Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Kenneth Branagh, Armie Hammer, Gal Gadot, Tom Bateman, Annette Bening, Rose Leslie, Letitia Wright, Sophie Okonedu, Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French, Russell Brand, Emma Mackey, Michael Rouse, Alaa Safi, Orlando Seale, Charlie Verhaeren, Susannah Fielding, Rick Warden, Ali Fazal.

It could be argued that we may have reached peak Christie.

The Queen of Crime has not lost any of the affection on the fans, the books will always sell, the dedicated devotee will pour over even the shortest of articles that has Agatha Christie’s name attached, even if by the merest of association, they will believe that there is somewhere a story, a tale in which perhaps one more exercise in observing the act of criminality and murder will make itself known.

Peak Christie, the author will undoubtedly be loved forever, but there may come a time, and possibly with Kenneth Branagh’s opulent directorial eye on the crime very much into the public conscious, that for a time the public will be found, if not caring, then certainly more blasé about the razzle dazzle, the sense of occasion that once was found to be innumerably excited for the re-interpretation, the re-imagining, the homage to one of Britain’s most embracing of writers.

There is a death on the Nile that will be overlooked, and one that despite the stunning cinematography, performances from Tom Bateman, Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French, and of course Kenneth Branagh, and the sheer scale of realisation from page to screen by Michael Green, will affect how the genre is regarded for what might be a generation.

The death of intrigue, of discovery, for that whilst the film starts off in a way that might have caught many by surprise, the atmosphere of what is to come never changes, the inevitability of knowledge is that it is the death of revelation, and in Death On The Nile, as with two of Christie’s more demanding books, …And Then There Were None, and Murder On The Orient Express, the understanding of how the dynamic of the various suspects is to be consumed, devoured, and not presented on a plate, not dumbed down for all to fathom within moments of introduction.

Stylish, certainly artful, a novel beginning which gives more depth to the legend of Poirot, an eye of direction which does Mr. Branagh justice, it is only the overall experience which leaves the cinephile and Christie fan wondering if, for a while, cinema and television should look elsewhere for its thrill of reveal into the minds of those with murderous intent.

Whilst cinematically pleasing, Death On The Nile is to be seen as peak Christie, as a pre-warning that eventually you can have too much of a good thing.

Ian D. Hall