I just watched Julia McKenzie in the recent adaptation of the Christie novel, inserting Miss Marple where she was originally absent. I clicked on the IMDb and Amazon to learn more about the production and found that there had been a 1971 movie which hewed more closely to the original. A purchase of a used DVD gave me pleasure for my money. It's interesting to see how different script writers turned and twisted the basic story lines and how the movies surprised and shocked the viewer. I won't repeat the comments that have already been said on this forum about this '71 film, but I will emphasize the value of seeing the opening minutes again to pick up fat clues that might be missed on first viewing -- the footsteps heard in the Van Gogh museum and the statement of the mother later that her son had experienced something significant. The movie just seems to sail along making one wonder what the mystery is, what the crime was, until the revelations that suddenly come toward the end. Talk about the technique of the unreliable narrator in mystery stories! By the way, Jon Tuska in his great critical work THE DETECTIVE IN Hollywood casually dismisses this movie as not very good. He's wrong.
