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Sunday, October 14, 2018

Thirteen At Dinner (1985)

An American film star (Faye Dunaway) asks the renowned detective Hercule Poirot (Peter Ustinov) to intercede on her behalf in getting her husband Lord Edgware (John Barron) to agree to a divorce. Shortly after Poirot's meeting with the husband, he is found murdered! The principal suspect is his wife. Based on LORD EDGWARE DIES by Agatha Christie and directed by Lou Antonio (who also has a small part in the film). This is one of Christie's least satisfying mysteries as the solution to the murder is almost painfully obvious and comes as no surprise. Indeed, I hate it when screenwriters decide they know better than Christie and change her novels but in this case, I would have been quite happy if they had come up with a more clever solution to the crime. It doesn't help that Dunaway is miscast as a Monroe like "dumb" blonde. The film features David Suchet as the Scotland Yard detective Japp and he would later play Poirot in a series of Christie adaptation for British television. With Lee Horsley, Allan Cuthbertson, Bill Nighy, Jonathan Cecil, Amanda Pays and Lesley Dunlop.

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