Murder on the Orient Express (2001 film)
Murder on the Orient Express | |
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Based on | Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie |
Screenplay by | Stephen Harrigan |
Directed by | Carl Schenkel |
Starring | Alfred Molina Meredith Baxter Leslie Caron Peter Strauss |
Composer | Christopher Franke |
Country of origin | United States |
Original language | English |
Production | |
Producer | Marion Rosenberg |
Cinematography | Rex Maidment |
Running time | 100 minutes |
Distributor | Ardustry Home Entertainment LLC |
Release | |
Original release |
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Murder on the Orient Express is a 2001 made-for-television mystery film directed by Carl Schenkel based on the 1934 novel Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie, featuring Hercule Poirot. This version is set in the present day and has a smaller cast than the novel. The screenplay was written by Stephen Harrigan and the original music score was composed by Christopher Franke.
Plot[edit]
Hercule Poirot is travelling on the Orient Express. While on the journey, Poirot meets a very close friend Bouc, who works for the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits. The train is stopped when a landslide blocks the line on the second night out from Istanbul, and American millionaire Samuel Edward Ratchett is found stabbed to death the next morning.
Since no footprints are visible around the train and the doors to the other cars were locked, it seems that the murderer must still be among the passengers in Ratchett's car. Poirot and Bouc work together to solve the case. They are aided by Pierre Michel, the middle-aged French conductor of the car.
A key to the solution is Ratchett's revealed involvement in the Armstrong tragedy in the United States several years earlier, in which a baby was kidnapped and then murdered. (The fictitious Armstrong case, inspired by the real-life kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh's baby boy.)
Cast[edit]
- Alfred Molina as Hercule Poirot
- Meredith Baxter as Mrs. Caroline Hubbard
- Leslie Caron as Sra. Nina Alvarado
- Amira Casar as Helena von Strauss
- Nicolas Chagrin as Pierre Michel
- Tasha de Vasconcelos as Vera Rossakoff
- David Hunt as Bob Arbuthnot
- Adam James as William MacQueen
- Dylan Smith as Tony Foscarelli
- Peter Strauss as Mr. Samuel Ratchett
- Fritz Wepper as Wolfgang Bouc
- Kai Wiesinger as Philip von Strauss
- Natasha Wightman as Mary Debenham
See also[edit]
- Murder on the Orient Express is a 1974 film with Albert Finney as Poirot.
- In December 2010 the series Agatha Christie's Poirot, featuring David Suchet as Poirot, aired "Murder on the Orient Express".
- In November 2017 a new film adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express starring Kenneth Branagh as Poirot was released.
External links[edit]
- 2001 television films
- 2001 films
- 2000s crime drama films
- 2001 crime thriller films
- American crime drama films
- American films
- American television films
- Crime television films
- Films about murder
- Films based on crime novels
- Films based on Hercule Poirot books
- Films set on the Orient Express
- Films set on trains
- Films scored by Christopher Franke
- Fiction about child murder
- American television film stubs
- Crime thriller film stubs