Murder on the Orient Express (1974 film)

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Murder on the Orient Express
original movie poster
Directed by	Sidney Lumet
Produced by	John Brabourne
Written by	Paul Dehn
Starring	Albert Finney Lauren Bacall Sean Connery Ingrid Bergman Michael York Vanessa Redgrave Jacqueline Bisset Richard Widmark
Music by	Richard Rodney Bennett
Cinematography	Geoffrey Unsworth
Editing by	Anne V. Coates
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date(s)	1974
Running time	128 min.
IMDb profile

Murder on the Orient Express is a 1974 feature film, based on the 1934 novel Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie and featuring Hercule Poirot.

Contents 1 Plot 1.1 The murder 1.2 Clues 1.3 Suspects 2 Academy Awards and nominations 3 Differences between Novel and Film 4 Other versions 5 See also 6 External link

[edit] Plot

[edit] The murder

Detective Hercule Poirot (Albert Finney) is travelling on the Orient Express. On the journey, Poirot encounters his friend Bianchi (Martin Balsam), who works for the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits . The train is caught in heavy snows in the Balkans on the second night out from Istanbul, and American millionaire Samuel Edward Ratchett (Richard Widmark) is found stabbed to death the next morning.

Poirot, Bianchi, and Dr. Constantine (George Coulouris), a passenger on another car, work together to solve the case. They are aided by Pierre Michel (Jean-Pierre Cassel), the middle-aged French conductor of the car.

[edit] Clues

• Ratchett was stabbed 12 times; some wounds were slight, but at least three of them could have resulted in death.
• Some wounds were made by a right hand and some by a left hand.
• Since the train has been surrounded by fresh snow since before the apparent time of death, and the doors to the other cars were locked, it seems that the murderer must still be among the passengers in Ratchett's car.
• A key to the solution is Ratchett's revealed involvement in the Armstrong tragedy in America several years earlier, in which a baby was kidnapped and then murdered. (The fictitious Armstrong case was apparently inspired by the real-life kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh's baby son.)

[edit] Suspects

The thirteen suspects are:

• Hector McQueen (Anthony Perkins), a tall, young American man, the victim's secretary and translator
• Edward Beddoes (Sir John Gielgud), the victim's British valet.

• Mary Debenham (Vanessa Redgrave), a tall, dark, young British woman, returning home to England after working as a teacher in Baghdad
• Colonel Arbuthnot (Sean Connery), a tall British army officer returning to England on leave from India
• Princess Natalya Dragomiroff (Wendy Hiller), an elderly Russian grande dame
• Hildegarde Schmidt (Rachel Roberts), a middle-aged German woman, the Princess' lady's maid

• Count Rudolf Andrenyi (Michael York), a tall, dark Hungarian diplomat with English manner and clothing, travelling to France
• Countess Elena Andrenyi (Jacqueline Bisset), née Gründwald, his pale young wife
• Greta Ohlsson (Ingrid Bergman), a middle-aged Swedish missionary returning to Europe on a fund-raising trip for her mission in India
• Mrs. Harriet Belinda Hubbard (Lauren Bacall), former Gründwald, née Arden, an older, very excitable American woman returning to the US

• Gino Foscarelli (Denis Quilley), an exuberant Italian car salesman
• Cyrus "Dick" Hardman (Colin Blakely), a Pinkerton's detective masquerading as a talent agent
• Pierre Michel (Jean-Pierre Cassel), the French conductor of the sleeping car

[edit] Academy Awards and nominations

• Academy Award: Best Supporting Actress, Ingrid Bergman
• Academy Award Nomination: Best Actor in a Leading Role, Albert Finney
• Academy Award Nomination: Best Cinematography, Geoffrey Unsworth
• Academy Award Nomination: Best Costume Design, Tony Walton
• Academy Award Nomination: Best Music, Original Dramatic Score, Richard Rodney Bennett
• Academy Award Nomination: Best Writing, Screenplay Adapted from Other Material, Paul Dehn

[edit] Differences between Novel and Film

• The novel introduces Poirot to two of the suspects on a train bound for Istanbul. The ferry crossing from one side of the city to the other is barely mentioned. On film, Poirot becomes aware of Debenham and Arbuthnot on the ferry across the Bosporus, and the ferry crossing is the real start of the narative.
• There are many changes connected to Ratchett's valet. He is a small, slight man called Masterman in the novel and is identified as an English man of 39 years of age who had never been to America. In the film the character's name is Beddoes (likely changed to avoid confusion with the similarly named Hardman), who, although English, was hired through an agency in New York City. At the time he played the part, John Gielgud was 70 years old. Gielgud is also notably taller than average.
• The character of the railroad official in the book is a Belgian named Bouc, he and Poirot converse in Belgian French and share an affinity due to the shared nationality; on film he is an Italian named Bianchi.
• Ingrid Bergman was also older than the character's stated age in the novel.
• Several characters look more like the actors who play them rather than their descriptions in the novel. Princess Dragomiroff is described as fat, Miss Debenham is supposed to have dark hair, and Greta Ohlsson is called sheep faced and her hair is worn in a bun. Wendy Hiller, who played the Princess was decidedly slight in build, Vanessa Redgrave displays her naturally red hair in the part of Mary Debenham and Ingrid Bergman is far from plain and sheep faced.

• The development of the plot and gradual solution to the case is streamlined.The novel introduces the revenge motive for the killing of Ratchett in dialogue during the course of the investigation. The film lays some of this ground work with a short, atmospheric and effective prologue. The book sees Poirot gradually working out each suspect's connection to the Armstrong family step-by-step and revealing his knowledge to them one on one. In the film, the ultimate solution happens in a dramatic group setting.

• In the book, The Countess does not partake in the murder, but her husband does. In the movie, they grasp the dagger together to make one stab.

[edit] Other versions

A made-for-television movie was also made in 2001. Many viewers, unfamiliar with the plot, thought that the murder mystery would take place against a dramatic backdrop of a world-famous train speeding through exotic landscapes and were disappointed to find that the train is stalled in snow for most of the movie.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] See also

• Death, Deceit and Destiny Aboard the Orient Express
• 1930s Nostalgia Films

[edit] External link

• Murder on the Orient Express at the Internet Movie Database
• Murder on the Orient Express at the TCM Movie Database
• Murder on the Orient Express at Rotten Tomatoes