Customer Reviews

Miss Marple: They Do It With Mirrors

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I enjoy all of these productions. The sets are fascinating and very detailed, and the acting is superb.

This particular story is about poor Carrie Louise. She is being slowly poisoned and her childhood friend, Miss Jane Marple is called in to investigate.

Lydia from A&E's Pride & Prejudice is one of the suspects and the tremendous Joss Ackland (the South African Drug Lord from Lethal Weapon) is another prominent character. All in all one of the best in this series. If you like Agatha Christie, don't miss this one.

The acting is professional and the clues are intriguing--not too little and not too much. An enjoyable mystery, and no sex.

+++++

I watched this movie without reading the 1953 Dame Agatha Christie novel (also entitled "Murder With Mirrors") that it was based on. (Christie wrote twelve Miss Marple murder mysteries altogether.) I'm glad I did this! Why? Because it forced me to really watch the movie in order to try and deduce who the murderer was.

Agatha Christie's heroine sleuth Miss Marple (the late Joan Hickson) travels to a country estate (called "Stonygates") of a good friend to find out who is trying to gradually poison her. Eventually a murder occurs. Clues can be found out at the nearby reformatory for criminal youth. Chief Inspector Slack (David Horovitch) aids Miss Marple in her investigation. Later, an attempted murder occurs.

I found that I had to concentrate when watching this movie in order to keep all of the character's straight and to follow the story. Also, I found that sometimes British accents were excessive, so I found I had to concentrate when listening.

Who are the people associated with this estate? They are as follows:

1. Carrie-Louise Serrocold, wealthy socialite and the estate's owner (Jean Simmons)
2. Lewis Serrocold, Carrie-Louise's third husband (Joss Ackland)
3. Ruth Van Rydok, Carrie-Louise's sister (Faith Brook)
4. Mildred Strete, Carrie-Louise's daughter (Gillian Barge)
5. Alex Restarick, nephew to Ruth (Chris Villiers)
6. Stephen Restarick, Alex's brother (Jay Villiers)
7. Gina Hudd, Carrie-Louise's granddaughter (Holly Aird)
8. Walter Hudd, Gina's husband (Todd Boyce)
9. Edgar Lawson, one of the reformatory's inmates and assistant to Lewis (Neal Swettenham)
10. Cristian Galbrandsen, Carrie-Louise's stepson (John Bott)
11. Dr. Maseryk (Saul Reichlin)

Joan Hickson (whom Agatha Christie herself wanted to play Miss Marple) captures the essence of the super sleuth in her performance. (Hickson was 85 years old in this movie!) David Horovitch as Inspector Slack and Neal Swettenham as one of the inmates also give good performances.

The cinematography is visually stunning. All costumes are authentic looking. Also, the background music adds to each scene.

The only problem I found was with the final deduction scene. In this scene, nothing about the attempted murder (I'm assuming that this is what it was) is explained. It's as if it never happened. I felt that this was a major oversight.

In conclusion, this is a fun movie even if you have read the novel it is based on!!

(1991; 100 min; made for T.V.; British drama; full screen; color)

+++++

My wife is a big Miss Marple fan so we were quite keen to spend a nice evening with this viewing. Alas, where to begin? The plot was sophomoric at best. There was a great deal of time spent on characters who simply had no connection to the story and who obviously only served as red herrings. The murderer was fairly apparent half way through, but not because of any clever clues. Once the murderer was revealed to the dunder heads in the script the logical working out of clues was non existent.

At one point the inspector went down into the cellar with a suspect to view the electrical fuses. While there he points out that the suspect was very near the place of the murder. Of course the murder took place upstairs on the second floor. (The first floor to Brits.) Unfortunately this was a prime example of the intellectual level of the entire script.

The costumes were nice and there was a beautiful car in the movie. There were also a few laughs, but unfortunately there were directed at the hokey music.

We love all the Miss Marple movies. We play them all the time and enjoy each one again and again. As always there is intrigue and great guest actors/actresses such as Jeam Simmons. Great story line with embezzlement, school to help wayward boys and a love story and of course murder.

Once again, Aunt Jane has to sort things out when a friend Ruth asks her to look in on her sister, Carrie Louise. You anticipate that Carrie has had it. In addition, you meet many unbalanced and seedy characters. While you are watching, you can miss the whole thing as they do it with mirrors.

Just side notes that the still pictures from this movie are on the back of the video sheath of "Murder at the Vicarage"

Well paced, and the perfect English actors to match each part.