Addio Miss Marple

Currently we are enjoying a spate of Joan Hickson's Miss Marple series on our free to air channel. I have watched the other adaptations of Agatha Christie's novel with Geraldine McEwan and while they were fine performances (story lines got a bit muddled) the JH ones are bringing back the original plots and stories. Only one thing is grating me is that the character of Gwenda supposedly from New Zealand is speaking with the most dreadful "Stryne" (Australian) accent. Good grief, the producers only had to go down to Earls Court and pick out a few Kiwis to hear the difference. Also, I get the picture that Gwenda was from a more refined family ( upper middle class) in which her accent would have been more cultured with a hint of "fush & chips" in it. Other than that I'm very much enjoying JH version.

Gwenda and her husband have moved to a country home in Britain. She grew up in New Zealand and is surprised that she remembers some of the sights in and around her new British home. Well, it turns out she was born and lived in Britain but was sent to New Zealand to live following a family tragedy. But what exactly that family tragedy was and why she was sent away, she has no idea and Miss Marple offers her help. But someone does NOT want the past to be dug up and this could mean danger for Gwenda.

I thought this was a weaker episode of the Miss Marple shows considering so much was told through conversations and flashbacks...an awful lot of it. This tended to make for a more passive episode experience. Still, it was interesting and is worth seeing...as are all the Marple shows.

What a film! Watching 'Sleeping Murder' scared me more than any other Miss Marple film, mainly due to the suspense. The version with Joan Hickson was much, much better than that with Geraldine McEwan, mainly because the director stuck to the plot and didn't add a silly romance between the protagonist and her aide to supposedly warm the hearts of the audience. I thought that the house used was just right, and the gradual tension brought about by new discoveries (some gruesome) added a thrill to the plot. The main actress came across as a genuine damsel in distress and her husband loyal and devoted. One of the few films to make me frightened.

A young woman, Gwenda Reed (Geraldine Alexander) falls in love with a house in England and insists that she and her new husband Giles (John Moulder-Brown) buy it.

As she stands on the stairway, she has a vision of a blond woman dead on the floor below. It doesn't make sense to her. She was sent from India to New Zealand as a child when her mother died to live with relatives. Her father remarried in England, but his wife eventually left him.

She starts renovations, which turn out to be actual features once in the house. She becomes nervous and frightened. When her Giles, who is away, calls and invites her to join him, she does.

It turns out one of his friends is Miss Marple's nephew Raymond (David McAlister) and she is visiting. That night, they all attend a performance of The Duchess of Malfi. During the monologue "Cover her face," she lets out a horrific scream and has to be taken back to the friends' home.

Gwenda confides everything to Miss Marple. Miss Marple believes she probably was in England at one point as a child and in that house. But she urges her not to delve into the past.

Nevertheless, Gwenda and her husband do, interviewing family and past suitors of her stepmother, and the people who worked in the home. Not only is there another murder, but she receives unsettling news about her father.

Excellent story and well done! As an added bonus, the husband reminded me of Brad Pitt! Beautifully photographed and much closer to the actual story than the Geraldine McEwan version with some very chilling scenes - such as the discovery of the wallpaper!

Very enjoyable, well cast, and entertaining.

The 1980s adaptations starring Joan Hickson are on the slow side by modern standards. This was in fact the last golden age of television before it was ruined by too many channels and the advent of the MTV attention span -- which has sadly affected us all, I fear. This version is lovingly crafted with delightful period details.

Although, in its slowness, this version fails to build up the various suspects as sufficiently menacing, it is a good version which keeps quite faithful to the book. Geraldine Alexander is excellent as Gwenda and to my ears does a super New Zealand accent. John Moulder-Brown is a let-down as her unconvincing animatronic husband, beautifully dressed in the gent's outfitters styles of the period, but far too mannered in his perfect elocution. Joan Hickson does her stuff very well as usual.

It is interesting (if depressing) to compare this with the travesty version starring Geraldine McEwan, where the plot has been mangled -- and garbled -- beyond recognition.