I Watch Films: Murder, She Said

Murder, She Said

Miss Marple (Margaret Rutherford) is on a train enjoying a murder mystery novel when she notices another train come alongside. After peering at some passengers and exchanging greetings with a child, she witnesses a woman being strangled. She reports this but after some investigation the police find nothing. She and her friend Jim Stringer, both mystery novel fans, decide to do some detecting.

As the police searched the train she checks the maps and decides that the body must have been dumped at Ackenthorpe Hall. It’s a comedy, so she goes in undercover as a maid*. The family are terrible, the patriarch is ill and there is a big inheritance. Miss Marple gains a sidekick, Alexander, a boy home from school, who is useful and annoying in equal parts. She attempts to investigate, but the clues are confusing and the bodycount increases. It's a comedy!

Watch This: For a light-hearted murder mystery, with a few wry looks at class
Don’t Watch This: If you want a comprehensible mystery taken seriously.
My Review: Of Murder Most Foul, another film in this series can be found at this link.

* The servant problem! Christie was an adult between the wars when the servant problem (it was impossible to get good servants, especially male servants, even when you paid over the odds) started to bite. In this film, from 1964, the man at the agency, assuming the posh Miss Marple is looking to hire someone, can’t even be bothered, there’s no one available, but when she says she wants to be hired he’s very keen. The point of course, is class; once upon a time if you didn’t at least have a girl come in to do the rough work, you weren’t middle class (also looking after children which turns out to require more than one person full time).