SkiesAreBlue Currently we are enjoying a spate of Joan Hickson's Miss Marple series on our free to air channel. I have watched the other adaptations of Agatha Christie's novel with Geraldine McEwan and while they were fine performances (story lines got a bit muddled) the JH ones are bringing back the original plots and stories. Only one thing is grating me is that the character of Gwenda supposedly from New Zealand is speaking with the most dreadful "Stryne" (Australian) accent. Good grief, the producers only had to go down to Earls Court and pick out a few Kiwis to hear the difference. Also, I get the picture that Gwenda was from a more refined family ( upper middle class) in which her accent would have been more cultured with a hint of "fush & chips" in it. Other than that I'm very much enjoying JH version.

Paul Evans Giles and his beautiful New Zealander wife Gwenda return to the UK, whilst driving through the sleepy village of Dilmouth, they drive past a house which Gwenda falls in love with, the couple quickly snap it up and move in. Gwenda starts to feel deja vu and memories of the house haunt her, she feels like she's been there before and also believes she witnessed a murder there. Miss Marple is called in to solve the puzzle and protect Gwenda.Sleeping Murder is one of my favourite Agatha Christie novels, it has some really dark elements to it, it's very captivating with real life and intriguing characters. I think the production team did an excellent job making it, they characters seem like real people, nobody is too over the top, the story is not too way out.There are several scenes that stand out, firstly the Dutchess of Malfi play, Jacobean drama is particularly heavy, but those words 'cover her faced mind eyes dazzle she died young,' they have such an impact, Gwenda's reaction is wonderfully sincere, the whole staging of the scene is brilliant. The unveiling of the murderer scene is also brilliant, so creepy and sinister.There is lots of tension, they succeeded in creating a definite sense of unease, the music is really spot on, it fits perfectly. The English countryside looks so beautiful too.The acting as always is spot on, not a single weak link in the chain. Joan Hickson is as always bang on the money. John Bennett is excellent as Richard Erskine, what a great actor. Freddie Treves is very good as the sinister Doctor Kennedy, John Moulder Brown is charming as Giles, but it's Geraldine Alexander that puts in a truly fabulous and believable performance as Gwenda, her interpretation is somehow better and more sincere then the character in the book. For years I believed she was actually a New Zealander, so she did a good job with the accent.An excellent production that's a must for any fan of mysteries, may be a little plodding for some, but I think it's spot on, beautifully acted it's such a clever story. 9/10 Miss Marple as the hero!

pawebster The 1980s adaptations starring Joan Hickson are on the slow side by modern standards. This was in fact the last golden age of television before it was ruined by too many channels and the advent of the MTV attention span -- which has sadly affected us all, I fear. This version is lovingly crafted with delightful period details.Although, in its slowness, this version fails to build up the various suspects as sufficiently menacing, it is a good version which keeps quite faithful to the book. Geraldine Alexander is excellent as Gwenda and to my ears does a super New Zealand accent. John Moulder-Brown is a let-down as her unconvincing animatronic husband, beautifully dressed in the gent's outfitters styles of the period, but far too mannered in his perfect elocution. Joan Hickson does her stuff very well as usual.It is interesting (if depressing) to compare this with the travesty version starring Geraldine McEwan, where the plot has been mangled -- and garbled -- beyond recognition.

jamesraeburn2003 POSSIBLE SPOILERSA young man called Giles Reed (Moulder-Brown) returns home with his New Zealand raised wife, Gwenda (Alexander). They buy a house in the small seaside town of Dartmouth in Devon and a number of strange things happen. Gwenda feels that she has been in the house before and she sees a strange apparition on the staircase of a man strangling a pretty blonde woman. The couple contact Miss Marple (Hickson) and after some investigation, they discover that when Gwenda's father sent her from India to live in New Zealand, they stopped off in England for a while and lived in the house that they have just bought. They also discover that Gwenda's father was committed to an asylum because he was obsessed with the fact that he may of strangled Gwenda's step mother and he committed suicide while inside. Giles and Gwenda are convinced that a murder did occur in the house, but the step mother had several affairs and any one of her lovers could have done it. Despite Miss Marple's advice not to dig up the past, they start their own investigation to find the real killer and clear her father's name even though it all happened twenty-years before.SLEEPING MURDER is a long and wordy adaptation of Christie's whodunit, but none of the talk is irrelevant to the film's plot twists and it is superbly acted throughout. Director John Davies does very able work and the settings are well chosen to suit the film's sinister mood. A few flashbacks would of helped things along.