Synopsis for
Marple: Towards Zero (2007) (TV) More at IMDb Pro »

This perfectly made period piece newly adapted for television, could just as well be a whodunit cracked by Poirot. That is; as well as this one kidnapped by miss Marple. Because Agatha Christie had chosen none of them in her original novel. The story is set in coastal England albeit with no signs whatsoever of the war, though the book first published in 1944 (in the US to be exact; like George Simenon who stayed behind during the war, superintendent Maigret encounters no occupation or even presence of a single German in contemporary Paris. Simenon might have been screened by the Gestapo, but as for the English speaking book reading public they might have been fed up with the war going on. Rather having nice cosy classical fictional armchair murders, than the crazy mass murdering taking place around them.) This false modern miss Marple has taken the shape of no less than three different characters in the Christie original. One is the rather clever superintendent Battle, incidentally helped by a head witness, a Scottish former suicide candidate McWhirter, who eventually carry of the former Mrs Strange as his bride to Chile of all places. Crazy? Yes indeed and so is the absurdly scheming murder plot, the murderer (no spoiler) totally insane. But so were the times. By the way, Poirot is actually mentioned in the original novel, but that is all. Miss Marple nevertheless won the TV engagement. Why? Another mystery...