156.
Murder on the Orient Express
The film begins with showcasing
Poirot's abilities as her solves a theft in Jerusalem, which to be fair, I
ended up guessing who had done it too. This Belgian detective, sees his power
of solving a case with being able to see a lie amid the truth, an overall curse
on him. He finally sorts out a holiday for himself but is soon contacted about
solving a case in London, so much return, via Istanbul. He travels by a small
boat where we see, Ridley's character being spoken to by another English man,
who tells her, 'It'll be ok when it's done'.
His friend Bouc, who he bumps into by a happy coincidence, offers him a
place on the Orient Express. On the train, we are quickly introduced to many of
the other travellers, Pfeiffer seems to be a flirty, older woman and Depp is playing
a gangster named Ratchett. He sits with Poirot and offers him a job as his
bodyguard during the train journey as he feels someone is after him. He has
been receiving letters, threatening his life. Everyone seems to be very
distance, with one of the characters not wanting a black man to sit with them
for food. Others do not like the gangster and so on. That night, Poirot hears
noises coming from Ratchett's room and as he enters the corridor, he sees
someone running away wearing a red kimono and as he goes to investigate
further, and avalanche derails the train and everyone ends up arse over tit.
The next morning, everyone is
accounted for but Ratchett. The Detective goes to the room to have a look and
finds it looked, but with a cold draft coming from the crack under the door.
After breaking in, they discover Ratchett murdered in his bed. Quickly, the guy
that we seen talking to Ridley's character on the boat, is discovered to be a
doctor, so does his best to identify what happened, the time of death and the
weapon. He had been stabbed many times, in different places and different
depths but probably by one person. They find a half-burnt letter, the Poirot,
linking Ratchett to a famous kidnapping of a young girl called Daisy Armstrong,
who was held for ransom. After the money was paid, the child was found
murdered. Ratchett has been identified as John Cassetti, the kidnapper and
murderer. The child's death caused her mother to die after giving birth
prematurely to a still born. The father, Colonel Armstrong then killed himself
from his loss. The family's maid was arrested for being accused of being
involved with it all. She hung herself in custody and was later exonerated.
More evidence is found on the floor, linking a few people to the case. Hubbard,
Pfeiffer's character, mentions that she felt someone was in her room that night
and on closer inspection, Poirot finds a handkerchief with blood on it and a
button from a conductor's uniform, inside Hubbard's room.
As the film progresses,
Ratchett's assistant is the main suspect, running away with some books under
the bridge that they are stuck on, but the only reason is that he didn't want
people finding out that he had been stealing money from his boss. The uniform
is later found hidden and the kimono is found in the Detective's case,
obviously planted. Hubbard stubbles into the main carriage, after being stabbed
in the back and again the black doctor is on hand to help out. Poirot turns to
question everyone, one by one, outside in the cold, in order to find out who
the actual murderer is. Judi Dench's character stays in her room with her
assistant to be questioned and Poirot reveals that the handkerchief found had
her initials on it. As Poirot gets around to interviewing Mary Debenham,
Ridley's character, he finishes up by standing on a carriage, contemplating
what he has found. Only to be cornered by Arbuthnot, the doctor. He shoots
Poirot in the shoulder, before claiming that he is the killer. But Poirot knows
that this guy is a medical doctor and knows that he was an army sniper. If he
wanted him dead, he would have with one shot.
This is time to draw the case to
a close, before a rescue team reaches the track to put the back on the lines.
He lines everyone up in an opening for the tunnel and begins to reveal what he
thinks happened on the train. Bouc is standing behind them all with a gun,
ready for anyone who wants to make a run for it. His first thought is that
Cassetti was murdered by one of many enemies that he had acquired over the
years, who had then fled after the deed. The second and more complex idea, was
that everyone on this train knew Cassetti and was linked to the case of Daisy
Armstrong. This is where the main explanation begins. Hardman, played by Defoe,
was a detective put onto the case and fell in love with the falsely accused
maid, who also turns out to be the trains conductor's sister. Mrs Hubbard is
Linda Arden, the mother of the woman who died from premature childbirth.
Everyone else is linked as Penelope's Cruz was one of the housekeepers who fell
asleep when the child was taken. Ratchett's assistant was the son of a
detective put on the case who was put under pressure to accuse the main and
when he killed herself, he was never the same again. Everyone else, are too
linked with the case in ways that would cause intent. We are shown the history
of this, in dark coloured flash back, as each person breaks down and then we
head to seeing the murder itself. Each person passes the knife to each other
and stabs the gangster in the chest. That way, no-one knows he caused the fatal
wound. Arden claims that she was the one to set it all up, no-one else is to
blame but her. Poirot turns to her and tells her that he is now the only person
who can reveal the plot and expose them so challenges someone to shoot him, as
he leaves his gun on the table. Instead, Arden lifts it to her mouth to kill
herself, but the gun isn't loaded and she collapses in tears. I assume her done
this to prove that they were not actually murderers, just people who wanted justice.
The train is finally put back
onto the track and Poirot walks through the carriages and through all
passengers, who look on nervously. He turns and tells them that there is no
justice to be found in this case and everyone has already suffered enough due
to the actions of one man. He will have to live with letting 12 people get away
with a murder and as the train reaches the station, the police are waiting for
him, who he explains his first theory too, that an enemy of the gangster had
murdered Ratchett and fled. Poirot decides to get off the train at this stop,
away from London and lets everyone carry on their way. He is approached by a
messenger as he is needed for a 'death on the Nile', which I believe is another
book in the series. He stops for a minute to watch the Orient Express disappear
into the distance, before getting in the car for his next case.
With no source material read or
earlier movies watched, I didn't have the ability to compare this to anything
else. This film has a lot of critics, even down to them saying that Poirot's
moustache wasn't right compared to how it is described in the books. As for me,
I really enjoyed with movie. The cast was really good, as each person offered
something different and no character was anywhere near the same. That's until
the end, where they were actually all linked together. I really didn't expect
Depp to be in this movie as little as he was. He was one of the main suspects
from the trailer. The cinematography, settings and colouring were all very interesting.
Considering that this took place in the confined space of a train, it was
really good and broad due to the fact of not knowing who was actually the
murderer. Towards the end, quite a bit took place in the bright snow, almost as
if the detective's mind was working and his ideas lighting up the way. This
movie offers are great escapism and it had been a while since I had seen this
genre of movie. With an amount of twists and intense storyline, it was very
enjoyable for me and proved me wrong in my guesses to an extent. This was down
to me not knowing anything about it going in, no matter how long the story had
been around.
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