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Murder on the Orient Express

Sidney Lumet’s adaptation of what is probably the best known book by Agatha Christie is claustrophobic and luxurious at the same time.

The plot begins when Daisy Armstrong, a three-year-old baby is kidnapped. Daughter of a prestigious aviator and Official of the Royal Air Force, her parents soon obey the kidnapper’s demand and pay the huge ransom, only to find their baby slain a few days later.

The story forwards five years in time when the famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot (Albert Finney) is preparing to leave from Istanbul on the Orient Express, accompanied by a group of curious travel mates.

The plot complicates when the train stops in its tracks because of a snow avalanche and one of the passengers is found murdered, stabbed several times. The director of the railroad asks for Poirot to solve the mystery and the detective soon puts his gears to work to unveil this intricate riddle.

Sidney Lumet tells the story about Daisy’s murder within the first minutes of film using only a combination of quick scenes and newspapers' reporting, giving a realistic appearance to the entire sequence. Nothing could be more appropriate, if we consider that Agatha Christie’s book was probably based on the true story of Charles Lindbergh’s baby, the infamous aviator who had the daughter kidnapped and murdered, a crime that shocked the entire world and happened only two years prior to the book’s first publication in 1934.

Sidney Lumet actually takes us inside the train with his clever directing, making us feel the claustrophobic environment shared by the characters, using close up shots at all times, respecting the train’s confined space, especially in the narrow corridor. The sequence of the train leaving the station also deserves special consideration, filmed with one incredible, continuous shot.

It’s amazing to see how Albert Finney manages to stand out from a cast that is really a constellation of talents: Sean Connery, Vanessa Redgrave, Anthony Perkins, Lauren Bacall and a fabulous Ingrid Bergman, who earned an Academy Award as “Best Supporting Actress” for her role as a religious Swedish missionary.

Moment by moment, as the mystery unveils, the viewers realize they were kept in a dark confusion all the time, but at the end it will all make sense, and what looks like a loose coincidence is actually more attached than the train’s wagons. Mr. Lumet makes a terrific parallel between the mystery being solved and the tracks blocked by the snow.

I suggest that we all accept Mr. Lumet’s ticket to travel on the luxurious, yet mysterious Orient Express and enjoy a ride through a story in which nothing is what it seems to be.

Written by: Edward Olivier

Reviewers Rating: 9
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