Just tried to watch the new Death on the Nile

[RozHuntleysLeftHand]

What the fuck have they done to it?!

I really really wanted to enjoy it, huge fan of Agatha Christie, love French and Saunders.

From the start it's just too....... Sexy?.... For a Poirot?

None of it felt right.

I'm gonna try again later because I had to turn it off after about half an hour......but jesus.

Oh bugger, I was planning on putting this on for my aged relatives tonight, it's the only thing I could think of that we would all enjoy (19yo dc1 loves Christie)

Those who hated this, what did you think of the new Why Didn't They Ask Evans?

I saw it in the cinema when it came out. I actually liked the sexy dancing as it suited those two characters and explained some of the motivations there (being SO consumed by someone) but disliked all the changes to the story. As far as I'm concerned Christie was a bloody genius- some small tweaks to suit a modern audience I can accept but why mess with perfection for the sake of it?!

It was filmed before the stuff came out about Arnie Hammer- they've just kicked the van down the road before releasing it in the hope the scandal would die down.

@meloncolic

Was just ranting at DH that the WHOLE POINT was that Christie invented him based on some Belgian refugees she met in the war so he was never actually serving! Branagh can’t help but put his ego front and centre, it’s like he’s SO CLOSE to being brilliant if he could just get himself out of frame. Haven’t watched past the dance scene yet as was horrified that the Sex Education girl started talking about shagging and I had it on with a 9 year old child as had assumed from having read it it would be fine! Had to turn it off!

BUT Hugh Laurie is producing Why Didn’t They Ask Evans which should be good!

Yes Poirot served as a police officer in the Surete. Never as a soldier! And that bit with him waving a gun around. Come on. He only ever used his little grey cells.

Can you tell I am an annoying Christie nerd?

17yo DD and I enjoyed it...and she's very hard to please when it comes to films, but we're fairly clueless on the Christie front.

Was absolutely gobsmacked at Russell Brand in it...never in a million year thought I'd find him attractive.

For some reason can't quote people anymore so apparently there is a quota of quotes!

But the moustache thing pissed me off again, the whole backstory of Poirot has pissed me off.

STOP FUCKING WITH GOOD THINGS!!

Christie is a warm hug of nostalgic-ness for me too. So thank you for saving me from it! I generally don’t enjoy watching things I’ve read anyway, so I’d probably have given it a miss, but I do like glam costumes, especially 40s/50s so I might have been seduced. Sounds like it’s not worth it.

Branagh can’t help but put his ego front and centre, it’s like he’s SO CLOSE to being brilliant if he could just get himself out of frame.

That’s a really interesting take, @meloncolic. He’s one of those actors who always “plays himself” in my book and I’ve never been able to get over that. (That said, I did see him get stage doored by a couple of very loud and very enthusiastic American ladies at about 11 o’clock one morning as I was walking down St Martin’s Lane. No crowds or press around and I’m sure he could’ve lived without it. But he was very gracious and pleasant, so I’ve always thought well of him after that!)

I did like some of the dresses.

I need to stop watching adaptations of mu fave books. Drives DH mad. Me constantly shouting " You have got it wrong.".

Agree with OP. Why change the story? Why not make something else instead of a poor remake of this

Tbf it was made before the Hammer shit came out, so I'll give them that at least.

But whoever said it was like they made a completely different thing was right really.

"Loosely based on" might have been better

And the Poirot backstory. Ugh. Nobody asked for it. So wrong

Oh and hello all fellow Christie nerds!!
Nothing better than a great but calming crime drama!

It was awful!! We managed about 20mins but it was dire. The dancing scene at the beginning was just wtaf???

Anyone who's into Poirot even a "leetle" bit (see what I did there!) knows his backstory, absolute bollocks and unnecessary!

The back story! If he had had such a traumatic injury to his face that ‘tache wouldn’t have covered it and then where was the scarring when he shaved it off? Branagh wasn’t foppish and pernickty enough.

@Greensleeves I rather liked Orient Express but really wasn't a big fan of the changes to Death on the Nile (what on earth was the point of Bouc and Poirot would never have done what he did!). Was pleasantly surprised by Russell Brand though.

Have just finished watching 'Why Didn't they Ask Evans' and really enjoyed it. Will Poulter was a great (if a bit intense) Bobby, Lady Frances (can't remember the actress' name) was just on the right side of arch and any changes to the story were well done.

@Greensleeves

Oh bugger, I was planning on putting this on for my aged relatives tonight, it's the only thing I could think of that we would all enjoy (19yo dc1 loves Christie)

Those who hated this, what did you think of the new Why Didn't They Ask Evans?

They might like it, and if not you can all play “well it’s not as good as Suchet is it?” And pick holes in it.

The problem is - in my opinion at least - that David Suchet and Joan Hickson were so good as Poirot and Miss Marple that there’s no room for improvement. And there’s little room in Agatha Christie for modernisation or sexing it up; the stories often don’t fully make sense outside their context. Branagh would surely have been better to take on some of the lesser known Christie books which don’t feature Poirot and make something his own?

Why Didn't They Ask Evans is my least favourite Christie along with Mystery of the Blue Train, so feeling a bit wary of it.

I enjoyed the scenery, but that was about it. The bit that is absolutely missing from KBs Poirot is the humanity and light heartedness of the David Suchet version.
In the series Poirot is such a warm character- vain and proud - but staunchly loyal to his friends and seemed to get a lot of enjoyment from life.
Here Poirot is dour and pernickety, someone you'd pay money to avoid sitting at the same table with.
KB was a bad choice to play him and whilst I get he wants to do a different Poirot to DS, it's not very enjoyable for the audience.

I live in Cairo, so watching it at the cinema was fun.

We collectively enjoyed the bit when the Pyramids migrated to the banks of the Nile...lots of outraged mutters of 'Edah!' (Arabic for 'wtf').

I liked it. Total nonsense but entertaining, & I enjoyed the new version of the Otterbournes. Oh & Rose Leslie was good.

French & Saunders no doubt got a nice holiday out of it .

My poor husband and daughter had to listen to me ranting about this. It's a pile of shit from start to finish. An Agatha Christie is subtle, clever and funny but this book had all the subtlety of a brick to the face.
Why would they just take out loads of characters and change the plot so much it barely makes sense? I was also very up in arms about Poirot being in the first world war trenches, he was retired from the Belgian police and settled in England before the war broke out and was helping Belgian refugees settle in the UK.
And shaving his moustache? Poirot would never touch his pride and joy like that.

Might be worth bearing in mind in terms of WDTAE - it's 3 hour long episodes rather than one film so may take more than one evening's watching!

Haven't even considered watching it after the awful job Kenneth did on Murder on the Orient Express. David Suchet = Hercule Poirot, end of story!

@Greensleeves

Oh bugger, I was planning on putting this on for my aged relatives tonight, it's the only thing I could think of that we would all enjoy (19yo dc1 loves Christie)

Those who hated this, what did you think of the new Why Didn't They Ask Evans?

Why Didn't They Ask Evans? is so much better and actually tells the story Agatha Christie wrote. It does have the luxury of time though as it's 3 one hour episodes.