Bluebell Alcock Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Clarissa Mora The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Michelle Ridley The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

TheLittleSongbird Ever since the age of 11, I've been an Agatha Christie fan. I always find the stories, characters and how she writes very clever and interesting, and when translated well to television or film it can be very diverting. Most of the time her books have translated well, evident with the Russian film version of And Then There Were None(the 1945 version too), Death on the Nile or Evil Under the Sun with Peter Ustinov or the David Suchet adaptations of After the Funeral, Wasp's Nest, Sad Cypress and Five Little Pigs. But that is not the case with all, the 1989 film Ten Little Indians, Suchet's Taken At the Flood and Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Lord Edgware Dies with Austin Trevor, At Bertram's Hotel and Sittaford Mystery with Geraldine McEwan and Why Didn't They Ask Evans with Julia McKenzie proved to be disappointments both as adaptations and on their own merits.I'd say that The Alphabet Murders is not as bad as the above disappointments, but unfortunately I do have to class it with the adaptations that didn't work. And I am going to make an effort to judge it on its own merits, as any adaptation of a book regardless of its quality or how it's adapted is deserving of that. The book that it's based on, The ABC Murders, is a compelling read, maybe not one of Christie's masterpieces like And Then There Were None, Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Death on the Nile, A Murder is Announced and Sleeping Murder, but still great. The Alphabet Murders does have redeeming qualities. Even with films I don't care for or dislike intensely I always look for a redeeming quality or two, and any criticism I have aims to be encouraging and without condescension. The film does look good, the locations are very nice and it is well photographed. Robert Morley is a lot of fun as Hastings, and of the major roles for me he steals the film. Margaret Rutherford is also a sheer delight, but you do wish she had more to do. Anita Ekberg is visually very striking and does what she can with her femme-fatale-like(well kind of) role.Sadly, Tony Randall's Poirot doesn't work, for some people he will have done, but not for me. Considering that Poirot is the main character, this is a major debit. If I were to ignore for a second that he was physically wrong for the character(too tall and thin for one thing), his accent is never consistent, and to the extent that at times I didn't have a clue of what accent he was trying to pull off. And it seemed that he was playing for laughs, within the film it may have worked, but considering the genre and the actual story itself it was jarring, the subtlety and intelligence of Poirot was gone. The worst Poirot? If Austin Trevor's interpretation didn't exist, I'd say that Randall would be. Disappointing also was Ron Goodwin's score, Goodwin's style was instantly recognisable and really elevated the Rutherford Miss Marple films(in particular it was the best thing about Murder Ahoy!). For my tastes though, it was too chirpy in tone and repetitive, adding nothing to the atmosphere.The way The Alphabet Murders was written also fell flat. Instead of being absorbing, the story felt too tediously placed and meandering. The great mystery is severely lacking in suspense and atmosphere, and when you watch a mystery you want to keep guessing to the very end and be surprised by the outcome, but here everything seemed too obvious. It is further hindered by the slapstick, there was too much of it, some of it seemed too dragged out, it was unnecessary and nothing came across as funny. The story and script seemed to be a mix of Agatha Christie, Inspector Clousseau and the sort of work Frank Tashlin did with his Looney Tunes cartoons. And just for the record, I very much like Clousseau and Tashlin. Some will be entertained by it, but for others they'll feel that not only was the material uninspired but the mix just didn't gel. On this one, I'm afraid I'll have to side with the latter group. Some of the dialogue between Poirot and Hastings is entertaining, especially the one about extra insurance and British railways, but the rest of the characters don't have much to work with and not much feels like Agatha Christie. Little is interesting about the characters, the support characters are reduced to stock, cardboard stereotypes and what we learn about Ekberg's character is that she's sexy and dangerous but that's pretty much it.Overall, disappointing but I do think it could have been much worse. But you're better off watching the Suchet adaptation of The ABC Murders, one of the best of the ITV Poirot series. I can understand it if people liked this, as what didn't work for me will work for them, but while I am not one to attack an adaptation for not being like the source material it is understandable also if purists will dislike this. 4/10 Bethany Cox

blanche-2 I suppose somewhere along the line, Agatha Christie took a deep breath and just decided to take the money and run. "The Alphabet Murders" is cute, but it doesn't have much to do with her novel, and if there is a worse Hercule Poirot than Tony Randall, I haven't met him.The story concerns murders that seem to follow the alphabet, as Poirot pursues a beautiful blonde (Anita Ekberg) with the initials ABC, believed to be the killer. There are a lot of chase scenes and some slapstick, and poor Robert Morley as Hastings trying to keep track of Poirot.This film was intended to follow up on the success of the Miss Marple movies starring Margaret Rutherford - in fact, Rutherford as Marple and her real-life husband, Stringer Davis, who plays her friend in the films, actually appear in one scene. While Rutherford's characterization has nothing to do with the Christie Miss Marple, it was successful on its own merits. The same can be said for the Hercule Poirot of Peter Ustinov -- absolutely delightful but has nothing to do with Christie's character.I have seen Albert Finney, David Suchet, Ustinov, and Ian Holm do Poirot. Finney was very good, Suchet perfection, Ustinov discussed above, and Holm very funny (he plays Poirot in "Murder by the Book" as he reads Christie's final novel about himself). Randall does the role with a light touch, but with several different accents - French, British, and American. He has Poirot's vanity and arrogance as well. Perhaps seeing this film when it was made, his performance comes off as better, but seeing it today after a history of better Poirots, it just doesn't come off, though Randall was a wonderful actor.The script isn't as good as the Rutherford scripts. Still, "The Alphabet Murders" is enjoyable enough. Just don't read the book, and forget it's Agatha Christie, and you'll have a good time.

tedg I'm quirky about Christie mysteries, so take this comment with caution. Most viewers seem to think this a failed comedy, a poor "Pink Panther," and I liked it.First, the form of the thing: in key plot elements, it is a rather close adaptation of a Christie book where a murderer "tells a story" in his murders in order to throw the police off. So it begins by being a story about fooling the detective inside another story (the movie) about trying to fool us as detectives.The clue is about words. As a mystery, it is one of the clever explorations that Agatha had, looking at every way she could legally twist the convention of the form.The tone of the thing is what is at issue. Peter Sellers had just had a hit with "Pink Panther" as a bumbling French detective and Poirot inherits some of this. Christie intended for him to be comic in a pompous way, and to varying degrees played with the tension between his genteel buffoonery and his sharp mechanical mind. It was not a simple joke, because her goal in part was to both describe and comment on how such an interesting mind would work.She explored this indirectly by describing his manner, his minor superstitions, his attention to domestic ritual, the vanity of the perfect phrase, whether as a thought or a courtesy. She couldn't do that with Marple, who was as sharp but whose mind and manner was crass and impolite.So part of the game for me in watching film versions is in how the adapter treats the relationship with the viewer so far as the mystery proper. There are all sorts of narrative mechanics that are involved there than aren't worth mentioning now. The other part is in how the mind of the detective is portrayed, and since we can only see the mind through the story (as I just said) and in the person's manner, that manner is key.I think I liked this Poirot better than any of the others. They're all comic in one way or another, and this one seems further in tone from what was written. It is, but it may be closer in intent even though its in a context of Jerry Lewis slapstick.Consider this: in mystery your mind and the detective's are supposed to parallel each other in important ways. In creating a version of the story -- the truth -- despite attempts to force it others wise, you both do this. So in fact, you create the world itself in a way. Some of the basic mechanics are frozen in life as in the genre, but others are completely open for you both to make: matters of how clever fate is, how comic are the wheels of nature, how inevitable is justice, what justice means, how conscience and consequence matter.If the filmmaker can harmonize the tone of what you as viewer see and create in your own mind of the world, with what your surrogate the detective does, then he has succeeded and you can enter the movie whole.This movie seems trivial. I think it is all but impossible to see. But it succeeds with its Poirot where no other attempt does.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

Jugu Abraham I have enjoyed David Suchet and Peter Ustinov playing Poirot among other interpretations of the detective, but Randall's turn is equally enjoyable. Randall is not a great actor but a fine comedian. Director Frank Tashlin should know a good comedian when he casts them--he had worked with Danny Kaye and Jerry Lewis to name just two.The film begins with Randall introducing himself as Poirot with a twinkle in his eye. The director is clear from the first scene--comedy first, mystery next.Robert Morley is fun, but Randall is even better--the bowling alley, the restaurant gags, the telephone calls--all scenes filled with visual, good humor rather than slapstick. Morley depends on the typical British attitudes, e.g., snapping fingers down the pecking order, jumping queues and not knowing one's shoe size all depicting arrogance of society and wealth. Director Tashlin dishes out a comedy with considerable social comment--Brits who cannot differentiate the French from the Belgian French and are in the police force!The most intriguing bit was to introduce Margaret Rutherford as Miss Marple and Stringer Davis as Mr Stringer of the Miss Marple films bump into Randall's Poirot briefly. Surely this was a gem of an idea from Tashlin.The film cannot be easily trashed--it offers comedy and entertainment, nearly 40 years after it was made. It is definitely not the definitive Poirot but an interesting interpretation of Poirot. It is probably one of the best Randall films ranking alongside "The Seven Faces of Dr Lao."