Dr Jacques COULARDEAU Miss Marple, the Terrible, is going to London, to Bertram's Hotel actually and you can be sure there is a lot of eavesdropping, watching, listening, observing and whatever helps find some truth out of an evanescent surface of things. But no surprise, once again it is a daughter-mother story, an abandoned daughter who comes across at the same time her mother and her long discarded father, though not forgotten. Miss Marple also has something against the aristocracy, at least aristocratic women who have nothing to do and feel more and more useless and bored in our modern world with brand new television (the old type I hardly remember). So from boredom to lovers and from lovers to killers and from killers to train-robbers, in any order possible, that's the way to add some piquant sauce to the drab life of an aristocratic lady. The second obsession of Miss Marple is canons, parsons, priests or whatever again, provided they can quote the Bible if possible without mixing the Song of Song and the Apocalypse. That's because young ladies need a watchful eye, I guess. And there the sky falls on the heads and shoulders of a few culprits with just a couple of sentences. Of course in a way we know what is going to happen and who is the criminal. The game of the director is to systematically mislead us with the music or an ellipse of some sort to make us expects what does not come, and frustrate our suspense with a little bit more suspense. Deliciously quaint.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID

tedg Spoilers herein.This is the sixth or seventh in the series that I have seen. BBC has a policy of putting different creative crew in charge of each one, so they vary significantly. I found the `Alien' and `Batman' franchises to be a mini-lesson in film techniques, and this is a lot like that.Usually, the Marple crews use BBC or TeeVee conventions and shoehorn in the unusual conventions of Christie, which themselves vary from story to story. Here, the adapter and director have actually paid attention to the manner in which is the story is presented in the book.The book has the hotel as a character: the walls carry personality and act as a sort of Moriarity. It is contrived. The director cleverly uses this; the camera always locates itself as part of the architecture first. It both contains and observes the characters. The pans are inhuman. They reflect Maples' nature: nosey, skulking.On top of this, everything is perceived with dull colors, as if the film itself was a copy of Bertram's: an obsessively maintained antique.There is a physicality to the end that reflects that of this story's Moriarty.This is probably the best of the Hickson Marples.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

Glyn Treharne One of the later Marple mysteries, it was first published in the swinging sixties, but has wisely been reset in the far gentler 1950s. It is one of Christie's lesser works and unfortunately this television production does not improve on it. Caroline Blakiston's central performance as the irrepressible Bess Sedgewick, is a master class in scenery chewing, and the plot borders on the ridiculous - a criminal mastermind uses an exclusive London hotel as a front for an assortment of nefarious activities. The supporting cast includes Joan Greenwood, in a nothing role, but still mesmerising us with her honeyed voice, radio stalwart Preston Lockwood, charmingly dippy as the absent minded Canon, and Irene Sutcliffe, suitably prim and proper as the hotel receptionist. George Baker is also around with his uninteresting interpretation of a dull policeman. This, alas, is one for die-hard Christie fans only.

catman47 The direction, acting and total production is wonderfully done in this adaptation of Agatha Christie's novel. The leading actress is superb...from the first scene which juxtaposes the arrival of Miss Marple and Lady Bess Sedgewick arrive at Bertram's Hotel is a joy of contrasts and adept editing. Throughout the film this actress (playing Lady Bess} is mesmerizing! The whole production does a fine job of recapturing the late 1950's England. A fine addition to the Joan Hickson/Miss Marple series! What a gift to have the Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot series on DVD.