The Sittaford Mystery

This is a big budget Miss Marple. Casting went for unusually handsome males like Timothy Dalton, Laurence Fox and James Murray. (Their unusual good looks turn out to be necessary for the plot.) The females are delightfully eccentric, including Rita Tushingham whom baby boomers will remember fondly. There are realistic looking Egyptian treasures, and two delightfully creaky English houses.

Miss Marple starts out a bit nuts. Then she disappears while others do the sleuthing. Then she comes in at the end to sort out who murdered who. That is not the usual formula. Everyone has motive to commit murder, or at least some crime. It all sorts out in the most implausibly complicated way. I think you would have to watch perhaps five times before you were sure you had all the motives and murders sorted out, including the raptor's. Can you spell coincidence?

The cinematography is done with just candles and firelight. It gives a very snowed in cosiness. The music is wonderfully spooky, not just the standard theme repeated.

This is probably my favourite Miss Marple episode.

I have a major problem with these particular Miss Marple mysteries in that I don't remember - or don't recognize - the actual stories because I read them so long ago. I think possibly the only way to watch these is if one forgets they are supposedly adapted (and apparently, all they take is the title) from the Christie novels.

The production values for this series are quite high and the casts are very good. In this one, we have such stars as Timothy Dalton, Rita Tushingham and someone who reminds me of Zac Efron in ten years, James Murray. Miss Marple herself (Geraldine McEwan) never seems to be the main character; they manage to turn the footwork over to someone else, and then Miss Marple solves the crime. Now, in the books, Miss Marple solved the crimes by being an excellent observer of human nature, based on the people she knows or knew in her town of St. Mary Mead. This Miss Marple very rarely mentions St. Mary Mead or compares any characters or incidents to the people she knew there. She is also a little too sly for the Miss Marple in my mind.

It seems a shame to upset so many people by trashing the books, renaming the characters, and redoing the plot.

I'll take issue with one thing that was complained of - the fifty minutes it took to get to the murder. Years and years and years ago, there was such a thing as a story buildup. If you watch the movie San Francisco, the earthquake doesn't happen until the last half hour or thereabouts. One got to know the characters and their interpersonal relationships first. Of course, this type of storytelling has gone out of style. If you're going to have an earthquake, a ship sinking, or a murder, it has to happen in the first five minutes. Since I didn't know this story from Adam, I have to admit the buildup didn't bother me. It's done so rarely.

All in all, one star as an Agatha Christie story, five stars for the production values, the acting, and the mystery. It just has NOTHING to do with anything Dame Agatha wrote. What's the point?

This is a review of the first installment in a two-part version of THE SITTAFORD MYSTERY on TV. Once again, although there is no Miss Marple in the original story, the writers have planted her in the midst of all the characters staying at an old inn. That's not the objection most of the comments here have to make. What IS resented is the fact that story elements have been drastically changed by the writers of the teleplay, even changing the identify of the murderer in the original story.

This is the kind of thing bound to upset purists who want their Agatha Christie stories told without all the unnecessary changes. What upsets me is that, first of all, GERALDINE McEWAN does not make a plausible Miss Marple. She's much too mild-mannered and lacks the intelligent inquisitiveness that Joan Hickson displayed so well in her interpretation of the role on the former British series.

But secondly, not having read the original recently, I was totally unaware of all the changes when viewing the first hour and I found it an engrossing kind of story, if a bit confusing in the way the narrative unfolded, especially with regard to the opening scenes at the Egyptian tomb. But TIMOTHY DALTON gave a compelling performance, using his personality to put some life into the role of Captain Trevelyan (whom I later found out dies in the first chapter of the Christie story). It took a whole hour for his death to take place here.

But that was a minor change, according to all these other comments, and at this point I have no idea what awaits in the second installment.

I can only say that despite all these "flaws" in the presentation, I thoroughly enjoyed the story with its ingredients of a fierce blizzard, an old country inn, a seance where a death is predicted, an assortment of strange guests, and a bevy of competent British players, some of whom (Rita Tushingham in particular) I never would have recognized without reading the cast list. It was nice to recognize JAMES WILBY as Mr. Kirkwood, proprietor of the hotel.

So, while I confess I did enjoy the first segment, I can understand why many were disappointed in the drastic changes to the story. The writers did the same thing with several other Christie "adaptations," including one of my favorites, EASY TO KILL (even the title was changed to "Murder Is Easy" and it ruined a perfectly good Christie story by changing the emphasis to the romantic leads and practically leaving the murderer out of the story).

Personally, I enjoy all of these Christie stories but do not think Miss Marple or Poirot should be injected for the sake of whatever following these kind of things have on TV.

It occurred to me that, when you rank all 23 episodes of "Agatha Christie's Marple" from highest to lowest IMDb-rating, "The Sittaford Mystery" is all the way at the bottom of the list. That being said, 6.8/10 is still a terrific rating many movies and TV-shows would be very happy with, but it's remarkably weaker than the average rating of the series. I can think of a few reasons to explain why the installment is slightly less popular.

First and foremost, the source novel is one of Agatha Christie's most known stories, but it doesn't feature Miss Marple anywhere. It's not the only episode based on a non-Marple novel, but the lead character is usually ingeniously processed into the other stories, whereas she's pretty much the third wheel on the wagon in "The Sittaford Mystery". Moreover, Miss Marple solves the murder without even coming near the scene of the crime. She bases her theories on what others tell her, whilst she's stuck in a mansion during heavy snowfall. I know she's good, but she cannot be that good. Secondly, it takes an awful long time before the murder is committed. The film is over halfway already when the killer strikes, which leaves very little time to guess along for the culprit's identity and motives.

And yet, don't be too alarmed, as "The Sittaford Mystery" is nonetheless a compelling TV-movie with a very intelligent finale. Great performances, as usual, and the most momentous appearance here is definitely Timothy Dalton. His biggest role will always remain that of James Bond, of course, but personally I prefer to see him as a sneaky and callous figure, like he did in "The Doctor and the Devils", "Hot Fuzz" or here in "The Sittaford Mystery".

Despite how annoyed I was at the multitude of changes in this adaption, I have to admit to rather liking it in a way. Kitsch, camp and ridiculous. But it genuinely held no resemblance to the book- the settings, characters and murder were all tinkered with, and the murderer and back story utterly changed! The inclusion of Miss Marple was just not necessary, considering this book stands up very well on its own without the inclusion of either of Chrsities famous sleuths. Whilst I praise the effort, and inclusion of good guest stars etc, I just didn't see why they had to change it so much. Stick with the book, I say....!