1
hr & 54 min, color, 2017
After
the Bible and Shakespeare, who is responsible for the third largest publishing
output in all of human history? This
author has given us a voluminous quantity of novels, plays, essays, poems and
short stories that it would take years for any modern chronicler to even
approach, let alone exceed. It would
require a museum to house a copy of every extant composition, and perhaps an
encyclopedia to list all the titles. Am
I talking about a historian? a
scientist? a scholar? One would think it would be somebody of great
versatility, a super intellect, or at least somebody occupying a niche in a
class or category that the person shares with no one else. One of a kind maybe?
Guess
again!
The
individual who has achieved this feat has been with us until fairly recently;
death occurred in 1976. And who ever
said that the male of the species has dominated the writing domain, since the
Bard’s demise? Yes, I am speaking of a
woman, someone celebrated for as long as there has been breath in most of the
bodies including my own now living on the earth.
Agatha
Christie may not be the most prolific writer of renown; she has not set any
standards of brilliance or blazed any new trails. She has not raised any bar of quality to
which others have been compelled to adhere.
She has just churned them out and churned them out, ever since she came
into public notice, and that was before she even reached the age of
twenty. The first specialty of
authorship that probably comes to most of our minds when her name is mentioned
is the mystery story. (I myself had the
privilege of appearing in a performance of one of her who-done-its many years
ago, a play derived from a work of hers entitled “And Then There Were None”,
better known in theatrical circles as “Ten Little Indians”.)
This
woman is not a shoddy writer, and she has always had the knack of weaving a
clever plot, a tireless creator of suspense who can be relied upon to entertain
and to stretch the viewer’s or the reader’s expectations, and “Murder on the
Orient Express”, first issued in novel form in 1934 and previously adapted to
the screen in 1974, is no exception. The time setting is the 1930s and in movie
terms the period scenery takes almost full command of what the eye beholds.
The
leading character is someone who has appeared in numerous works of hers – a
Belgian detective by the name of Hercule Poirot, played here quite colorfully
and at times passionately by Kenneth Branagh (who also directed the film). Poirot was introduced very early in
Christie's oeuvre as a former police investigator retired to private life and
preferring a detective business of his own.
The man is distinguished in this film by a very long handlebar mustache
that curls most conspicuously on both ends and a thick almost French sounding
accent to go with it. In the opening
sequence he is waiting by the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem to board a ferry that
is to take him to Istanbul where the famous Orient Express awaits him. But before his departure he is prevailed upon
to identify the thief who has just lifted precious stones out of the Temple and
hidden them. He not only fingers the
thief but uncovers the stones as well.
In this introduction we are given a taste of his deductive technique,
not so very different from that of Sherlock Holmes.
Everybody
seems to know him and admire him, even though he is reticent to take on any
more cases until he has had time to enjoy an extended vacation. But of course we know that that vacation will
have to be postponed, after a murder during the wee hours aboard the Express
interrupts his plans and seemingly those of all the varied passengers on board
as well. The murdered person is a man
traveling under an assumed name (played by Johnny Depp) but identified by
Poirot as the suspected kidnapper and murderer of a child back in the States.
A
rather sizeable ensemble cast of players comes under suspicion as Poirot is
compelled to conduct what turns out to be a very confounding
investigation. Space would not permit me
to list all of them, but aside from Branagh some of the other major ones who
drive the plot are Michelle Pfeiffer, Penelope Cruz, Daisy Ridley, Josh Gad,
Willem Dafoe, Derek Jacobi and Leslie Odom. In fact I find it quite hard to
discuss fine details, especially vital facts about the characters, without
giving away so much and spoiling suspense, so I choose to confine myself to
speaking about Poirot, the ambience of the production and about what influenced
Christie to compose this particular tale.
It
seems that divine intervention plays its part when a snow drift blocks the
rails and barricades everyone on board.
What we then have is one of those secluded confrontations wherein the
suspects are several and when escape to the outside world is impossible. In “And Then There Were None” it is an island
to which some famous individual has invited an assortment of people, just about
all of whom die off before the real murderous instigator of the party is
unmasked.
Poirot
is totally devoted to a black/white universe.
“There is good on one side and evil on the other with nothing
in-between”. Such is the code by which
he has always lived and done his work.
But on this fateful journey across most of the Eurasian countryside he
runs into a complex situation that calls his code into serious question. He is
forced to ask himself if society’s system of justice is really as neat as he
has always supposed it to be. This,
after he has to face a circumstance unlike any he has ever had to confront
before.
Poirot
is drawn in this episode more vulnerable and fragile than Christie was
accustomed to making him. He finds that
he cannot quite make sense of all the clues and contradictions the case turns
up. He also reveals something about his
heart of hearts in his quiet reflective conversations with a beloved woman in
his past, who I assume is a departed wife.
Thoughts of her bring tears to his eyes, when he is alone. He confesses to her that for once in his long
career he is stumped.
“Murder
on the Orient Express” is fiction, but in this case Christie was certainly
influenced by fact. Many of you I am
sure have become familiar with the Lindbergh kidnapping/murder case that
occurred in the early 1930s in New Jersey.
It was called the Crime of the 20th Century. The 20-month old son of Aviator Charles A.
Lindbergh and his wife Anne Morrow Lindbergh on the night of March 1, 1932 was
lifted out of his crib and never seen alive again. Many weeks later his body was found, victim
of a bludgeoning, not very far from the Lindbergh residence. The case dragged on for three years before a
German immigrant named Hauptmann was arrested, tried and executed for the
crime. The case was dominating the American newspapers at the time Christie’s
book was published, though Hauptmann’s execution had not yet taken place. There was much controversy surrounding the
case’s outcome. Many prominent people
had doubts about the German man’s guilt, one to which he never admitted. Some of the evidence used to convict him was
thought to be ambiguous. The handwriting
of the ransom note had some characteristics in common with the man’s recorded
samplings, but it was never precisely identified as his. Even Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady at the
time of execution, weighed in with her doubts, so much so that she strongly
urged the New Jersey governor to postpone the execution until further
investigation and study had been made, but to no avail. Many to this day think perhaps it was a rush
to judgment.
In
the opening of the 1974 movie version, newspaper clippings spell out the
details of the 1930s crime, though fictional names were used, some of the time
element has been altered and additional tragedies in the wake of the crime have
been added. There are those who think
they see some parallel between some of the characters in the thriller and
people known to be close to the Lindberghs.
I will say no more on that subject for the benefit of those unfamiliar
with how Christie resolves the story’s tension.
Any who are curious enough to do so after seeing it can make their own
study of the official record and draw their own conclusions.
Whatever
the conclusions about the factual case and its bearing upon the Christie yarn,
we have to admit that the story reminds us in elaborate form that a homicide
never victimizes only one single person.
The cruel wanton killing of one victim does permanent damage to a circle
of decent people, those related to and personally acquainted with the deceased. Lives of the survivors suffer from the
injustice, not just once but in a never ending spiral of recollection and angry
resentment and hatefulness. Those left
behind bear the indignity. Poirot, who
is in the habit of enjoying the work of catching criminals, ones in whose fate
he is not accustomed to having any personal investment, seems here to get
caught in a web of emotional involvement and has to surrender a large measure of
control over his usual habit of playing the judge with the last word. He has to make a decision that leaves
everyone on the train and in the audience in the grip of controversy. After the last fadeout, you may be left
wondering if in some strange way you have been compromised.
To read other entries in my
blog, please consult its website:
enspiritus.blogspot.com. To know
about me, consult the autobiographical entry on the website for Dec. 5, 2016.
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