Agatha and the Midnight Murders (2020)

Written by Peter McGinn on October 27, 2020

If I didn’t have a lot of experience reading reviews, perhaps I wouldn’t have watched this. While I considered it’s description I saw a lot of very negative reviews on another site. I mean, it was made out to be the worst movie ever by some. But I watched it and I will say why in a moment.

I enjoyed the movie. Not the best mystery I have watched lately, but it held my attention throughout. There was just enough humor, just enough factual detail, and small twists to keep me engaged. I was pleasantly surprised.

Perhaps it helped that I have never been an Agatha Christie fan. Her writing is fine, but I didn’t care for Poirot as a character. I didn’t mind Marple, so perhaps I should give her books another try.

But back to this movie. When a film has a ton of one-star ratings, I have learned to quickly peruse a bunch of them to determine if it is for one of the most common reasons: politics, religion or remake or a similar bias. In this case a lot of angry people seemed to think that all Agatha Christie based films should be directly from her books. This movie was more creative, spinning a 5ale of might have been. I thought it worked; you shall have to decide for yourself. But if you are a Christie purist, save yourself the frustration and give it a miss.