Scared by Kenneth Branagh: A Haunting in Venice

M R James meets Agatha Christie’s Poirot meets Death in Venice, with some Don’t Look Now thrown in for good measure… Venice looks amazing. There is an increasingly heavy rain storm throughout — will the palazzo do a Bond moment from Casino Royale? Is it sink or swim for Poirot?

On one level it is deliciously cheesy in the best way. On the other hand it’s been produced in part by Ridley Scott, so expect thrills and chills as well as looking amazing. The cinematography is tight as we try to work out, along with Poirot, what is going on, and if ghosts are real. Everyone is terribly post-modern throughout and deny evidence of the afterlife, God and the spirit world, backed up by it’s post-World War Two setting. On the other hand as the creepy/precocious child throughout asserts — they believe in you…

Poirot (Kenneth Branagh), with the helping hands (literally) of his body guard evades any more cases and pestering clients, and lives a quiet life of ease and exquisite patisserie consumption. Until his friend Ariadne Oliver bursts up his apples and pears bearing more apples, refuses to join in him in partaking of elegant biscuits cos diet and pulls Poirot into a children’s Halloween party and later a family séance.

I love the scenes of beleaguered nuns and overexcited children here. After being terrified by a lantern show revealing the murky and very much horrible history of the building they’re in, the party begins, games are played, small children run around squealing with delighted glee and lashings of ginger beer and heaps of cake are consumed. The glamourous hostess (a former opera singer) is in mourning for her dead daughter, who died at the same palazzo in mysterious circumstances, which she’s now filled with partying, sugar-filled children. Eeep! (And lots of flaming candles which can go out when you most need light). In one of the rooms is a man who is really not mentally well (turns out he’s the family doctor who cared for the deceased daughter). Meanwhile lurking on a sofa is his son who is really rather forward — speaking in very adult tones, as well as a child carer for his father and really into reading Edgar Alan Poe. His role is to declaim about ghosts at inconvenient and unsettling moments.

After a beautifully delicate Venetian glass chandelier crashes ominously to the ground, the children all exit. Or do they? A tragic carnival masked and caped Michelle Yeoh arrives. She is a medium and hears the spirits, apparently. Or will she? Poirot is determined to unmask the con and the con artist — and he does, finding a helper with a gadget concealed within a chimney. And yet the medium seems to connect to the dead daughter, to proclaim that her murderer is in the room! Only she doesn’t say who and before Michelle Yeoh can connect to the spirits again, (it’s a busy line in this house with a tragic history apparently), she’s skewered. Along for the ride is the deceased daughter’s former finance — they parted in bitter circumstances, as he seemed to want money and status and not her. Therefore, mes amies, Poirot does what he does best — locks everyone in a room/palazzo and furiously exercises his little grey cells to work out which one of them is the murderer (as more of them die).

For the present, the rain pours (sometimes into the villa), lightning flashes, thunder crashes, storms rage, light bulbs pop, windows smash, candles go out without warning, water to taps turns on and off at will, the palazzo develops a mysterious basement boom (only there is no basement!) Alarmingly, the telephone rings, (but there’s no-one there)…Tension mounts, as do the screams and the body count….Even Poirot is feeling the tautness of the situation as his hands start to shake uncontrollably and he can’t turn the taps on! (Then the creepy child points out helpfully that he’s left the taps running)…

Thankfully not too gory, this is more of an old school ghost meets crime story which cranks the apprehension up through the unexpected and anticipation of what might horribly happen next. This is achieved through the use of sound, light and dark, angles and shadows of historic architecture, suddenly banging shutters and howling storms, an ominously silent parrot which flies and screeches — abruptly, with the palazzo’s surviving inhabitants fizzing emotions soaring higher and higher, their secrets revealed as the hysteria reaches its zenith. With some great camera work both the pet parrot and the palazzo become characters in the adventure in their own right. There is also Poirot’s mysterious helper…

By focusing on psychic pain and Gothick-ness rather than shock/horror, this haunting is atmospheric and uses the suggestiveness of its audience (and their imaginations) to great effect. We are continuously told stories, including some of the morbid history of the building — how much are we willing to believe? How gullible are we? Combined with these elements are some genuinely sad and moving moments. Throughout the plot developments (and increasing crime scene), the ensemble cast is terrific and the reveals hit home. As with Sherlock Holmes, we know from the start that Poirot will triumph, but how is the teaser as we follow him in his moments of frustration and vulnerability through the wild twists and turns of the movie.

Fun too is to see a starry cast playing against type — Michelle Yeoh is the potentially fraudulent communicator with spirits, Joyce Reynolds; Kelly Reilly is the very glamourous palazzo owner; Amir El-Masry is Poirot’s ‘handy’ bodyguard, bringing some comedy to proceedings; Jamie Dornan is terrific as the very troubled family doctor, as is Jude Hill as the petrifyingly serious Leopold Ferrier. Kyle Allen creates some great outrage and indignation as the former finance Maxime Gerard, who is mysteriously invited to the seance (no-one knows why). Camille Cottin as a former nun turned housekeeper who is a weak nay-saying/warning voice to begin with, but comes into her own at the end as she becomes caring and protective of vulnerable within the villa. Most of all I adore Kenneth Branagh’s Poirot- that natty moustache, his focus on the details of everyone and everything, scribbling away in his notebook and his usually controlled emotions coming to the fore as he seeks a logical conclusion. Is this illogical case getting to him? His investigating zeal and humanity drive the movie and give it its heart. Tina Fey is brash as Ariadne Oliver — I don’t like her character’s behaviour, but watch the movie to see why!…