Death on the Nile Review

*No Killers Spoiled…

IMDB Synopsis

Belgian sleuth Hercule Poirot’s Egyptian vacation aboard a glamorous river steamer turns into a terrifying search for a murderer when a picture-perfect couple’s idyllic honeymoon is tragically cut short.

“How many great stories are tragedies?”

The Agatha Christie model of murder mystery is something that has been a part of Hollywood for a long time. A number of the Agatha Christie stories even have been adapted themselves into shows and movies. In recent years Kenneth Branagh has taken upon himself to keep those stories alive by creating a new set of stories with the legendary detective Hercule Poirot. And who else could play him other than Branagh as well.

Branagh started with Murder on the Orient Express, probably Christie’s most famous book. It was an absolutely stacked cast, and the movie worked for the most part. The best part being probably Branagh’s portrayal of Poirot. It clearly did well enough to garner a sequel and so he decided to adapt Death on the Nile with another star studded cast. Gal Gadot, Armie Hammer, Russell Brand, Letitia Wright, Rose Leslie and others all get to have their fun with different murder mystery type characters. And story wise you get your basic murder mystery with one of them getting murdered and the rest being suspects to said murder.

As far as the technical parts of this movie, I did not think it looked overly great. I thought the sets could have felt a bit more extravagant and the costumes could have had a bit more pop, and it would have shined on screen more. I also felt the Patrick Doyle score just felt a bit off and did not totally feel married to the tone of the story. All of that giving this story a very uneasy feel to it.

Stock Watch

Stock Down – Gal Gadot

I liked Wonder Woman 2, but the masses did not love it. Red Notice was shameful, and her performance here makes us really start to question what we have with her. She obviously looks like a movie star, I mean come on, but she cannot shed her accent whatsoever, and never really changes her energy in any of her scenes. I still think she can lead a movie, but there are definitely questions now.

Stock Neutral – Kenneth Branagh

He is having a big time moment of course with BELFAST being nominated for Best Picture and himself nominated for Best Director. But following up that with Nile just feels like a miss as a director. I did like him though in the Poirot role again because he seems to just be having a ton of fun.

Stock Up – Emma Mackey

Holy hell did she pop off the screen like an explosion. I had not really seen her and she seemed to be the only one in the whole cast who really was leaning into the tone and having a ball. I loved everything she did in her role as Jackie and I cannot wait to see what she is doing next.

*A couple other tidbits

I truly do not know what movie Russell Brand was in.
The Mustache origin story was….something.
The final reveal in my opinion was a bit too obvious.

I had fun with the first version of these stories, but I felt this one did not quite get there. It has moments and a couple good performances that might be worth seeing, but the rest does not add up to the sum of its parts. If they do another one of these they need to up the charisma level of the whole cast by about triple.

Juice Rating: