The Pale Horse

Yes there are bound to be the usual people that don't like it because Joan Hickson isn't in it and Miss M shouldn't be in it, but, she is here and i'm glad she is. Julia Mackenzie i think is making a wonderful Jane Marple and here she is wonderful, she is getting better with every outing. This is one of Christie's darker novels, I loved her work when she explored black magic and the occult. Fantastic casting, minor parts for class acts like Linda Baron and Nicholas Parsons. Tom Ward, Sarah Alexander, Jonathan Cake are fantastic, but i was so impressed at how good JJ Feild and Pauline Collins were. Heaps better then the ITV version from a few years ago. Seems that there is a lot of effort and money into making these films a visual treat. This is one of the best!!!

A close friend of Miss Marple, Father Gorman, is savagely beaten to death while on his way to see one of his ailing parishioners, Mrs Davis. Miss Marple is deeply upset and suspects it wasn't a random act of violence. She received a letter from him shortly after his death, listing names and a Bible verse from Revelation. Mrs Davis, who died the same night as Father Gorman, had a similar list. There may be sinister forces afoot.

Quite clever and reasonably intriguing. Miss Marple herself is as dull as ever but the case is puzzling and quite dark, making for a suspenseful episode.

One or two interesting sub-plots too.

The Pale Horse has some fine actors and performances, albeit a few chosen for popularity rather than their acting prowess. The production value is without fault and Julia McKenzie delivers another strong turn as Miss Marple.

As another long-term fan of Agatha Christie - I was introduced at a young age by my mother, and as someone with a reading difficulty, having me watch the televised version first helped me develop my reading skills - I get upset when people attack these versions of the stories, just because there are changes to suit the storyline. It's like criticizing art that has come from a school of a great painter. While some elements of the stories haven't been handled with the greatest of care, these new updated versions are bringing the world of Jane Marple to a younger audience. I like to take each tele movie as a story on its own - I can see the distinct differences, but can appreciate why sometimes it is necessary to adapt the stories to meet the needs of modern set of viewers, whose attention span and ability to read between the lines might not be as astute. I personally have watched Margaret Rutherford, Helen Hayes, Joan Hickson, Angela Lansbury, Geraldine McEwan and Julia McKenzie all play the role, and for my generation I prefer Joan Hickson onwards. Watching Margaret Rutherford as Marple puts me to sleep as those productions are slow and plodding. For the purist out there, these stories were not aimed at you, but rather at a cross sectional transcontinental audience. Considering the many levels they have to appeal to, I think they do very well.

If Ms. Christie's books are to appeal to the next generation, the stories will have to adapt slightly to appeal to them.

The Pale Horse mystery by Agatha Christie is arguably one of her best stories. It is a story that is on another level and more than just a motive by one of the characters. We saw an elaborate scheme or set up that was almost fool proof. Witchcraft was the supposed centre and cause for many so called natural deaths. Dig deeper and you see a non practicing lawyer taking bets for predicting the deaths and the owner of the Pale Horse Inn also collecting money for the witchcraft. However digging deeper you find the true head of the scheme who is a figure in the dark that actually executes these murders carefully and disguising murder as natural causes. This story is so intriguing and remarkable that perhaps adding action and thriller on a bigger scale would be worthy of a James Bond film.

However the film adaptation was poorly executed. The story was told so badly that it was hard to follow in its entirety. Often stories are paced very badly. You have close to nothing revealed in 3/4 of the film and then a big complex story with no backstory is given quickly to close the case. The audience is wondering how we jumped from A to Z. Sadly a few Poirot episodes have followed the same trend with little revealed throughout and a hasty summary at the end. A good film would have clues distributed evenly before the big reveal. Overall great story but poorly told and portrayed.

Okay, it isn't easy finding enough Miss Marple stories in the Christie canon to create a full-fledged series. But the producers have done a nice job of wedging her into one of Christie's most ingenious tales. Like "The Mirror Crack'd," "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd" and "Murder on the Orient Express," the tale features a wonderfully original plot device -- in this case, a whole new approach to contract killing. Throw in a kind of British take on re-creating the Salem witch trials and you have a mordantly murky and entertaining mystery. Purists may take umbrage at Miss Marple wandering off her own turf to solve a series of seemingly occult murders. But if it's a well-told mystery (as this one is) and doesn't otherwise twist Dame Agatha's story, why not?