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Kenneth Branagh’s whodunit sets sail, but is it worth the trip?
‘Death on the Nile’
By Moira Macdonald
The Seattle Times
T
hese days — let us hope,
for not too much longer —
a movie has to be something
special to lure an audience into
a theater, something you just
can’t wait to see, something that
would be diminished if watched
on a screen at home.
Unfortunately, Kenneth
Branagh’s “Death on the Nile” is
not one of those movies. It’s a
perfectly serviceable entertain-
ment, albeit one that’s been hit
with more than its share of bad
luck: multiple delays of its origi-
nal December 2020 release
date, due to the pandemic and
to sexual assault allegations
against star Armie Hammer
(who’s been neatly reduced
to blink-and-you’ll-miss-him
status in the movie’s trailer). But
it’s just a little fl at, like a party
— remember those? — full of
interesting guests that none-
theless has more than its share
of awkward pauses.
As director and star, Branagh
gets both the credit and the
blame. He’s a delight as Agatha
Christie’s famed Belgian detec-
Rob Youngson/Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
From left, Gal Gadot, Emma Mackey and Armie Hammer in “Death on the Nile.”
tive Hercule Poirot, a portrayal
fi rst unveiled in Branagh’s 2017
fi lm “Murder on the Orient
Express.” Just the way he
pronounces “vege-tables” is a
feast, as is the way this me-
ticulous gentleman carefully
adjusts a corpse’s legs so as
to be more symmetrical, and
fusses over the possibility of an
odd number of desserts. The
fi lm even gives us a mustache
origin story — Poirot’s eely
facial hair is a trademark — and
a poignant romantic past.
But while I’d happily watch
an entire movie purely about
how Poirot became a detective
in the fi rst place, here we’re
focused mostly on a few days in
1937. In typical Christie fash-
ion, an assortment of distinc-
tive and elegantly dressed
folk — among them a beautiful
heiress (Gal Gadot), her brand-
new husband (Hammer), a
romantic rival (Emma Mackey),
a jazz singer (Sophie Okonedo),
Poirot’s right-hand-man Bouc
(Tom Bateman), Bouc’s arch
mother (Annette Bening),
among others — assemble in
the glamorous setting of Egypt
(i.e., some hardworking British
soundstages) on a posh yacht.
Tensions are fl ared, eyebrows
are raised, a gun is fi red ... and
just like that, somebody’s dead,
and Poirot needs to fi gure out
whodunit.
Herein, though, lies a big part
of the problem. In “Murder on
the Orient Express,” the char-
acter bumped off was certainly
the one I’d have voted off the
metaphorical island; in “Death
on the Nile,” it’s the one who’s
pretty much been holding the
movie together, and things
seem stale once that person
is gone. And while Poirot is
always witty, few of the other
characters are. Michael Green’s
screenplay often feels weirdly
detached, like we missed some
crucial early scenes that tell
us why we should care about
these people.
All that said, it’s no great
hardship to watch “Death on
the Nile”; it looks pretty, feels
pleasantly old-school and is
over within shouting distance of
the two-hour mark. I’m hoping,
though, that we haven’t seen
the last of Branagh’s Poirot; I
suspect he might have a few
more cases up his elegantly
tailored sleeve.
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