Taking the easy way out

Yesterday my wife and I went to watch the new version of Agatha Christie’s classic “Murder on the Orient Express.” On the whole it was well done and enjoyable but there were a few things that annoyed me about it. Stay clear if you don’t want spoilers.

Writers afraid to take risks

 

The first thing that caught my eye was in the opening scene. It is the usual opening scene  establishing the hero in his normal environment and showing to the audience that Hercules Poirot is a great detective. So in this opening scene, the case Poirot is dealing with has three suspects: a rabbi, a priest and an imam which as Hercules Poirot states “sounds like the old joke.” The problem with this scene is that as soon as Poirot said that a rabbi, a priest and an imam stand accused, I knew that none of them had committed the crime.

 

The reason I knew none of them had committed the crime was not for any story reason. The crime had not even been explained yet and no evidence had been presented. I knew that none of them had done it because I knew that it was very unlikely that any screenwriter in this day and age would have made a choice of one of the three religious people being responsible for the crime. Why? Because then they would possibly be facing recrimination from people of that religion in the real world complaining that the movie is showing their religion in a negative light.

 

While I can understand not wanting to stir up controversy, the scene itself was sloppy. The clue given for the crime makes it painfully obvious who the culprit is as soon as it is given. It took me about two seconds to guess who had done it. I appreciate that the movie is trying to allow the viewer to solve the mystery along with Poirot but the clue it gave either makes the viewer feel the movie thinks they are stupid or that Poirot is not really that great a detective after all.

 

The reason eventually given for the crime makes no sense whatsoever and everyone just kind of shrugs as the movie moves on. It is obvious that this scene was not from the book but tacked on to give the movie more runtime. Agatha Christie was a lot better at putting the mystery into a crime. I feel it would have made the story more interesting if a better crime had been committed and one of the religious people were guilty, not for religious but for personal reasons. I don’t mind writer’s keeping real world issues in mind when they write but they cannot allow it to affect the story.

 

Moving a story from a book to the screen

 

The second scene that broke my immersion in the story was the scene where the doctor examines the body of the murder victim on the train.

 

In the book, there is a scene were Poirot examines the body of the victim and sees the nature of the victims wounds. In the movie there is a doctor on the train who examines the body. I can’t remember if the book had a doctor on the train or not but in any case, the book has Poirot talking about the wounds as coming from different angles, right-handed and left-handed as well as varying strengths.

 

In the movie, the doctor has this role and he describes the wounds in much the same manner. The problem is that we see the doctor’s examination of the body and even see the body itself. The body is lying on the train compartment’s bed, still fully clothed, and all you can see of it is that the shirt is slashed and covered in blood. The doctor does not open the shirt nor does he clean the blood off the body to see the nature of the wounds. Ergo, there is no way that the doctor could have seen the detailed nature of the wounds he describes. The movie is in fact simply telling us something instead of showing us, and not telling us, the cardinal sin of novel writing and an even bigger sin in cinema where the medium is a visual one.

 

Since I already knew the story, I can’t tell how effective the movie was at keeping a new viewer guessing who the murderer is. If you like mysteries and have never read the book than it should be pretty enjoyable.

 

The point to take away from all this as far as writing goes is that you should never try to brush over the details just to move along with your story. Maybe they had a more extended scene but it was edited out for brevity’s sake though I feel that in a murder mystery, examining the victim’s body should be one of the main plot points of the novel.

 

This makes me want to pay more attention to making sure that all the necessary details are put in my novel. It is progressing (I promise) though this month I have not been able to write much with our seasonal business in full swing but I am trying to at least nurse the scene I am currently along and hopefully once we finish our season in mid-December I can get back into full swing. I’m still hopeful that I can finish the first draft by the end of Spring Festival (the January-February holiday here).