The Big Four

[poliphilo]

He's done it. There were times when it looked as if changing times and tastes- and the economy and all that- would scupper the enterprise, but here we are at last- embarking on the final season of Poirot, with everything Christie wrote about the little man safely processed into images. By this stage of the game all the good stuff has been used up and we're down to the dregs, but never mind: the feebler the source material the less anyone is going to mind if you muck it about. The Big Four is the one in which Poirot tackles the Yellow Peril and pretends to be his own twin. It's nobody's finest hour- so the omnipresent Mark Gattis and his co-writer have taken amusing elements of the original- murders by chess board, and electric fire, the clue of the joint of mutton- and inserted them into a very different story with an entirely different denouement- and the preposterous theatricality of the original is taken advantage of- bent back upon itself and tied into an elegant knot. The chief joy of this episode is the return after an absence of ten years of Japp, Hastings and Lemon.  One had hardly dared hope that those three actors would be available and willing, but- here they are...

Actually, it's not entirely true about the dregs. Suchet has been holding Curtain in reserve- for obvious reasons- and Curtain is one of the best.

Comments

[artkouros.livejournal.com]

Are you saying there's a new David Suchet Poirot? And it's the Yellow Peril?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

They're beginning to air a final season of four films- starring Suchet- the first of which (premiered last night) is The Big Four.

Still to come are: Dead Man's Folly
The Labours of Hercules
Curtain