Page 14 - Fujifilm Exposure_48 Tamara Drewe_ok

xactly 21 years after he first Eappeared on ITV as Hercule
Poirot in The Adventure Of The Clapham Cook, David Suchet’s little Belgian detective with “the little grey cells” is back on the case in
perhaps the most ingenious, and arguably best-loved, of all Agatha Christie’s mysteries.
Murder On The Orient Express, likely to be aired at Christmas, will mark the 65th outing for what has now become 64-year-old Suchet’s trademark role easily eclipsing other considerable Poirots down the years, which have included Peter Ustinov, Albert Finney, Tony Randall and Austin Trevor.
Yet the name of Finney must be recalled as it’s been 36 years, not counting an eminently forgettable contemporary version for US TV in 2001, since the first-ever screen adaptation, the all-star 1974 EMI film, directed by Sidney Lumet, which became an enormous hit around the world.
Joining Suchet on this new trans-European odyssey are, among others, Eileen Atkins, Hugh Bonneville, Barbara Hershey, Samuel West, Jessica Chastain, Marie-Josée Croze and Serge Hazanavicius, not to mention Toby Jones as the odious Ratchett, whose murder sparks Poirot’s probe.
This latest Poirot is not the first time DP Alan Almond BSC has climbed aboard the Hercule express. A couple of years ago he shot Mrs McGinty’s Dead while, even more
relevantly, back in 2005, he worked on The Mystery Of The Blue Train.
“One of the reasons they asked me to the interview this time round was because I’d had previous experience of trying to get a studio look as if it’s moving,” notes Almond. It is however the first time he has worked with director Philip Martin, on his Poirot debut after winning BAFTA’s Best Director Fiction for the biopic Mo, as well as being part of the award-winning Wallander team.
Says Almond: “He’s one of the best directors I’ve worked with for a long time and he really inspired the cast and crew; I felt I learned a lot from him. We were constantly having a dialogue.
“We had perhaps two weeks of ‘prep’ on this and he was always saying what he didn’t want.
“He was very keen, for instance, that it shouldn’t be just a typical Poirot. He and I inherited a crew that had been working on Poirots and Marples for about 15 months and they were very good indeed, but Philip was very anxious that they shouldn’t feel, “oh, here we go again.’ He wanted to change gear a bit, not have them just go through the motions. Also I don’t think he liked the first film very much so we kept well away from that.”
For Almond, there was no question that the production should be shot on film. “It’s not a question of preference,” he asserts, “it’s about practicalities. With the kind of fat schedule we had which we had to ➤
IN PRODUCTION
BACK ON BOARD AS OLD FAVOURITE MURDER ON THE ORIENT
EXPRESS BUILDS UP A NEW HEAD OF STEAM FOR ITV
CAUGHT
Photo main: the snowbound train in Murder On The Orient Express; inset: the original book cover of the Agatha Christie classic
12 • EXPOSURE • THE MAGAZINE • FUJIFILM MOTION PICTURE
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