If there’s a crime movie I would enjoy more than the 1974 version of Murder on the Orient Express, based on the 1934 novel of the same name by the inimitable Agatha Christie, I haven’t found it yet. I’ve seen the movie — starring Albert Finney as the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot — a number of times. And even though I know whodunit, I can watch the movie over and over again and still be fascinated by it.
The appeal of this particular adaptation of the book begins even before the first scene, with the opening overture and the graphics against which the opening credits are listed. The music is jazzy and upbeat and the graphics are perfect — art deco, bright, snazzy. Everything fits the time during which the famous train ride is supposed to have taken place. Agatha Christie wrote Murder on the Orient Express during the second half of the 1920s and the music and graphics in the movie suggest the Roaring Twenties as well as any novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
As the opening credits fade, the musical score becomes darker, more sinister, and we are plunged straight into the story of the kidnapping of the Armstrong baby. The flashback sequence in the movie is perfectly executed. There is no talking, only music and action. Newspaper accounts fill the screen and we get suggestions of how the kidnapping occurred. We catch fleeting glimpses of the kidnapper escaping with the baby, a woman tied to a chair, a car fleeing the scene. We see the aftermath of the kidnapping: the baby’s body has been found, a couple too distraught to speak try to dodge all the reporters clamoring for a comment.
As a writer, what I find most interesting about the opening scenes of the movie is that they are a flawless example of the adage “Show, don’t tell.” Not a word is spoken until we meet Hercule Poirot five years later on a ferry about to cross the Bosporus, and yet we know everything that has happened. We’ve met the family, we know of their grief, and we’ve got an idea of how the crime was committed.
And now we get to the cast, one of the greatest strengths of the 1974 movie adaptation. The movie features, in no particular order (in addition to Finney), Lauren Bacall, Richard Widmark, Jaqueline Bisset, Sean Connery, Ingrid Bergman, Vanessa Redgrave, and Anthony Perkins, among others. The cast list reads like a Who’s Who of the movie industry.
Finney manages to be both funny and serious. He’s in his element, investigating a crime in a variation of the locked-room scenario, but he is world’s greatest detective, after all, and he allows himself a certain amount of pride and preening. I laugh every time he puts on the hair net and the mustache protector to sleep, and when he dons gloves to read the newspaper or puts on his robe with the snakeskin pattern. He’s a man of contrasts that Finney plays to perfection.
And every time I watch Lauren Bacall reveal her true identity (that’s as close as I’ll get to a spoiler if you haven’t seen the movie), I am shocked. The movie is that good.
I could go on, talking about certain cinematic nuances, like the train brakes that sound like a woman screaming or the snowstorm that strands the train on the tracks, but I won’t. I want you to see the movie for yourself. And see it before November, when the newest adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express is released.
—Amy M. Reade
USA Today Bestselling author Amy M. Reade writes women’s contemporary and gothic fiction. Her books have been compared to authors such as Daphne du Maurier, Phyllis Whitney, and Victoria Holt. Her standalone novels feature vivid descriptions of exotic and fascinating locations, such as the Thousand Islands region of New York State, Charleston, South Carolina, and the Big Island of Hawaii. Most recently, she has been working on The Malice series, set in the United Kingdom.
Well said. A favorite movie from the first time I saw it.
A great movie! I always re-watch it when it comes on TV. I really fear for the new version. Kenneth Branagh is a so-so director, and Johnny Depp’s acting is pretty much just mugging at this point. Still, the story is solid. I hope they don’t change it too much! Poirot is secretly in love with one of the suspects! Poirot investigated the Armstrong case and blames himself! The action is shifted to the United States (the Orient Express being the nickname for a train that crosses the Rockies)! Even Poirot stabbed him! I really, really hope not.
What a great post! I totally agree with you about this movie. I’ve seen it more times than I will admit, and I’m never bored. Finney was a terrific Poirot, and I wish he had done the other theatrical films that followed. He would have been great in “Death on the Nile”. A little bit of trivia for you: Director Sidney Lumet and cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth smeared Vaseline on the wood paneling to reflect the light which give the compartment walls that glassy shine. I’m not looking forward to the remake. Branagh’s moustache looks ridiculous.