Even with the presence of David Suchet, who is the best film incarnation yet of Agatha Christie's anally-retentive Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, Death on the Nile manages to run aground.
This 2003 television production is certainly stylish, and the attention to 1930s period detail is immaculate. And for the most part, the cast of myriad victims or suspects of foul play on an Egyptian river steamer is solid, even though, apart from Suchet, there is no single outstanding performance.
But while the 1978 movie was so extravagant in its settings and general atmosphere as to induce a reasonably effective suspension of disbelief, this modern television production just serves to highlight the flaws in this, one of the absolute silliest of all plots created by England's Queen of mystery, Agatha Christie.
This murder mystery is, to put it bluntly, totally absurd; so full of holes that it invites stupefaction rather than amazement. Far too much could go wrong along this mystery's carefully-plotted course. Improbability is piled upon improbability, and the film is just not quite grand and exotic enough to disguise the paucity of its story.
Nice try, but this is definitely the weakest of the four Poirot stories which make up this current series of ABC DVD releases.
This is an excellent anamorphic transfer of a well-filmed television drama, and the stereo sound is as good as you would expect from a modern television drama. There are no extra features of any sort.