Le major parlait trop

Helen Hayes just doesn't cut it.

Rather than going the whole hog and playing Miss Marple as an American, she plays her as an Englishwoman. This is a mistake,since her accent veers from deep south of USA to England via Ireland. In short, her accent is all over the place.

Her lines are also peppered with Americanisms which no British person would ever say. Two examples:

1) She refers to "tourist class" when British people call it "economy class".

2) She says she's going to "mail" some postcards, when a genuinely British person say "post", not "mail".

Two minor examples, I know, but they add to a general feeling that this Miss Marple is as British as a fudge brownie. All the references to her hometown of St. Mary Mead in England can't change that.

Another point is that Santa Barbara is not in the slightest bit convincing as a stand-in for the Caribbean. The one shot of a caribbean town, Havana perhaps, is obviously grainy archive footage.

Steer clear of this poorly made rubbish, and watch the BBC productions starring Joan Hickson instead.

This is a pretty poorly made TV movie typical of the early 80s, with an overly syrupy score and bland cinematography and awful acting by everyone under the age of 60. So it can be taken as proof of Agatha Christie's genius that a straightforward telling of one of her stories is pretty enjoyable even when done by hacks. The best part is watching the way Miss Marple manipulates the situation, pulling the strings of those around her while managing to seem harmless and perhaps dotty. In spite of her floating accent, Hayes makes an excellent Miss Marple, and Hughes and Evans are also quite good. The rest of the acting varies from mediocre to truly incompetent, but the story is strong enough to survive. The ending is unfortunately weak and feels as though it was rushed through, so the feeling of satisfaction one gets in a Christie book is sadly lacking, but overall it's pretty watchable, and I give it 6/10, which is about as much as you can give something filmed with the care of an episode of MacMillan and Wife.

Cable TV here has just shown the two versions back to back. I prefer this one as the more 'solid and faithful' even though the British version has the great Joan Hickson and a strong supporting cast. This version has the great merit of sticking to the story with no fancy touches (or overacting). It's been updated (to the 80s from the 50s) but the cast have the right kind of glitter and vivid beachwear (and big hair).

This US Christie series often looks like Agatha played by the cast of Dallas - appropriately enough since she often wrote about people who didn't need to work thanks to Daddy's money! xxxxxxx

This is a decent movie and if there were nothing to compare it to, I would say a good adaptation from the book. I like all the actors. However, this movie falls short of the one with Joan Hickson "Agatha Christie's Miss Marple, V. 1: A Caribbean Mystery (1989)"

They sped up the pace of the movie and it looks like a baby crawling at 60 miles an hr. Jane is more actively figuring out the plot and really needs no other characters to think.

This movie does, however, introduce you to Jason Rafiel who is the basis of "Agatha Christie's Miss Marple, V. 7: Nemesis (1986) If you are rich buy them both, if not then this is not the one.

I've never been anyplace where someone was murdered, but Miss Marple can't escape it. On vacation in the Carbbean, she meets a nice old codger (Maurice Evans) who passes away in suspicious circumstances. Does she just see murder everywhere she looks, or . . .

The first sign Helen Hayes is playing rather than being Jane Marple is during the opening credits when she's beaming out of a plane window. My mother loved the sainted Helen but I can take her or leave her.

It's a largely 1980s cast, including Jameson Parker and Beth Howland. And Stephen Macht (I never understood how he maintained a career; he had the goods on somebody?)

The story is followed closely enough with proper tweaking for oversensitive American audiences (and we've only gotten worse; we're like children). Which is strange because the script is partially by Sue Grafton who had already started her popular "alphabet" series of crime novels (it's nice to find a gimmick).

Frankly, I've always preferred 1920s and '30s Christie. She produced some great stuff in later life, but not that much. I do like the idea Marple has that people are the same everywhere and so she can always draw her village parallels. It's a very American notion (or used to be).

It's nice to see Brock Peters. Nice to see Maurice Evans, too. In fact, I wish Evans had played in the wheelchair and grumpy Bernard Hughes had been murdered, but one can't have everything.

I agree with those who say Joan Hickson's version is better, but I'm reviewing this and not that. And while I have reservations about some of the cast, this version is good enough and not too heavy if, like me, you're an insomniac who needs to pass the night without getting (inside joke) one's blood pressure up.