological father. Since he doesn’t drown rescuing his illegitimate son, he gets to die dramatically offscreen. It was … okay, I guess. The plot made it clear that he was using Edgar and had no paternal feelings.

The name of the film changed to the novel’s American title. Murder With Mirrors is a bad name compared to They Do It With Mirrors. The mirrors are involved; the second title implies stagecraft and sleight-of-hand.

The murder of Christian Gulbrandsen worked. I know the novel well and Agatha does a good job of concealing what’s in plain sight. The 1991 Joan Hickson version of the murder is so obvious, it’s painful. If you think for thirty seconds, you’ll see what happened. The 2009 Julia McKenzie version is better, but it’s still clear whodunnit because they’re the only suspects out of eyeshot.

I didn’t notice with this version. It worked and, mind you, I’ve read the novel and seen the other films.

Where this film shines is in the three leads. Helen Hayes was wonderful in this, her last film. Bette Davis (ten years younger than Helen despite looking ten years older) was terrific. She only made a few films afterward, dying in 1989. Leo McKern was outstanding.

McKern’s opening scene as Inspector Curry with Miss Marple is a marvel. After he arrives at Stonygate, he demands to interview Miss Marple first, not any of the other, more viable suspects. Behind closed doors, Miss Marple dithers and flutters. She’s the picture of an overwhelmed and shocked old lady who cannot even begin to cope with murder and can’t imagine how anyone would do such a dreadful thing and why on earth does the inspector want to speak to her, when there are other, more likely suspects waiting.

Inspector Curry tells her to quit the act. He knows who she is. He goes into detail about what other police inspectors think of her, the good and the bad. It’s funny, watching Miss Marple regroup when her cover’s blown. She and Inspector Curry snipe at each other during the inquiry and develop a grudging respect for each other’s brains and professionalism. They’re terrific, and the reason to watch the movie.

And Bette Davis. She’s got a difficult role, but luckily the scriptwriter didn’t rewrite her into something she wasn’t. Carrie Louise is otherworldly, naïve, and not paying much attention to reality. Yet she’s the reason for Stonygate, why the family clusters around her, and the source of love and tension. Her relationship with her daughter, Mildred, was well-handled, something that doesn’t happen in the other films. So is her relationship with Miss Bellever, who’s her companion, housekeeper, nurse, and tolerates no interference from well-meaning daughters.

Miss Marple tells Carrie Louise a story about someone like Mildred and it’s enough to open her eyes to someone who needs her, but whom she doesn’t see.

The three versions of They Do It With Mirrors are so different. Each highlight different parts of the novel, or rewrite it into something that Agatha never envisioned. Of them all, this version is probably the closest to the original text. As a class in film studies, it’s worth watching all three to see how one novel can be interpreted into three very different films.

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