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6.2/10
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Miss Jane Marple comes to solve the mystery when a local woman is poisoned, but a visiting movie star seems to have been the intended victim.Miss Jane Marple comes to solve the mystery when a local woman is poisoned, but a visiting movie star seems to have been the intended victim.Miss Jane Marple comes to solve the mystery when a local woman is poisoned, but a visiting movie star seems to have been the intended victim.
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- 2 nominations total
Charles Lloyd Pack
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Lord Brabourne who produced The Mirror Crack'd as he did a few other films adapted from Agatha Christie's work was lucky to have produced this at all. He was the son-in-law of Lord Louis Mountbatten and when the IRA blew up the yacht they were on, Brabourne's mother and son were killed on the vessel as well as Mountbatten. Brabourne, his wife and a younger son survived. This all happened a year before The Mirror Crack'd filmed and was released.
This film is right in keeping with the high standard of pictures Brabourne made of Christie stories like Murder On The Orient Express and Evil Under The Sun. As the story involves an American film crew over in Great Britain in 1953 Brabourne was able to get a quartet of top Hollywood names in support of Angela Lansbury as Jane Marple.
Producer Tony Curtis and Director Rock Hudson are collaborating on a film about Mary Queen of Scots that will star Hudson's wife Elizabeth Taylor in the title role. Curtis's wife Kim Novak plays what would be billed as a cameo in the film as Queen Elizabeth. Taylor and Novak are rivals in the tradition of Bette Davis and Joan Crawford and get off some truly bitchy lines at each other.
Maureen Bennett who is one of the villagers and who met Taylor years ago in passing when she was a WREN and Taylor was entertaining troops is poisoned at a gathering of the villagers and the film crew. Someone spiked Bennett's daiquiri and who could possibly want to murder this ingenuous fan. Later on Hudson's secretary and girl Friday and trenchant observer of the whole Hollywood scene Geraldine Chaplin is also poisoned when her inhaler is similarly spiked.
When Lansbury figures out the who in the film it all becomes deceptively simple. The motive however is an incredibly complex and obscure one involving a trivial passing incident that brought to life a great tragedy suffered by one of the visiting Americans.
The film is a reunion of sorts with Hudson and Taylor as co-stars of the classic Giant from the Fifties, a personal favorite of mine for both its stars. Also back in those days Rock Hudson and Tony Curtis were both the leading contract stars at Universal studios, but they never starred together in anything. They did appear in Winchester 73 as featured players but had no scenes together. I really liked Curtis the best in this film with him doing a wonderful satire of Darryl F. Zanuck in the producer part. I'm sure Agatha Christie must have met Zanuck sometime because she had him down great and of course Curtis knew him as well.
Definitely The Mirror Crack'd is a must for Agatha Christie fans and for fans of the stars. And considering what its producer went through we are lucky to have it at all.
This film is right in keeping with the high standard of pictures Brabourne made of Christie stories like Murder On The Orient Express and Evil Under The Sun. As the story involves an American film crew over in Great Britain in 1953 Brabourne was able to get a quartet of top Hollywood names in support of Angela Lansbury as Jane Marple.
Producer Tony Curtis and Director Rock Hudson are collaborating on a film about Mary Queen of Scots that will star Hudson's wife Elizabeth Taylor in the title role. Curtis's wife Kim Novak plays what would be billed as a cameo in the film as Queen Elizabeth. Taylor and Novak are rivals in the tradition of Bette Davis and Joan Crawford and get off some truly bitchy lines at each other.
Maureen Bennett who is one of the villagers and who met Taylor years ago in passing when she was a WREN and Taylor was entertaining troops is poisoned at a gathering of the villagers and the film crew. Someone spiked Bennett's daiquiri and who could possibly want to murder this ingenuous fan. Later on Hudson's secretary and girl Friday and trenchant observer of the whole Hollywood scene Geraldine Chaplin is also poisoned when her inhaler is similarly spiked.
When Lansbury figures out the who in the film it all becomes deceptively simple. The motive however is an incredibly complex and obscure one involving a trivial passing incident that brought to life a great tragedy suffered by one of the visiting Americans.
The film is a reunion of sorts with Hudson and Taylor as co-stars of the classic Giant from the Fifties, a personal favorite of mine for both its stars. Also back in those days Rock Hudson and Tony Curtis were both the leading contract stars at Universal studios, but they never starred together in anything. They did appear in Winchester 73 as featured players but had no scenes together. I really liked Curtis the best in this film with him doing a wonderful satire of Darryl F. Zanuck in the producer part. I'm sure Agatha Christie must have met Zanuck sometime because she had him down great and of course Curtis knew him as well.
Definitely The Mirror Crack'd is a must for Agatha Christie fans and for fans of the stars. And considering what its producer went through we are lucky to have it at all.
Agatha Christie's plot and Angela Lansbury's casting as Miss Marple take a back seat to the Hollywood movie crew that invades the little village of St. Mary's Mead in this film adaptation of Christie's 1962 novel "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side."
A movie about Mary, Queen of Scots is being filmed and two rival movie queens, played by Elizabeth Taylor and Kim Novak (in their only film together) are playing Mary and Elizabeth I. Catty and campy to the max, they snipe at each other as they jockey for power in making the film. Taylor is married to Rock Hudson (the director) and Novak is married to Tony Curtis (the producer). There's also an assistant (Geraldine Chaplin) who is having an affair with Hudson.
The locals are a pale lot compared to this Hollywood flash. But when a local woman (Maureen Bennett) is poisoned at a reception for the Hollywood crew, Miss Marple jumps into the fray with the help of her nephew from Scotland Yard (Edward Fox).
The murder mystery unveils amid the flying insults between Novak and Taylor as well as between Hudson and Curtis. But things turn very serious when another murder occurs.
This might be minor Christie and Lansbury strikes me as badly cast as Marple but the film is lively and fun. Others in the cast include Wendy Morgan as Cherry, Richard Pearson as the doctor, Charles Lloyd-Pack as a vicar, Carolyn Pickles as Miss Giles, Margaret Courtenay as Mrs. Bantry, and look for Pierce Brosnan as a movie extra.
There's also a film Marple goes to see called "Murder at Midnight" which features Dinah Sheridan, Nigel Stock, Ian Cuthbertson, and Anthony Steel, and which seems to serve no purpose other than to display Marple's powers of deductive reasoning.
Worth watching for Kim Novak and Elizabeth Taylor.
A movie about Mary, Queen of Scots is being filmed and two rival movie queens, played by Elizabeth Taylor and Kim Novak (in their only film together) are playing Mary and Elizabeth I. Catty and campy to the max, they snipe at each other as they jockey for power in making the film. Taylor is married to Rock Hudson (the director) and Novak is married to Tony Curtis (the producer). There's also an assistant (Geraldine Chaplin) who is having an affair with Hudson.
The locals are a pale lot compared to this Hollywood flash. But when a local woman (Maureen Bennett) is poisoned at a reception for the Hollywood crew, Miss Marple jumps into the fray with the help of her nephew from Scotland Yard (Edward Fox).
The murder mystery unveils amid the flying insults between Novak and Taylor as well as between Hudson and Curtis. But things turn very serious when another murder occurs.
This might be minor Christie and Lansbury strikes me as badly cast as Marple but the film is lively and fun. Others in the cast include Wendy Morgan as Cherry, Richard Pearson as the doctor, Charles Lloyd-Pack as a vicar, Carolyn Pickles as Miss Giles, Margaret Courtenay as Mrs. Bantry, and look for Pierce Brosnan as a movie extra.
There's also a film Marple goes to see called "Murder at Midnight" which features Dinah Sheridan, Nigel Stock, Ian Cuthbertson, and Anthony Steel, and which seems to serve no purpose other than to display Marple's powers of deductive reasoning.
Worth watching for Kim Novak and Elizabeth Taylor.
I liked this version of The Mirror Crack'd, and I am fond of the Joan Hickson version too. The Hickson version, it is true, is more faithful to the book, despite its liberties, but on its own merits this film is pretty good. The main merit is the performance of underrated character actress Angela Lansbury; she is terrific as Miss Marple, and Edward Fox does a great job as Inspector Craddock. The supporting cast are fine in their roles, Elizabeth Taylor overdoes Marina Gregg slightly but she plays with gusto, Rock Hudson is suitably subdued as Jason Rudd, and Kim Novak is delightful as Lola. The dialogues between Taylor and Novak are wonderfully witty, and often verging on hysterically funny. The film is beautifully shot, and the locations and costumes are lovely. The music is stunning too. However, the character of Heather Badcock is changed quite considerably here, and why she was changed to a naive village girl I still find perplexing. The film is overlong and has pacing problems, and the final solution was weak compared to how it could have been. On the whole, it is a movie worth seeing, and as I've said, see it for Angela. 7/10 Bethany Cox
The Mirror Crack'd is one of the many Agatha Christie stories made into an all-star film. This one is more campy and less opulent than "Murder on the Orient Express," for instance, but for what it is, it's pretty good.
Set in the '50s in Miss Marple's village of St. Mary Mead, the film stars lots of big names from that era: Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, Tony Curtis, Kim Novak - a veritable who's who of '50s megastars.
Angela Lansbury plays Miss Marple, and she's perfect in the role. The film also has an appearance by Pierce Brosnan in a small, uncredited part.
The script has the Taylor and Novak characters camping it up with bitchy insults which I don't quite remember from the book. The story concerns a movie star, her husband, her co-star nemesis, etc., coming to St. Mary Mead to make a movie.
During a party, a local resident is murdered, but the intended victim is assumed to be Taylor. It's up to Miss Marple to unravel the mystery as more murders occur.
The scene between Taylor and Edward Fox is especially good, and I've never been sure if Taylor falling on top of Hudson on the bed was supposed to be funny or not - in the movie theater, it got a laugh.
It's great to see all these old stars in the same film. By the way, perhaps this was mentioned by one of the posters - this story is based on a real-life incident that happened to Gene Tierney.
Set in the '50s in Miss Marple's village of St. Mary Mead, the film stars lots of big names from that era: Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, Tony Curtis, Kim Novak - a veritable who's who of '50s megastars.
Angela Lansbury plays Miss Marple, and she's perfect in the role. The film also has an appearance by Pierce Brosnan in a small, uncredited part.
The script has the Taylor and Novak characters camping it up with bitchy insults which I don't quite remember from the book. The story concerns a movie star, her husband, her co-star nemesis, etc., coming to St. Mary Mead to make a movie.
During a party, a local resident is murdered, but the intended victim is assumed to be Taylor. It's up to Miss Marple to unravel the mystery as more murders occur.
The scene between Taylor and Edward Fox is especially good, and I've never been sure if Taylor falling on top of Hudson on the bed was supposed to be funny or not - in the movie theater, it got a laugh.
It's great to see all these old stars in the same film. By the way, perhaps this was mentioned by one of the posters - this story is based on a real-life incident that happened to Gene Tierney.
Being a fan of both Agatha Christie, Angela Lansbury, and Rock Hudson I watched this film with pleasure. The cast here has done a great job, everybody is convincing, even Liz Taylor, although her acting is at times overdone, as usual. The movie has a good pace, dialogues are witty and humorous, and the mystery itself engaging. I think the proportions of each character's involvement in the story are true to the original (I was afraid they'd make Miss Marple into an action figure or something, but was glad to see she stayed in the background to make her grand entrance in the finale). All in all, it's a very good and convincing adaptation of Christie's book.
Did you know
- TriviaAt this time of her career, Dame Elizabeth Taylor's career was in the doldrums. She was 48 years old, hadn't had a decent hit film in years, her marriage to US politician John Warner was struggling, she was taking anti-depressants, and she had put on weight. When Rock Hudson was approached to do the film, he said he would only do it if his long-time friend Taylor could also be cast. The producers had assumed that Taylor's salary demands would put the film well over budget and were lining up Donald Pleasence as a possible alternative to Hudson. However, Hudson said that he could get Taylor to agree to star with him for the same salary he was being offered. Hudson convinced Taylor that coming to England for a few weeks to do a mainstream film with him, Dame Angela Lansbury, and Tony Curtis (people Taylor had known for about 30 years) would be beneficial for her mental health, plus give her a chance to catch up with old friends who lived there.
- GoofsAlthough the film takes place in 1953, Marty Fenn drives a 1959 model car.
- Quotes
Marina Rudd: Lola, dear, you know, there are really only two things I dislike about you.
Lola Brewster: Really? What are they?
Marina Rudd: Your face.
- Crazy creditsOpening credits prologue: 1953
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- El espejo roto
- Filming locations
- Shoreham, Kent, England, UK(Shoreham was used to double up as part of the village of St Mary Mead)
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $11,000,000
- Gross worldwide
- $11,000,657
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