Directed by: Kenneth Branagh
Starring: Kenneth Branagh, Gal Gadot, Armie Hammer, Sophie Okonedo, Russell Brand
Rated PG-13, 127 minutes
In theory, Sir Kenneth Branagh would be a natural fit to adapt Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot mysteries to film. Best known for his adaptations, the Northern Irish actor-director has filmed five Shakespeares, plus “Cinderella,” “Frankenstein,” and even Mozart’s “The Magic Flute.” He’s won Laurence Olivier Awards for his work on the London stage and played Laurence Olivier onscreen. He also just received his first Oscar, in screenwriting, for the semi-autobiographical drama “Belfast.” A skilled filmmaker with a sincere devotion to the Western dramatic canon, Branagh would seem better prepared than most to tackle Christie’s Poirot novels, which rank among the most popular and influential mysteries ever written.
However, his execrable 2017 adaptation of “Murder on the Orient Express” revealed that Branagh, for all his admiration for the classics, is not gifted in every genre. That film’s flat performances, worse writing, and cheap visuals paid meager homage to Dame Christie, turning her mustachioed detective into a bloviating ham and the mystery around him into a tedious chore. And now, in answer to the wishes of no one, Branagh has adapted Christie again. His second attempt turns out, thankfully, to be an improvement on its predecessor in almost every way. If not a great or even especially good movie, “Death on the Nile” is at least an entertaining one.
This much, at least to me, is a surprise. Following the Belgian detective as he comes along for a wealthy couple’s ill-fated honeymoon cruise through Egypt, “Death on the Nile” is notable for its many deviations from the source novel. Combining some characters and altering their backgrounds (and even changing culprits once or twice), the movie reshapes the story into something altogether different, losing some of the element of surprise in the process. But screenwriter Michael Green, whose “Murder on the Orient Express” script was full of hacky tweaks to the original story, puts in a more concerted effort here to sell his changes. So while some of these updates are bottomless in their kitsch, many also enliven the story, giving the characters and actors more opportunity to explore their idiosyncrasies.
Take, for example, Russell Brand (“Arthur”), nearly unrecognizable here as the reticent Dr. Windlesham, the one-time fiancé of the heiress whose death sets off Poirot’s investigation. A lord by birth but a doctor by choice, Brand’s Windlesham is self-effacing but serious, quiet but self-assured. “What I do as Lord Windlesham belongs to buck-toothed tradition,” he quips. “What I do as Doctor is mine.” Sophie Okonedo (“Hotel Rwanda”), as the American blues singer Salome Otterbourne, is another highlight, her wry sense of humor and diva’s presence a curious foil to Poirot’s straight-laced bookishness. With a stronger cast this time around and a willingness to let the whodunit occasionally take a backseat to more pressing matters of character, Branagh crafts moments of real and powerful dramatic effect.
Elsewhere, however, his direction still suffers. Gal Gadot (“Wonder Woman”), as the doomed heiress Linnet Ridgeway-Doyle, is an impressively boring lead, the center of attention yet impossible to pay attention to. You too may find yourself wondering how all these other, more interesting people could harbor such strong feelings about her. Like “Murder on the Orient Express,” “Death on the Nile” also possesses a visual style that can only be described as no style at all. Branagh’s aimless mix of sweeping vistas and tight closeups and artlessly composed shots, all edited together clumsily, create an effect so bizarrely bland as to be comical. The average viewer may not know what goes into the noble art of cinematography, but we all know bad work when we see it, and you will see it all over this movie.
Still, there is cause for optimism for whatever other Agatha Christie projects Branagh might be planning. In addressing some of the issues that plagued “Murder on the Orient Express,” he’s shown, at the very least, that he can learn from his mistakes (a virtue that many of Christie’s characters lack). Even his Poirot is sharper this time around, self-aware in a way that humanizes Poirot’s deductive style and brings out the richness of it. Sir Kenneth’s second try is a good deal better than his first, and with any luck, his next Poirot installment will see him finally get it right.
Originally published in The Harvard Press on 4/8/22.