After doing Geraldine McEwan a huge injustice in Nemesis, sending her out of a hatchet job of a script, it became clear there was an effort to strip the episode back, and pick out the core of what Christie did so well. The focus for this episode is the characters, not gimmicks.
I'll start with Miss Marple herself, I was a fan of Geraldine, I liked the sparky twinkle in the eye that she had, she was sweet and tough at the same time. Joan will always be the character naturally, but Julia is actually rather wonderful, having read all of the Miss Marple novels I have a mental picture of what I believe her to look like and how I'd expect her to behave, mannerisms etc, and Julia hits the mark incredibly well, there seems a softer side to her. I didn't really identify McEwan in the same way, although I loved her performances.
As for the rest of the cast, I'm a big fan of Rupert Graves, I find his extremely charismatic and very watchable, I liked very much his interpretation of Lance Fortescue. Liz White is excellent as is Matthew Macfadyen. the Crumps are just joyful, verging on being caricatures but they pull it off so much fun, the much missed Wendy Richard and Ken Campbell, who could forget Roger from Fawlty Towers. I loved the cameo from Prunella Scales, what a legend she is.
Overall it's a solid, traditional version. It doesn't exactly get the old blood pressure up in terms of excitement but it's certainly very enjoyable, it's a little slow and padded to begin with, but once Miss Marple arrives on the scene it gathers momentum and becomes excellent. It's subtle and almost softer then some of the loud productions we've had, purposely so I thought. A very good 8/10 The end is so sad.
I'll start with Miss Marple herself, I was a fan of Geraldine, I liked the sparky twinkle in the eye that she had, she was sweet and tough at the same time. Joan will always be the character naturally, but Julia is actually rather wonderful, having read all of the Miss Marple novels I have a mental picture of what I believe her to look like and how I'd expect her to behave, mannerisms etc, and Julia hits the mark incredibly well, there seems a softer side to her. I didn't really identify McEwan in the same way, although I loved her performances.
As for the rest of the cast, I'm a big fan of Rupert Graves, I find his extremely charismatic and very watchable, I liked very much his interpretation of Lance Fortescue. Liz White is excellent as is Matthew Macfadyen. the Crumps are just joyful, verging on being caricatures but they pull it off so much fun, the much missed Wendy Richard and Ken Campbell, who could forget Roger from Fawlty Towers. I loved the cameo from Prunella Scales, what a legend she is.
Overall it's a solid, traditional version. It doesn't exactly get the old blood pressure up in terms of excitement but it's certainly very enjoyable, it's a little slow and padded to begin with, but once Miss Marple arrives on the scene it gathers momentum and becomes excellent. It's subtle and almost softer then some of the loud productions we've had, purposely so I thought. A very good 8/10 The end is so sad.