Teresa Reviews “Peril at End House” (1990): Send Lawyers, Guns, and Money

Fidelity to text: 3 guns

The obvious change is removing Freddie Rice’s worthless husband and adding Miss Lemon. Inspector Japp and Hastings get their roles beefed up too. The concealed change is removing the evidence that Poirot used to solve the crime.

Quality of movie on its own: 3 guns

It’s gorgeous, fast-paced, beautifully acted, and missing large chunks of vital storyline. You’ll keep asking yourself how did Poirot know? Another ten or fifteen minutes of exposition would have prevented the impression that Poirot yanked the solution from his boutonnière vase.

Peril at End House uses a classic trope that Agatha used several times (and possibly even invented it). It’s the unimpeachable witness. This is the one in which someone of sterling character is maneuvered into seeing something concocted by the villain to hide the truth. And who could be a more unimpeachable witness than Hercule Poirot?

The film opens with Poirot and Hastings flying across the English countryside to St. Looe (one of Agatha’s many nom de places for her hometown of Torquay). They’re aboard a small plane, the sort that, at the time, only wealthy travelers would have used. Hastings loves the flight; Poirot is not nearly as enamored with flying. This is a genuine vintage plane, by the way. It’s also a subtle allusion to Michael Seton, an important character in the story even though we never meet him.

Michael is the famous, daredevil pilot attempting an around-the-world flight. He’s also the sole heir of the second-richest man in England as well as Magdala “Nick” Buckley’s fiancé. Her happiness is riding on him making it back to England safely and marrying her. Or, since he thoughtfully made a will leaving his estate to her, dying at the hands of cannibals in the Solomon Islands. Either way works.

At the gorgeous Art Deco resort, Poirot is still shaken from his harrowing flight over the green fields of England and is having a hard go of it. Unsteadily, he trips and is rescued by Nick. To his dismay, she claims to have never heard of the great detective. She joins him and Hastings, swats away wasps, and tells them that strange things have been happening to her, possibly murderous attempts on her life.

Poirot seizes the lifeline she tosses and away we go, as he tries to solve who could possibly want to murder such a delightful young lady. His first clue is the hat Nick accidentally leaves behind, complete with bullet hole, and an easily found spent bullet. She wasn’t swatting at wasps, after all. Except shouldn’t someone in the hotel have heard a gunshot?

Conveniently, everyone who could want to murder such a charming young lady is present at her home, End House. Is it her dearest friend, Freddie Rice, who oh so casually tells them that Nick is a terrible liar? How about Nick’s housekeeper who doesn’t like her? Or the nice Australian couple renting the lodge who tell Poirot and Hastings that no one in the village likes Nick? Or Nick’s cousin who tells Poirot that Nick is obsessed with keeping her mausoleum of a house going? Perhaps it’s Nick’s sailor friend who has no visible means of support?

If you know Agatha, you know where this is going. If you don’t know Agatha or worse, haven’t read the novel, you’ll feel not only misled at the climax, you’ll feel cheated. The novel nicely lays out all the clues, some in plain sight, along with the red herrings, also in plain sight. You can follow Poirot’s deductions at the climax; then reread and see what you missed, marveling at Agatha’s subtle hand.

The film, however, elides over the clues so much that when Poirot solves the crime, it’s with great leaps of fact-free logic, as if he was hopping from one remote South Pacific atoll to another in search of fresh water and fuel. There are no flashbacks showing missed clues or misunderstood connections. None. One of the most vital clues is so subtle that you won’t see it, unless you slow down the DVD and move forward frame by frame and then zoom in on the table in the library.

It was maddening. I didn’t just rant after the movie was over. I ranted during all four laps of our late evening walk, working out the missed opportunities when, if the scriptwriter had played fair, the clue would have been seen by an observant viewer. I don’t expect the solution to be handed to me on a silver platter along with my dry martini. I do expect to have a fighting chance of working out whodunnit.

This was a pity, because there was much to admire about this episode, from the opening scenes of the Devon coast from the air to the vintage sailboats and the stunning motorcars that Hastings pants over. The St. Looe harbor is charming. End House is suitably atmospheric, especially the ghoulish gardener’s son reveling in watching pigs getting their throats cut. The resort hotel is an Art Deco dream and so is the nursing home.

The fashions are equally eye-catching, whatever the occasion. The stylish black evening gowns with scarlet capes even matter for story purposes and not just as eye candy; one woman is shot instead of the other because their clothing was similar.

The acting is first rate. Wait till you see Miss Lemon lead a séance, although again, the script fell down here. Poirot uses Miss Lemon to do some detecting in London and visits End House to report, but he doesn’t warn her that she’s expected to channel spirits?
I couldn’t accept it. Poirot knows the séance is critical to revealing the killer, and he wouldn’t leave anything to chance.

Polly Walker plays Nick Buckley and she’s a marvel; a charming free spirit concealing a layer of darkness. Freddie Rice (Alison Sterling) loves her friend but she knows something’s wrong. The Australian couple, who are always good for a laugh, lay it on thicker than thick and subject Poirot and Hastings to thousands of photographs of Australia. Nick’s sometime boyfriend who Hastings completely misjudges. Poirot himself, disdaining soft-boiled eggs because they are not perfectly matched.

Then there’s Maggie Buckley (Elizabeth Downes). She barely has a line in the movie; her sole purpose is to be mistaken for her cousin, Nick. Watch her scene at the dinner party when Nick discovers that Michael Seton’s plane was lost somewhere out in the vast South Pacific.

Maggie doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t have to and she can’t. Her parents figure in the novel, but they are excised from the film; a mistake, I thought, because their scene brings home the true cost of murder. The people who die leave grieving relatives behind. A scriptwriter should never forget that.

Should you watch this film? Yes. There’s an awful lot to like. But read the novel first. Then you’ll know where the scriptwriter skipped important bits and you won’t mind when there’s so much to enjoy. If you don’t read the novel first, you’ll feel cheated.

Peril at End House should have been better; the source material is first rate and by the start of the second season of Poirot, the production company and David Suchet knew what they were doing. They’re better than this.