Death on the Nile
Dir: Kenneth Branagh
Cast: Gal Gadot, Armie Hammer, Kenneth Branagh, Ali Fazal
Rating: 2.5/5

Remake auteur Kenneth Branagh takes a much-needed break from Shakespearean tragedies to expand on his new muse ( Agatha Christie remakes following his 2017 outing ‘Murder on the Orient Express) by refashioning a conservatively dramatic thriller-whodunit into a flamboyant, musically inclined, bluesy, racially mixed, less classy but far more vivid, socially relevant quasi-contemporary one. He dons the role of the famous Belgian detective, egocentric Poirot, by giving him a much more fitter, war-ravaged persona - albeit an exacting epicure who fusses over his dessert selection, as opposed to the corpulent foodie played by the erstwhile Peter Ustinov in the 1978 John Guillermin directed original. And our very own freshly minted Hollywood star-in-the-making Ali Fazal gets to essay the role of the central character, an heiress, Linnet Ridgeway’s( Gal Gadot) mixed-race cousin, a Barrister, Andrew - not a role worthy of major screen time but certainly an integral one nevertheless. In its effort to appease a modern audience, the characters are made more diverse in gender, ethnicity, ideologies, and personal choices. Aside from a prologue, an epilogue, and a few alterations the basic plot of the novel remains the same.

Branagh and writer Michael Green lend the film a couple of additional characters and some backstory which inevitably takes away much of the tension and interest from the central theme that takes ‘anything for love’ to murderous heights. From humble heroism (as presented in the war-torn opening)  to a bombastic, self-congratulatory sleuth invited to a bluesy outing at a club (in 1937), Hercule Poirot is obviously living the life while doing his bit to put killers away. It’s a set-up that even the famed detective fails to cotton onto until several people invited to the honeymoon cruise party of the loved-up couple Linnet and Simon Doyle(Armie Hammer), aboard the river steamer, a rather plush ‘ S S Karnak,’ are found dead. As the narrative gets deep into the story each invitee’s individual motivations are exposed. While the obviously jealous, embittered stalker Jaqueline (Emma Mackey) gets to fire the first unsuccessful salvo in front of eyewitnesses, the rest of the attempted killings happen when everyone else is preoccupied with Poirot’s deliberately defamatory fiddling.