Death on the Nile (1978)

In England, Jackie (Mia Farrow) asks her friend Linnet (Lois Chiles) to give her soon-to-be husband, Simon Doyle (Simon MacCorkindale) a job.  Linnet agrees.  Six weeks later, Simon and Linnet are on their honeymoon in Egypt.  Not only has an insanely jealous Jackie followed them, so has a cast of suspects.  Romance novelist Salome Otterbourne (Angela Lansbury) and her daughter, Rosalie (Olivia Hussey) may be financially ruined on account of a lawsuit by Linnet.  Mrs. Van Schuyler (Bette Davis) is a wealthy woman with a love of jewelry, especially pearls like the dazzling necklace that Linnet wears.  Van Schuyler's nurse, Miss Bowers (Maggie Smith), had been reduced to being a servant on account of Linnet's father's business practices.  Doctor Bessner (Jack Warden) may see his clinic ruined on account of the harsh criticisms that Linnet has leveled.  Andrew Pennington (George Kennedy), who is Linnet's uncle, has been embezzling funds and could be ruined should Linnet discover it.  Even Linnet's maid, Louise (Jane Birkin), is upset at her employer for derailing her marriage plans.  This hornets' nest of would-be murderers has the misfortune of encountering the famed Hercule Poirot (Peter Ustinov).  Linnet requests his assistance in ridding them of Jackie and he is soon traveling with them and the cast of suspects on the SS Karnak down the Nile.  It is little surprise when Linnet is found dead.  Poirot is joined in his investigation by Colonel Race (David Niven), an old friend and occasional assistant.  As the pair interview all the suspects, additional murders occur.

The all-star cast is terrific in this version.  Poirot is fastidious and has an uncanny knack of being in earshot of all the incriminating conversations, which he parrots back at the enraged suspect.  Unlike the recent remake, this one was filmed in Egypt.  Just this puts it head and shoulders above the Branagh production.  Better still, no anachronistic casting, no efforts to represent this group or that group, just a straight-forward adaptation of the novel.

After watching both versions, I must say that the plan was ludicrous.  A gunshot on a ship the size of the Karnak should have drawn more people.  The idea that there would be no one around seems unlikely.  The stars had to align for the outlandish plot to work.  Also, Hercule Poirot is on the ship!  Are you crazy?  Time to abort the plan and wait for another time.  Heck, maybe wait for whoever pushed the rock to give it another try.

I've not seen the David Suchet version of Death on the Nile.  Until I do, I rate this one the best.  Highly recommended.

Death on the Nile (2022)

Our story opens in 1914 with a unit of Belgian soldiers ordered on a suicide mission.  Luckily, a young soldier proposes a different plan.  This is Hercule Poirot.  The plan works, mostly.  However, Hercule is hit in the face by shrapnel.  His fiancé suggests he grow a mustache to hide the scars.  Twenty-three years later, the mustachioed Hercule visits a blues joint in London.  It just so happens that he witnesses the meeting of Linnet Ridgeway (Gal Gadot) and Simon Doyle (Armie Hammer).  Doyle is engaged to marry one of Linnet's friends, Jacqueline, but one cannot help but notice an attraction between Simon and Linnet.

Six weeks later, Poirot is in Egypt.  He happens upon Bouc (Tom Bateman), who served as an assistant in Murder on the Orient Express (2017).  Bouc invites him to join him and his mother (Annette Benning) in celebrating a wedding.  On arrival, he discovers that Simon has married Linnet.  A very disappointed Jacqueline has followed them on their various honeymoon stops.  Linnet approached Poirot and asked him to look out for her; she does not feel safe among any of the guests on the tour.  Gee, I wonder who is going to be murdered.

Branagh's Poirot is an action hero.  In both films, he dodges bullets and chases escaping culprits.  There's not a lot of action, but certainly more action than one would see from David Suchet, Peter Ustinov, or Albert Finney.  In addition to a dash of action, Branagh's Poirot is also obsessive compulsive.  He likes his eggs to be the same size, the feet of corpses to point in the same direction, desserts to be served in an amount that can be organized into a triangle (3 or 6, but not 7).  This seemed appropriate and the type of personality that would aid in his manic attention to detail and noticing things that don't quite line up.  I like the OCD, but drop the action hero aspect.

The movie has very anachronistic attitudes.  Bouc is in love with Rosalie (Letitia Wright), who is black.  Now, that would not raise eyebrows in 2022, but would be scandalous in 1937.  The same goes for Poirot's attentions toward Salome (Sophie Okonedo), the aunt of Rosalie.  Then there is Linnet's cousin, Katchadourian.  He is Indian, which hints at further interracial couplings.  None of this is viewed as scandalous or out of the ordinary.  The previous film in the series has this same ahistorical treatment of race when Daisy Ridley's character planned to marry Leslie Odom's character.  Just to hit all the demographics, there is also a lesbian couple, though they are concealing their relationship.  This ahistorical treatment of race has blanketed British films of the past decade (e.g. Mary, Queen of Scots).  On the one hand, I like the idea of depicting racial harmony, but on the other hand this feels like rewriting history.

There is a lot of CGI for the setting.  Pyramids, the sphinx, and other noted locations are all CGI.  As with the anachronistic casting, this took me out of the film.  Rather than thinking how amazing these Egyptian monuments are, I was thinking that the CGI wasn't convincing.  The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) filmed in Egypt and I remember how cool the 'sets' were.  45 years later and it's unconvincing CGI.  One expects better quality over time, not worse.

There is one other nitpick.  It is highly unlikely that a bullet from a dinky .22 caliber pistol could go through one person's torso and still have enough kinetic energy left to inflict a lethal chest wound on another person.  I'm sure that most gun aficionados groaned when that happened.

It is okay.  I prefer Peter Ustinov's Death on the Nile (1978) over this one.  Likewise, I thought Albert Finney's Murder on the Orient Express (1974) was better than Branagh's adaptation.