Coventry I'm having a love/hate (mostly "love", though) relationship with these four Agatha Christie adaptations that George Pollock directed during the first half of the 1960s and starred Margaret Rutherford as the unsurpassable spinster-detective Miss Marple. Although Mrs. Rutherford was a great actress who put a lot of devotion into her role of Miss Marple, the character never should have been a headstrong, boisterous and intrusive woman. From the many books, I know Miss Marple as a timid and fragile little old lady who's always right and much more intelligent than everybody else, but she modestly remains at the sideline to solve the crimes. In the film series, she's more of an imposing hag and her intellect doesn't come so much from observation and deduction, but from nosing around and setting traps. Still, when I manage to ignore my own personal prejudices, these four whodunits (all starting with the word "murder") are admittedly very entertaining and well worth checking out. I even daresay that "Murder Most Foul" is the second best of the quartet. "Murder, She Said" is the cream of the crop, but this installment outshines "Murder at the Gallop" (originally a Hercule Poirot story, like this one) and "Murder Ahoy" (which wasn't even based on existing Agatha Christie material). The first 5-10 minutes of "Murder Most Foul" are downright brilliant and incredibly funny, with Miss Jane Marple stealing the show in court during a murder trial. First, because she's nonchalantly knitting on the jury's bench and thus irritating the honorable judge, and secondly because she, as only member of the twelve-headed jury, stubbornly refuses to find the accused guilty of murder. Of course we immediately know that Miss Marple is right and her "sabotaging" the trial provides her with the required extra time to investigate and solve the crime herself, much to the nuisance of the patient police inspector Craddock. She quickly deducts that the victim was a former stage actress and got killed because she tried to blackmail someone who wasn't too impressed. Miss Marple infiltrates into the stage actors' association of the eccentric Driffold Cosgood, as the murdered woman played with them during the early fifties. The killer helps her to reduce the list of potential suspects, however, because more members of the same association turn up dead. The mystery aspects are overall compelling and there are a few inventive red herrings. Like in the other installments, the middle-section somewhat drags and feels overlong. The comical chemistry between Rutherford and her real-life husband Stringer Davis has worn out since the first film, but luckily there's always a sublime supportive cast, this time including Ron Moody and Meg Jenkins.

Marcin Kukuczka "Murder most foul, as in the best it isBut this most foul, strange and unnatural" (Ghost in William Shakespeare's HAMLET) Having overwhelmed so many viewers as a captivating female sleuth in the two preceding MGM movies, with the third movie of the series, Miss Marple humorously proves the fact that women can indeed have 'superior minds' (not only to the inspectors' embarrassment). While figuring out the extraordinary mysteries, within the foggy reality of the hangman's resting place, premonitions cannot take over: a murder most foul is still to be investigated in the most unpredictable spots while 'Milchester cops' dig in the dusty past. Disguised within the 'gray' existence, they help us penetrate the most inaccessible spheres of criminal knowledge. How? Based upon Agatha Christie's novel MRS McGINTY'S DEAD, MURDER MOST FOUL offers a display of the most absorbing features developed within the genre in its initial, fresh form. The very opening scene creates a unique impression: Mrs McGinty is found hanged by one cop. Scattered banknotes and a crushed rose are meaningful, almost ghostly objects of significance. But there is something more, or rather someone more: Harold Taylor, the only person caught at the scene. What haunts him from the moment are suspicion and...formalities of legal proceedings. The courtroom sees the case being dealt with in the usual boring-to-death manner. 'His honor' rather tends to have a taste for dry martini than to get absorbed in that seemingly open-and-shut case. Yet, a real surprise evokes when a seemingly ordinary woman, who sits in her jury box and knits in order to concentrate, catches the attention of us all - the lovable Miss Jane Marple (Margaret Rutherford) - a nuisance for simplified mediocrity but delight for eagerness and creativity. As the verdict is being postponed for a later date of a retrial, she decides to dig in that case herself.Much ventured and what gained? Time and patience show that this woman gains more than the most skillful chief inspectors would probably see in their most daring sleep. But what a weird stage of investigation! The theater! Among the troupe of Cosgood Players, where Hamlet's dilemmas and experiences have an impact on many players' lives, Miss Marple makes important discoveries about the behavior of people around her. As the murders tend to go in pairs or even threes, she makes us realize that they are all 'one and the same'...In MURDER MOST FOUL, like in each other part, a true delight to watch is Dame Margaret Rutherford in the role of her life, a truly captivating character Agatha Christie created. Her skillful performance combines humor with mystery in her lines and gestures. Her interpretation of the character is simply unique and timeless. All shortage can be filled deeply with her heartfelt acting by making Miss Marple a very humane, sympathetic, lovable and professional. Some of her best lines include: "I am definitely no angel (...) A bachelor not staying for tea (...) Women sometimes have superior minds." The pinnacle of ambiguity appears at the perfectly acted scene when Miss Marple mixes up her lines during the rehearsal of the performance and says "Mrs McGinty's dead" instead of "Rona LaPlante's dead." The height of humor is, perhaps, at Miss Marple's visit at one Mrs Thomas's and her 'rheumatism' exercises. But she truly leaves us stunned by the way she handles the recitation of the poem "The Killing of Dan McGrew." - a must see in the original!SUPPORTING CAST: Apart from the mainstays in all "Murder" parts, including Charles Tingwell as Inspector Craddock and Stringer Davis as Mr Stringer, MURDER MOST FOUL can boast of some brilliant British cast of the time who prove a high caliber of acting skills. Great credit to Ron Moody who portrays Driffold Cosgood, actor/manager of the theater troupe. He portrays a poignant character whose innocence lies beyond questioning and the character whose vibrant, artistic nature is bound to give in as the investigation proceeds. Yet, Mr Moody crafts it exceptionally. An important name among the supporting cast is Francesca Annis but the interesting and haunting performance is given by Alison Seebohm as Eva, a rather ghostly, removed character. She is a sort of nightmarish dream by a sleepwalker who highlights the supernatural blending mystery with insanity. But even her unhealthy and peculiar manners cannot terrify the marble nature of Miss Marple...What can be repeated about the merits of MURDER MOST FOUL from the previous MGM productions on Miss Marple are George Pollock's entertaining and satisfactory direction, Ron Goodwin's enchanting music score, Desmond Dickinson's dazzling cinematography. The director of photography nicely highlights the moments of tension, mystery, undertones of characters' mental states. The backbone storm when the conspiracy of silence makes Miss Marple's task harder and people around her more ghostly and unavailable, is no exception.Indeed, Miss Marple is truly no angel but she is, undeniably, the most memorable character among Agatha Christie's characters. But it is, above all, the charismatic Dame Margaret Rutherford who makes us remember Miss Marple.Much having been ventured, much is gained...injuries are not too serious, joyful promotion and thoughts make the treatment time more pleasant and the 'Milchester Players' as true sleuths may introduce yet another plot, may open yet another investigation. Since this is the end of the very case, murder is always without end...

bkoganbing Murder Most Foul begins with Margaret Rutherford as Jane Marple serving jury duty where she proceeds to deadlock the jury in what everyone, including her exasperated friend Charles Tingwell as Inspector Craddock thinks is an open and shut case. The poor defendant was found bent over the body of a hanged woman. It was his lucky day to have Rutherford on his jury of peers. No sooner than a mistrial is declared than Margaret is off to investigate and the trail leads to a traveling theatrical company. Two more murders of the company of strolling players occur and the original victim in fact was a former actress herself. Besides Tingwell as the arm of the law and Stringer Davis as Mr. Stringer and Margaret Rutherford's husband in real life, the cast of Murder Most Foul also includes Dennis Price and Ron Moody as a pair of fourth rate hams. They're the older members of the stock company, the younger ones are hams as well, but Price and Moody are hams with a lot of style. This is a fine addition to the Marple quartet that Margaret Rutherford did in the Sixties. Even though the story is actually from a Hercule Poirot mystery by Agatha Christie, it suits Rutherford just fine.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU There are three most important reasons why you should watch this film, even if it is in black and white and slightly old in style. We would not make films like that any more even for TV, but we could also say that about Hitchcock or Charlie Chaplin. So what! Well, be positive and as I said before there are three main positive reasons for you to watch this film, or any film of that series, because it is a series. First it is Agatha Christie, and Agatha Christie is the most English woman that writes the most English detective stories with the most English "private eye" or "sleuth" no one in no Hollywood or even Bollywood could think of or imagine. Second Miss Marple is the sleuth of the film and that Miss Marple is an old fire-fox at that. She knits when on duty in a jury, and then she blocks the jury in its decision, one to eleven. Her imagination is totally twisted and warped, just what is needed to find the criminal in the story, a typical English criminal, no serial killer or pure psychotic violent schizophrenic or whatever twisted lunatic you may think of. No, just a plain English person who for some reason or other has to kill someone out of logic, maybe not our logic, but a plain simple logic that says when endangered or menaced a plain ordinary simple unremarkable individual has to kill to survive. In this case the menace is blackmailing about some old childhood crime that had gone unpunished. And the third reason is that this Miss Marple is played by Margaret Rutherford who is a real pleasure on the screen or the stage, in fact I should say was of course since the film is from 1964 and she was already canonically old then. She is a real treat because she really acts and she turns her old age, her deformed body and her drooping skin and flesh into visual assets to build her character. This too is a very great particularity of England: first actors work equally on the stage or for the cinema or for TV, and they do make an effort to provide parts to older actors, and thus to give a picture of real society in which old people are part of our daily social landscape. Now to get the detail or details about the crime you'll have to go and watch the film. But be sure that in the most English way possible the private eye has the last word in the case over the public police officer and of course the woman sleuth has the upper hand over the male detective. Some will say the film is quaint, but that quaintness is a whole culture that you may not be able to witness any more in real life. The cinema is our unfailing memory.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines