A HAUNTING IN VENICE : Tuesday 19th September 2023

I saw the M Rated 'A HAUNTING IN VENICE' earlier this week, and this American supernatural mystery film is Co-Produced, Directed and stars Kenneth Branagh and is based on the 1969 novel 'Hallowe'en Party' by Agatha Christie. The film serves as the sequel to 2022's 'Death on the Nile' which was itself a sequel to 2017's 'Murder on the Orient Express' in which Branagh portrays the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, as well as serving as Director on those two previous outings. The film was released in the US and here in Australia last week, has so far grossed US$42M off the back of a US$60M production budget and has garnered generally positive critical reviews.

The film opens with Hercule Poirot (Kenneth Branagh) waking up startled from a nightmare. He is living a life of retirement in 1947 Venice, Italy having become disillusioned with God and humanity having witnessed first hand the cruelty man can bestow upon his fellow man. Poirot employs local retired Police Officer Vitale Portfoglio (Riccardo Scamarcio) as his bodyguard. Having visited the local market later that morning and procured himself his supply of breakfast pastries, there comes a knock at his apartment door. Ariadne Oliver (Tina Fey) is at the door - Poirot's long term friend and novelist who has penned thirty books so far of which twenty-seven were best sellers but the last three not so much. It is Halloween, and Oliver persuades Poirot to attend a seance at the palazzo of renowned opera singer Rowena Drake (Kelly Reilly) and help expose psychic medium Joyce Reynolds (Michelle Yeoh) as a fake.

Later that night, Poirot, Ariadne and Vitale are all taken by gondola along the canals of Venice to Rowena's palazzo, where there is a children's Halloween party in full swing, and we learn through this that the palazzo is on the site of a former children's hospital at which there were numerous children's deaths and the ghosts of those children still haunt the place to this day. After the children have all left for the evening, the adults that remain are Rowena's guests for the seance - they are Joyce Reynolds who Rowena has hired to help her communicate with her daughter Alicia (Rowan Robinson), who committed suicide after her fiance, chef Maxime Gerard (Kyle Allen), broke off their engagement; Rowena's housekeeper Olga Seminoff (Camille Cottin); the Drake family doctor Leslie Ferrier (Jamie Dornan) and his nine year old son Leopold (Jude Hill) and Reynolds' assistant Desdemona Holland (Emma Laird). 

At midnight all the gathered guests assemble in Alicia's bedroom which has remained exactly as she left it the day she died. During the seance, Poirot quickly deduces that Reynolds has not one assistant but two, revealing Desdemona's half-brother Nicholas (Ali Khan) hiding in the chimney of Alicia's bedroom and manipulating a typewriter with a magnetic device that is all part of Reynolds ruse. Reynold's then speaks to Rowena in Alicia's voice, revealing that she was murdered, and states the killer is one of the guests present in the room. Poirot attempts to confront Reynolds about her act, who gives him the brush off and puts her mask and cloak on him and tells him to lighten up. Taking this advice and while attempting to bob for apples, while nobody is watching, Poirot is nearly drowned by an unknown assailant. Reynolds is then found impaled on a statue in the courtyard minutes later. 

Meanwhile, a storm gathers momentum outside, which ultimately cuts off the palazzo until such time as it subsides. Poirot therefore begins his investigations by interviewing the guests, during which time he hallucinates seeing Alicia's ghost, and hears the sound of a female singing, although no one else can hear it. The investigation yields baffling results, namely that Leslie, who is severely traumatised from his experiences at the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, is secretly in love with Rowena. Leopold says he hears the voices from the spirits of children who were left to die back when the palazzo was a plague hospital.
Maxime, who was a last minute addition to the guest list broke off his engagement because he felt Rowena did not approve of him and that Alicia was obsessed with keeping her happy; and Nicholas and Desdemona, both Romani refugees, have been stealing from Joyce and intend to use the money to travel to St. Louis, Missouri, which they fell in love with after seeing the first half of the film 'Meet Me in St. Louis' at a displaced persons camp.

Shortly after, the guests come across a previously hidden basement containing the skeletal remains of the dead children, and Leslie suffers a panic attack and nearly kills Maxime. He is locked inside the music room to recover, with Rowena handing Poirot the only key. After examining Maxime's invitation, Poirot deduces Oliver sent it and that she and Vitale conspired to bring him to the palazzo. Vitale explains he investigated Alicia's death and fished her out of the canal, while Oliver admits she hoped to use Poirot's incapability of explaining the seance as a plot for her next book. Leslie is soon afterward found stabbed to death in the music room to which Poirot had the only means of access.

Poirot brings the remaining guests together, and exposes Rowena as the murderer. She was obsessed with keeping Alicia to herself and, after learning she planned to reconcile with Maxime, used honey extracted from poisonous rhododendron blooms to weaken her, using small doses at a time. When Olga unknowingly gave Alicia tea containing a large fatal dose, Rowena staged Alicia's suicide to prevent exposing herself. When she began receiving blackmail threats, Rowena suspected either Joyce or Leslie. She pushed Joyce to her death after mistakenly attempting to drown Poirot and forced Leslie into stabbing himself via the palazzo's internal phone line, threatening to kill Leopold if he refused. Rowena flees to the roof garden in an attempt to escape, followed by Poirot, but Alicia's ghost seemingly appears from behind and pulls Rowena down, causing her to fall to her death in the canal below. 

Come sun up and the case cracked open in a few short hours, Poirot bids goodbye to Oliver, elects not to turn Vitale in to the local Police for his involvement in the seance, and privately exposes Leopold as the blackmailer. Leopold explains he understood the poisoning signs his father missed and made the connection after realising Rowena's first starring role was in an opera whose lead character was known as the 'king of poisons'. Poirot suggests to Leopold and Olga that to clear their consciences they should use the blackmail money to help Desdemona and Nicholas start a new life in St. Louis before returning home to accept a new case.

Three Agatha Christie big screen adaptations in, and Director and lead Actor Kenneth Branagh has more than settled in to his routine of bringing Hercule Poirot to life, with all his eccentricities and idiosyncrasies firmly intact. Branagh has crafted a solid enough film here that is sure to please those that enjoy a good whodunnit, Venice is shot beautifully, the cast is more than up for the task, and this Gothic inspired supernatural thriller for me sits between 'Murder on the Orient Express' and 'Death on the Nile' that offers the audience a more grounded view of Poirot's methods of deduction, even if at times it defies logic. All within the space of four of five hours Poirot is able to solve not one, not two, but three murders and tie up a whole bunch of loose ends very neatly before moving on to his next case before breakfast - if you can believe it!

'A Haunting in Venice' merits three claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-

BELFAST : Wednesday 9th February 2022.

I saw the M Rated 'BELFAST' last week at my local independent movie theatre, and this British coming of age comedy drama film is Written, Directed and Co-Produced by Kenneth Branagh whose previous film making credits include his 1989 debut feature 'Henry V' then 'Peter's Friends' in 1992, 'Mary Shelley's Frankenstein' in 1994, 'Sleuth' in 2007, 'Thor' in 2011, 'Murder on the Orient Express' in 2017, 'All Is True' in 2018, with 'Death on the Nile' released just last week. This film saw its World Premiere screening at the Telluride Film Festival in early September last year and also won the People's Choice Award at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival. The film was released in the US in mid-November 2021 and in the UK and Ireland on 21 January. It has received positive reviews from critics and has, so far, grossed over US$26M at the global Box Office, and has picked up thirty-eight award wins and another 230 nominations from around the awards and festivals circuit (many of those nods are still awaiting a final outcome at the time of writing).

The film charts the life of a working class Northern Irish Protestant family from the perspective of nine year old Buddy (Jude Hill), during the rise of the Troubles in Northern Ireland in Belfast, where Buddy and his family live. Father Pa (Jamie Dornan) works overseas in England on a construction project, while the family—Ma (Caitriona Balfe), elder brother Will (Lewis McAskie), and paternal grandparents Granny (Judi Dench) and Pop (Ciaran Hinds) live in Belfast. 

Opening up on 15th August 1969, a mob of angry Protestant loyalists randomly and without warning attack the homes and businesses of Catholics along the street where Buddy lives, smashing windows in, breaking down doors and torching a car. The local folk set up a barricade at the end of the street to prevent their re-entry, and Pa returns from England (as he does every other weekend) to check on the safety and security of his family. Buddy and Will attend church one Sunday without their parents on this occasion, and the minister delivers a fire and brimstone speech about choosing the right fork in the road - one which leads to the sanctity of heaven and the other to all damnation in hell. Buddy continues to reflect on the words of the minister throughout the film. At school, Buddy begins to develop feelings towards high-achieving Catholic classmate Catherine (Olive Tennant), and in time they become friends, so much so that in conversation with Pop, Buddy alludes to one day marrying her. 

In the meantime, local low level crim and Protestant loyalist Billy Clanton (Colin Morgan) approaches Pa demanding his involvement in 'the cause' but when Pa refuses, he turns aggressive and starts harassing Buddy saying that he expects his Pa to do the right thing. The family also is struggling to pay off their accumulated debts to the tax office. Pa produces brochures about emigrating to Sydney or Vancouver as the chance for the family to start afresh, however, as far as Ma is concerned this is not an option, as she is dead set against leaving her home, her friends and her family. But, on the other hand, she can no longer deny the option of leaving Belfast as the conflict deepens. Pa returns home after his fortnight in England and tells Ma that he has been offered a promotion in England to work on a five year long construction project that comes with a housing deal from his employers. His employers want an answer from him by Christmas. They try to discuss the matter with their boys, but Buddy has a melt down at the thought of leaving Belfast.

Buddy, local teenage girl Moira (Lara McDonnell) and another young lad attempt to steal chocolate bars from a sweet shop, but the plan goes south and Buddy narrowly escapes the clutches of the shop owner carrying a single bar of Turkish Delight. Moira chastises Buddy for making off with the sweet confection when there were Crunchie's and Flake's to be had instead. When later questioned by the Police, Buddy does not reveal his accomplices. Afterwards, suitably impressed by Buddy's resilience, Moira recruits him into her local gang, who participate in a looting of a mini-supermarket. A reluctant Buddy is forced into stealing something and grabs a box of laundry detergent before returning home and telling Ma of his activities. Ma berates him and immediately drags both Buddy and Moira back to the ongoing looting in order to return their stolen items. Billy Clanton then appears and shouts at them that they take things and don't put them back and promptly takes them hostage to leverage his own escape. Pa, Will and the British Army arrive at the scene to bring an end the riot. This results in a standoff with Billy who attempts a shootout until Pa and Will manage to disarm him. Billy is then arrested and swears retribution.

The Christmas deadline for Ma and Pa's decision to move to England comes and goes - and they further delay until Easter. In the meantime Pop has died. Realising that they are no longer safe in Belfast, the family decide to relocate to England. Before leaving, Buddy bids farewell to Catherine. He laments to Pa whether he could have pursued a future with her despite the fact she was a Catholic. Pa responds that it doesn't make a difference what culture, creed or beliefs someone has, they will always be welcome in their home. As Granny watches, the family boards a bus headed for the airport, saying to herself 'go, go now, and don't look back'. Granny is left alone after the death of her husband and the departure of her children and grandchildren, as she closes the door behind her and rests her head on the window, sobbing. 

'Belfast' is a film for the ages, and anyone who grew up in Britain during these turbulent times will be able to relate to Branagh's tender, whimsical, thought provoking semi-autobiographical offering, centred firmly in his young childhood formative years. The casting is top notch, and Jude Hill as the central character of Buddy is a standout, with equally impressive performances from Dornan, Balfe, Dench and Hinds who all deliver grounded, believable and relatable roles. Whilst the troubles of Northern Ireland are secondary to the plot here and there are no political machinations behind them, this is a film of family connectedness, community solidarity, fun and laughter, love and emotion, music and cinema as seen through the eyes of a nine year old who is struggling to come to terms with a changing world being ripped apart by violence. And within it, Branagh has crafted a crowd pleasing, awards worthy addition to his already impressive resume. 

'Belfast' merits four claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps. 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-