The first of four EMI Agatha Christie starry adaptations of the 70s and 80s always brings back the thrill of seeing it on the big screen when first released.
Christie's 1934 classic has Hercule Poirot solving the brutal stabbing of a shady businessman on a snowbound train with the usual cross-section of probable and improbable suspects.
Sidney Lumet was always a fine director of actors and here he orchestrates his cast into a wonderful ensemble.
It is almost an anti-thriller: after the murder, there is no feeling of threat to the other characters, just the pleasure of watching Albert Finney's dazzling Poirot question the other passengers one-by-one.
Lumet offered Ingrid Bergman the role of Princess Dragomiroff - after
Dietrich said no - but she chose instead the smaller role of
the missionary. He filmed her 5 minute scene
in one take - and she won an Oscar for it!
Shelf or charity shop? Total shelf for Lumet's direction, Geoffrey Unsworth's cinematography, Tony Walton's production design and costumes, Richard Rodney Bennett's score and of course that cast! Pauline Kael, in her New Yorker review, called it a
film full of 'turns' which is, of course, the pleasure of watching
it. Personal favourites are Bergman, Finney, John Gielgud's disdainful manservant, and Vanessa Redgrave who has never seemed so relaxed and playful. Sadly, it would be a lonely cast reunion with only four of the seventeen main cast members still alive at time of writing. A special mention too for the unnerving montage intro that lingers in the mind as the film progresses and the blue-lit murder scene.
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