Death on the Nile - A Review

I just watched Gilderoy Lockhart's Kenneth Branagh's version of Agatha Christie's Death on the Nile, and wanted to share a few of my thoughts about it. This review will have mild spoilers, so stay away if you haven't read the book or seen another version of the movie.

I'll start with the positives.

Kenneth Branagh isn't terrible as Poirot. In fact, he seems to have improved his act since the first movie, Murder on the Orient Express, and his accent is slightly more like David Suchet in this movie (who is the best Poirot in my opinion). I would keep Branagh ahead of Alfred Molina, Peter Ustinov, and of course, John Malkovich. He may even be better than Albert Finney. I like the rest of the cast as well - Gal Gadot, Emma Mackey and Armie Hammer fit into their roles. The visuals are great, and modern techniques, such as drone shots and CGI suit the story well. The digitally de-aged Branagh looks a little weird in a flashback scene, but I can live with that. Overall, anyone who is not fanatic about murder mysteries or Poirot would probably find this a gripping movie.

But I'm not such a person. I scrutinize murder mysteries with psychopathic attention to detail, and I'd not hesitate to end friendships over a disagreement involving Poirot. So here's my verdict.

First, the story is incoherent and full of holes. It's too much to think Poirot would go back to the heat of Egypt after having just come from there, whatever be the justification. Secondly, when people are dropping dead like flies, and everyone is trapped on a boat, is it believable that Poirot will not have everyone's belongings searched? And how does the murderer get the gun in the revelation scene, while Poirot himself remained clueless? The first murder comes a bit too late in the movie, and as a result, the movie drags on quite a bit longer than necessary.

The second aspect in which this movie fails is perhaps evident even from the poster above. Quick, look at it, and tell me who the main character is in the movie? From the beginning to the end, Poirot remains just a character in the movie, not the character. I would have blamed the director for this, but Kenneth Branagh himself is the director. If a person who played Gilderoy Lockhart and Hercule Poirot, arguably two of the most pompous characters in British literature, fails to make a movie revolve around himself, I don't know who can. I re-watched David Suchet's Death on the Nile right after watching this one and the difference between the two is stark. The older version has long sequences focused on Poirot, his mannerisms, his dialog, his idiosyncrasies. In the newer one, the other characters often steal the show. We never even see Poirot sitting still and thinking, exercising his little grey cells, something that the older version focused on often. The newer version replaces that by cheap thrills of a nimble Poirot chasing the murderer across the ship's deck, up and down stairs.

But the third and most vital point where the movie maker failed, and which was totally avoidable in my opinion, is what they did with Poirot's moustache. They gave it a back story.

I try to keep an open mind when it comes to interpretation of literature into film, and while I'm infinitely more fond of David Suchet's waxed version of the moustache, I don't blame Kenneth Branagh for trying to do something different. But whatever be the style, I do consider Poirot's moustache to be his pride, not his weakness. Characters like Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot are like superheroes in many ways, and their little oddities, however illogical, become part of their personalities. Imagine a Superman movie showing a backstory about why Superman started using the red cape, then trying to explain the cape using aerodynamics, and finally showing him giving it up so that he can fly/fight better. Would you like that movie? I wouldn't. Similarly, one can invent all sorts of backstories to make the character more real, but when they try to rationalize Poirot's moustache, or love for symmetry, with logic from that backstory, these things definitely lose their magic. These things are not loved because they are logical - in fact, I'd say it's quite the opposite.

Branagh has said he wants to do more Poirot movies, and this movie hints "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd" is going to be the next installment. Will I watch that when it comes out?

Probably.

I'll watch it for the same reason I watch every new Jurassic World movie, every new Fantastic Beasts movie, every new Feluda / Byomkesh movie or Srijit Mukherjee's Kakababu movies - even when I know the stories and I hate the movies. I have grown up with these characters, and watching them say or do something familiar on screen still gives me a moment of  attachment to my childhood days, and harks me back to the carefree summer afternoons I spent binge-reading mystery stories lying on my bed. Watching any rendition of Poirot a rendition of Poirot that at least tries to stay faithful to the original will always recreate some of that magic for me, and Branagh's rendition is definitely in that category.

But if he wants me to love him as Poirot, he will have to do better. He'll have to stop trying to explain Poirot's eccentricities and embrace them for what they are, and make the movie all about himself, as Gilderoy Lockhart would have done.