16 wishes - 2010

A nice little story for teenagers. It was on tv and I had nothing to do so I watched it. I summoned the teenager inside me and let her watch it. :-p Well, it was a bit silly, and full of these characters that are so alien to me, but it wasn't too bad.
Protagonist is about-to-turn-16 Abby (Debby Ryan) who only thinks about herself and what she wants, and who always wanted to grow up to have everything she desired, mainly popularity and clothes. She has a best friend in Jay (Jean-Luc Bilodeau) who of course is in love with her, no surprise there, friendship doesn't exist in this movies. Neighbour Krista (Karissa Tynes) is in constant competition with her, always trying to win against her.
On the day of her 16th birthday, fairy Celeste (Anna Mae Wills) comes to her in unexpected ways. First, her house in infested by wasps and they have to leave it, then she receives a gift, a box with sixteen candles and matches. Since she was eight she has a list of things she's like to do at 16, and those candles are supposed to be wish candles. She tries one as a joke, thinking it can't make things worse (she believes to be in a nightmare already only because she has to take the bus to school :-/). First candle, a famous (I guess) guy appears to wish her a happy birthday, so she realises that candles and wishes are related. Candle number one will grant wish number one, and so on.
She starts using them all in a stupid way, like having a car because Krista has a car, and generally trying to win against her. When at last she goes shopping for a birthday-party-dress, so it happens that Jay was carrying the money and he lost his wallet, so she had no money at all, and the woman working there treated them both like little kids, so Abby wishes to be an adult (or seen like an adult, or treated like an adult, I'm not sure on the words, but it doesn't matter). Wish granted, but it'll take some time for her to realize 'how' it worked. She's now 21, or 22, and has always been for the people living there. She has suddenly lost everything. Her parents wants her to find a job and leave alone, Jay is not her best friend anymore because he's 16 and she's 22, and she also lost her so-precious 16th birthday. Since the party she had planned never happened, her parents apparently gave Krista all her decorations, and she's now having the birthday party she wished for herself. They share the same birthday, but now Krista is different, not competitive, kind, and a better friend for Jay than she ever was.
Finally Abby realizes how selfish she had been: finally!
She tries her last chance to put things right thanks to a picture taken by her parents that same morning.  She wishes for that day to start again, so she can put things right.
It works of course, and this time she makes things different. She gives the money she had saved for her dress to her brother to buy a real guitar, and she confronts Krista wanting to know why she's so competitive with her. She doesn't even remember, but years ago Jay was Krista's best friend, and Abby stole him from her. Now they make peace and have a birthday party together, suddenly friends.
Pretty common stuff, classic teenage-movie.

ITA i 16 desideri

Ella enchanted - 2004

This was very silly, sure, but not too bad. It's set in a fairytale world, where the new king has made slaves of the giants and entertainers-by-law of the elves. When Ella is born, her mother and Mandy (her aunt? I don't know) try to hide her before fairy Lucinda (Vivica Fox) finds her, but they fail. The baby started crying when Lucinda picked her up and wouldn't stop, so Lucinda gave her the 'gift of obedience'. From now on Ella is forced to do whatever she's ordered to do, but must hide this curse from everybody. Her mother dies when she's still a child, and soon her father marries again, for money. The stepmother (Joanna Lumley apparently, I had not recognized her) has two hideous daughters, of course, vain Hattie (Lucy Punch) and dumb Olive. The eldest daughter is quite bossy and is constantly going 'do this, do that', and since Ella is forced to do it, she soon discovers her secret and takes advantage of it, to the point of having her steal and reject rudely her best friend. She's forced to tell her that she never wants to see her again, and she cries while she does so, and also she's offensive in some kind of racist way, still forced by her 'step-family'.
I was rather disappointed that the friend had no more role in it, I had hoped that their friendship would count more, that there might have been scenes with them, like the friend not giving up, believing something was wrong and that Ella would have never treated like that of her own free will.
But there was nothing of the sort. Friendships don't count in this type of movies.
Ella is a good girl, and can't go on living with her step-sisters knowing her secret, so she goes off on  a journey to find Lucinda and have her remove the gift. Mandy is a fairy herself, but really clumsy, she can't do magic properly, to the point that she has turned her boyfriend into a talking book.
On her way, she is saved from some ogres who wanted to eat her by Char (Hugh Dancy), the prince who lives in a state of blind bliss, not knowing anything of what is going on in his world and believing every word his uncle Edgar (Cary Elwes) told him. Char believes that the ogres killed his father, for a start, but it was Edgar, to become king.
Ella and Char journey together (there's also an elf who wants to be a lawyer, but he has no relevance at all) and he finds out about the giants being treated as slaves, but he still believes his uncle to be good, and probably ignorant of it all. Silly.
When they finally get back to his castle, he confesses to his uncle that he wants to marry Ella, and Hattie tells Edgar about Ella's secret, hoping that he'll have Char marry her.
Edgar orders Ella to kill Char, so she goes as far away as she can. When she meets Lucinda, she begs her to take back her 'gift', but Lucinda dismiss her with a simple 'if you don't like my gift, get rid of it yourself', then she's all 'you should be at the ball' and orders her to go, so she's forced to go back to the castle.
She's in love with Char, apparently, and it all started because when he said 'stay' and she came back because forced, he then said 'I don't want you to do what you don't want to do', or something like that, maybe thinking she was obeying because he was her prince-soon-king, and when he proposes she cries her heart out while her hand raises a dagger. She succeeds, however, in breaking the curse by not killing him, because her heart is stronger than magic (as I said, friendships don't count in this movies, although I admit that a murder is much worse than a broken heart).
At this point, she is imprisoned because Char believes she wanted to kill him, and a group of people free her. I understand the elf and the giants, but why would the ogres want to help her? They were not friends, they were going to eat her!
She explains everything to Char, and at the end Edgar finally admits to everything right in front of all the guests, and quite stupidly he forgets he swapped the real crown with a cursed one and puts it on his own head and dies. Come on!
It ends with Ella marrying Char, of course.
I did not like the scene with the elves singing, not a bit, but the scene with the giants singing was not bad, it was a fun party.
I did not like the talking snake and the stupid death of Edgar.
I did not like, as I said above, that there were no more scenes with her best friend. I think she appears at the end, smiling after her when she leaves with Char after the wedding, but that is all. She should have had an active role in helping her. It also seems strange that Hattie found out about her secret in a few days while her best friend had no clue after years of knowing each other. Of course she didn't go around ordering her, but still it happens to everybody to say things like 'stop it' or 'come with me' or whatever else. Spending so much time together, it's quite silly that she had no clue.
Char was stupid and the elf useless.
Mandy was lovely and fun, and she had the best lines of it all. Minnie Driver played Mandy, and she was adorable.
Anne Hathaway played Ella, and did a good job. I'm not a big fan, but still, if this movie is not completely rubbish is 20% Mandy (she has little space) and 80% Hathaway. She's really good here, and the scenes when she's forced to do or say things are the best in the movie.

ITA Ella enchanted-il magico mondo di Ella

Marple - A caribbean mystery -

I didn't like this one very much. It had a few good points, but there were more things I didn't like.
Miss Marple (Julia McKenzie) is taking a little vacation at a Caribbean village. She stays at a little resort run by English couple Tim (Robert Webb) and Molly. I find Robert Webb very nice, but I would have rather seen him in another story playing another character.
It all starts when an old major speaks to Marple about murder and is about to show her the picture of  a murderer who got away with it when he sees something or someone and changes the subject.
The next day he's dead. Heart attack, it would seem, and the local police is satisfied, but Marple isn't.
She has an ally in grumpy and rude Mr Jason Rafiel (sorry, I didn't like him).
It didn't seem bad at first, but then it went slowly but inexorably down. There were two couples of friends, the Dysons and the other ones. Lucky and her husband were not in love anymore but couldn't separate because apparently she killed her husband and then he married her so he would be considered an accomplice. She had an affair with the husband of the other couple, and had him do whatever she wanted, and now he can't take it anymore but is too weak to say no, and his wife knows everything, and I liked her a lot, this strong wife was my favourite.
There is a religious guy who apparently went to a voodoo woman for a love potion, to 'fall out of love' because he was in love with Molly and he thought it to be hopeless.
Molly is losing her mind, not remembering where she's been, seeing things that are not there and such.
Maid Victoria is found killed too, and all suspicions are on crazy Molly.
One night a body is found and they all think it is Molly, but then it turns out to be Lucky Dyson (not so lucky after all) with a shawl just like Molly's. I liked how Tim (well, Robert) said 'oh thank God', it  was very well said, because he was faking relief, and he rendered it perfectly.
I didn't like all that talk about voodoo, it had nothing to do with the real story and it was useless.
Marple reveals the solution when she stops Tim from killing Molly. He had previously killed his wife and got away with it. He wanted now to kill her so he would have been able to sell that land and make lots and lots of money. Businessman Rafiel was there to try and buy the land.
Tim was making Molly mad, poor thing, and he killed the major because he had recognized him that night, then he killed Victoria because she knew too much and had helped him making Molly crazy for money. He killed Lucky Dyson because he mistook her for Molly.
I was rather sorry that they changed Marple's intervention. In the book it was more exciting, her going to Rafiel saying she was the nemesis of the criminals, and asking him to 'lend her' Mr Jackson who was young and fit, with specific orders to do whatever she asked. I liked it more that way, but they changed it.
They added a scene that was supposed to be funny, I guess, or just a 'clever addition', I don't know. They put in the character of not-yet-famous Ian Fleming, who got the name of his famous spy from a man who was taking a lecture on birds; stuttering he said that his name was Bond..uh James Bond. Who would have guessed.

ITA Miss Marple nei caraibi

Marple - Why didn't they ask Evans? -

I didn't like this much, to be honest. It's so confused, I thought it might be a good one at the beginning, but then it became a real mess, with nothing to compare with the real Christie's story.
It starts with what seems to be a silly boy playing alone, but then he hears a noise and sees a man who has fallen on the rocks. The man's barely alive, and before dying he has time and strength to say only a few words: Why didn't they ask Evans? He is identified as a Mr Pritchard. When Bobby has to go to the inquest, he meets an old friend on the train: a young woman called Frankie. She's lovely, the nicest thing in the movie.
When she asks him if he told everything, his Yes is rather unconvincing, and this is because he didn't mention the last phrase the man said before dying. He writes a letter to a man (called Trent) he thinks to be a relative of the deceased  mentioning those words.
Miss Marple is staying at Bobby's house because she's friends with his mother and has known him since he was little. She helps them a little, putting them on the right track by finding the dead man's car. Frankie is rather annoyed, and calls her 'a silly old woman' while Marple walks like a hiker "keep it up" :-/  They find a map and a key in the car.
I understand Frankie, she doesn't know Miss Marple and this was her adventure, with Bobby. Frankie comes from a rich family, and invites him to a party at her house, but when he goes there he sees her surrounded by rich people, smiling, so he goes away without saying hello. Silly boy,  she wanted him to go. Anyway, he goes back home on his bike when a car comes up behind him, and he tries to speed up in his bike :-/  silly boy again, he eventually falls off the road, and when she hears about this Frankie is all excited: did Trent try to kill him after receiving his letter? But here Bobby is still bothered by her smiling at someone else at her party and scorns her enthusiasm, so she goes off on her own. She follow the 'map clue' and goes to Castle Savage; she crashes her car just outside as an excuse to go in. She meets butler Wilson, Roger playing the piano, strange boy called Tom playing with snakes and his sister Dotty who tells her 'please stay' and their mother Sylvia. Doctor Nicholson visits her and then she learns that Sylvia's husband Jack recently died and that he used to work with a Mr Evans.
Marple helps Bobby get aways from his mother by pretending to go to London and have Bobby taking her. Instead, he leaves alone on the train to London, to follow the 'key clue', while Miss Marple goes to Castle Savage instead as Frankie's governess. At first Frankie is rather annoyed, then Marple tells her "something's not right. Wouldn't want to be here without a friend" so Frankie goes from "I don't need help!" to accepting her and sharing her informations with her.
Bobby has found the dead man's hotel and from his room he learns that the man was not called Pritchard, he was John Carstairs.
Doctor Nicholson's wife Moira says that Jack never loved Sylvia, and used to hit on every girl, including her. Bobby comes to Castle Savage as her driver, bringing her her clothes (clothes? for how long does she intend to stay? All this because they can't be so rude as to tell her to go home?).
Bobby meets beautiful Moira (who seems to be afraid of her husband) but is jealous of Roger flirting with Frankie. She rather appreciates Roger's flirting with her, but is jealous of Moira.
Frankie rather unreasonably thinks Evans did it, even after he dies. Bobby suspects the doctor (probably because of Moira) or Roger ( because of Frankie).
It was very very annoying the way they all treated him because they believed him to be her chaffeur, as if it was his place to be humiliated and offended by those who think they're better than him only because they have more money and do nothing all day long, how stupid.
One night he gets tired of this and reveals to everybody in the house that he's actually her friend come to investigate the death of John Carstairs, then he has another fight with Frankie, and the "bloody kids" expression that Marple had on her face after that was the best thing of the whole episode :-p
After Mr Evans' death, the stupid, pompous commander shouts at everybody and eventually wants to arrest dr Nicholson.
Marple goes talking to Tom and Dotty, saying she knows that Carstairs left them their father's will to keep safe, because he knew something was wrong. In the will, he leaves everything to a orphanage in China, but the witnesses are strangers they don't know. That day there was nobody in the house. 'how strange that they didn't ask nurse Florrie to witness the will'...
Marple tells us a bit of family history (this is just guessing, but she guesses right apparently). She met and married George and they were happy, but then they went to China and it was like rules didn't apply anymore and Sylvia had an affair with George's brother Jack.
When Bobby and Frankie go away Marple stays because she knows something's gonna happen. Frankie and Bobby come back very soon, simply because both Moira and Roger have mentioned Sylvia's birthday :-/ so what? what's so suspicious about that? Anyway, that night Moira and Roger enter Sylvia's bedroom, ready to kill her. Marple tries to stall by telling the whole story of how it went, then poor Sylvia was all "do it, I want to die" and now Moira hesitated because this is not how she wanted it, and they all act. Tom shoots Roger, Bobby tries to stop Moira but can't hurt her because she's beautiful, but Wilson takes her syringe and injects her with the poison she intended for Sylvia.
Moira and Roger said they were Sylvia's son and daughter, left in China. He was lucky enough to be adopted by a family (an English family I think) but she wasn't, and she remained there to 'entertain the soldiers'. What does it mean? They were Sylvia and George's children, and Jack left them behind? We knew nothing of the existence of other children until a moment before.
Moira killed Jack by pretending to accept his avances, then Roger pretended to be Jack to make a new will, and called as witnesses the two new gardeners that didn't know the real Jack. The family and Wilson were away because of some reason I didn't get , and Florrie had the day off, so Moira dressed as a maid to let them in, so nobody who knew Jack was there.
Carstairs was the old lawyer who knew Jack well, and he knew that  will could not be right, and he was very close to the truth when he was killed.
Now, as they put it it doesn't seem to make much sense, or maybe I missed something big time.
It is revealed that Evans is Florrie's surname, and the answer to the question "why didn't they ask Evans?" should be : because she would have known that it was not Jack making that will, but put like this I say: because it was her day off and she wasn't there!
Again, it is rather strange that Roger doesn't know who Evans is. He thought they referred to Jack's old partner and killed him? so why at the end Roger asked 'who is Evans?' and how could he not know it was Florrie? If he didn't, how could he know where Carstairs was going and be there to kill him? If he followed him, why didn't he dispose of the car too?
It doesn't make sense. It is completely changed from the book, and for the worse.
At the end of the film, Marple reveals that Florrie Evans in no less than Bobby's new maid, recently married and now called Roberts. I loved her bit at the end. She wants to be called Florence now. She says: "Met Mr Roberts. Treats me like bloody Princess Margareth" :lol: Good for you Florence, way to go :-)

ITA perché non l'hanno chiesto a Evans?

Marple - 4.50 from Paddington - 2004

I liked this very much, one of my favourites no doubt :-) Starting from Marple's friend, coming for a little visit "I'm catching the 4.50 from Paddington" :-) I liked this Elspeth McGillicuddy (Pam Ferris) a lot :-) These two old women together were a hoot :) It goes like this: after having seen, while on the train, a man strangling a woman on a parallel train, she tells everything to Marple, and since nothing can be found on the newspaper about a strangling on a train, they go directly to the "railway police" where inspector Awdrey (Rob Brydon, nice job, just a little over the line here and there) laughs in their faces. They keep thinking about it, neither of them can forget it, so they try taking the same train, and Marple replies to Elspeth's concern with a "I doubt he makes a habit of strangling women on trains" :lol: with that serious/satyrical voice of great Geraldine McEwan :lol:
The scene when they want to reenact the murder was hilarious: Marple"Would you mind strangling me, Elspeth?" - "not at all Jane" - a man on the same wagon looks at them and Marple goes"please don't mind us" :lol: I loved them together :-)
After that, Marple looks at a map and finds the nearest house to the most likely place the body might have been placed/thrown/hidden, but she needs help this time, so she engages a brilliant young girl, Lucy Eyelesbarrow (Amanda Holden), a lovely character, I've always liked this character in the book, and it was well rendered here :-) Good :-)
She works as a housekeeper because she wants to, because she likes what the job can offer her, because she can do it well, she's very good. She likes to change place from time to time, to visit new places and meet new people, and she also likes to take on new adventures and new challenges, so she accepts Marple's request: "I want you to find a body" :-p
Lucy goes to work (and spy) at Rutherford Hall while Miss Marple stays not far away, at Tom's house (John Hannah, lovely from the first second :-D). It won't take him long to ask her: "are you up to something Miss Marple?" - "am I?" :-p  she never lies :-p
Lucy enters the house and meets the family, then she starts sneaking around and even asking questions.
I did not like that scene where Alfred (Ben Daniels) cries over the woman who left him (for another man, she's not the dead one).
One night Lucy goes looking inside the family mausoleum and finds it! Tom comes to the house because he's Detective Inspector Campbell :-) Lucy tells him the whole truth, and he believes her because he knows Miss Marple :-p
Lucy stays at the Hall to keep looking, and they share their news - once he lied about her having some dirt on her chin just to touch her :-p adorable :-p - I really never understood why I like John Hannah so much. He's not exactly beautiful, no, (as always, so very personal opinion) but he's got something, indeed. It may sound silly, but I like the way he looks at people , that intensity of the eyes,   and his smile when Marple gave him a goodnight kiss on the forehead, and his little mouth :-) I find these things adorable :-) Anyway, moving on.
Doctor David Quimper (Griff Rhys Jones) is now engaged to Emma Crackenthorpe (Niamh Cusack), and tells Tom about late Edmund's wife Martine who the family saw only once and nobody knows what became of her. Martine wrote a fortnight ago to say she was coming, but she never arrived. Apparently she wanted money for her son.
Marple goes to Rutherford Hall to meet 'her niece' and look at everyone :-p while Tom is waiting not far away.
Alfred was the first suspect, being the eldest, but he dies too. The rest of the family reunited in the house : Luther Crackenthorpe, Emma's grumpy father (David Warner), her youngest brother Cedric the painter (Ciaràn McMenamin), her brother-in-law Bryan (Michael Landes) with his son Alexander (his wife died giving birth and now he likes Lucy) plus her slimy brother Harold (Charlie Creed-Miles) with his poor, annoying wife Lady Alice (Rose Keegan).
Tom and Marple find out that a French dancer who's gone missing, she had an English husband, but she's not Martine. Martine is alive and well, and comes here with her son to clear things up. She remarried and her son is Alexander's friend James.
Bryan keeps flirting with Lucy, and he's very cute and nice and sweet :-)
So, it would seem like the solution is almost like in the book. The dancer married the doctor years ago, then they separated but she would never accept a divorce, so he killed her to be free to marry Emma. Marple says he did it out of love (:-/ ), to marry her, while in the book it was for her money, if I remember right.
Case solved. Now, a scene I loved was when Tom first meets Lucy, to interrogate her after she found the girl's body:
Tom: you suffer from insomnia and went for a midnight walk and then you thought to look in the mausoleum to see what it was like
Lucy: No
T (confused): no?
L: that's what I told Miss Crackenthorpe, but,  I was looking for the body. A friend of mine told me it was somewhere here
T: why would he, or she, think there was a body at Rutherford Hall?
L: She.. (his face here, he knows it already :-p) a friend of hers saw a woman murdered on a train. I know it sounds improbable, but my friend is never wrong
T: let me guess your friend's name :-p

At the end of the movie, Marple says "that's a girl who travels alone" but she doesn't, Lucy chooses Tom over Bryan, and Marple "I'm not always right" :-p
At Christmas, the three of them, Tom Lucy and Marple, are in Tom's house, and Tom and Lucy sweetly hold hands, and Marple, always the knitting one, has to choose between pink and blue wool :-p How sweet :-)

ITA istantanea di un delitto

Marple - Greenshaw's Folly - 2013

I didn't like this, sorry. I did like Louisa and Alfred and Catherine, but they didn't have all that much space.
The story: Marple (Julia McKenzie) helps a young woman (Louisa=Kimberley Nixon) and her son. She lets them stay one night at her house, then she takes them to her old friend Catherine Greenshaw (Fiona Shaw), at Greenshaw's Folly. Louisa is running away from her husband Philip, a sadist that used to burn both her and Archie's arms, he liked hurting them. Louisa tells only Alfred about her husband. Well, Marple knows and probably Catherine too, but nobody else does.

Catherine's nephew (what was his name?? I couldn't catch it the whole time) comes and meets them, and also steals the last piece of cake from the child, and that makes him immediately unlikeable.
The butler is found dead, killed says Miss Marple, who is staying for a while to help with the knitting for the Church's orphanage and also to look after Archie.
Mr Bindler keeps sneaking around; the gardener Alfred (Martin Compston) is nice, but mistreated by 'the nephew', always offensive. Father Brophy seems to be always in search for money, he goes to Catherine too asking for some, but she knows at last that he'll use it for his gambling and his drinking, not for the children.
A Funny moment was when Miss Marple went to the police station to talk to the inspector, and it would seem that they were having bets on 'how long before she comes here', it seems like they all know her there. What I don't understand is: if they do know about her, why is it that inspector Welch (John Gordon Sinclair) keeps treating her as an annoyance, as a stupid, annoying old lady?
Marple asks for a postmortem and he says "but you're still alive Miss Marple" :lol:
She wants a postmortem conducted on the butler's body, because she's sure that something's not right about it. They say he was drunk and fell, but she doesn't believe it to be that simple. Anyway, her request is denied :-/
Alfred spends some time with Archie, when the obnoxious  nephew is not around, and when Louisa says that sooner or later they will go away to have a proper home somewhere, Archie complaints:"I don't want to go to another Country, I want to stay here with Alfred" :-) Good boy :-)
Up to this moment there is no case, but Marple keeps investigating, trying to see the records, but they are missing, and trying to understand Bindler's notes, since he has disappeared.
When Catherine sees Alfred with some silver things she thinks he is trying to steal from her. Alfred has been in prison for three months for theft, so it's an easy assumption, I guess.
One day Louisa sees through her window that Catherine has been shot with an arrow, but she can't do anything. Archie's father comes looking for the boy, but he runs away to Alfred, who helps him by knocking the man down. I like Alfred, it's a pity that I only understood half of what he said.
The police come to investigate a clear murder now, and Mrs Cresswell (Julia Sawalha) tells the police "I saw him stealing. Do you think he did this to keep her quiet?"
Since Alfred has a "criminal record" the police is quite happy to suspect him, not caring that one single theft when you're young and stabbing a woman through the neck are two very different things.
Cicely (Judy Parfit), Marple's old friend, talks to Marple about the old professor's experiment, back when she was a child and her brother died, then Miss Marple finds Mr Bindler's body.
Trying to take advantage of the dark and the confusion, Philip tries again to take away Archie, but Alfred stops him hitting him on the head.
Marple explains a few first things while the inspector is still completely lost: Bindler was actually a reporter, sneaking around trying to find proof for his scoop on the experiments that were conducted by the old professor (Catherine's father I think). The professor had used the children of the orphanage for his experiments, injecting them with the polio virus to develop a vaccine. Some of them were left paralyzed, many of them died, and Cicely was there and that nightmare still haunts her. At this point the dumb inspector suspects Cicely of the murder, over 70-year-old Cicely... :-/
Bindler must have found out something else, that got him killed... Only at this point the inspector will grant her request for an autopsy, but only on the butler, not on Catherine.
The nephew reveals to be the only heir, faking big surprise "do you think it is a joke?" :-/ and the priest is very disappointed to hear that his 'orphanage' will get no money at all.
The inspector is ready to arrest Alfred, "a clear cut suspect" he says, but Marple stops him promising new evidence that will prove his innocence. She actually starts a long speech. The butler and Catherine were both poisoned before they were killed. The priest stole the silverware to repay his debts, and loyal Alfred was trying to put everything back without betraying him. Cresswell dressed up as Catherine and faked the arrow wound that Louisa saw from her window. Cresswell locked both Archie and Louisa, then 'the nephew' locked her and killed the sedated Catherine (not clear to me which one of them killed Catherine, but it doesn't matter, as she killed the butler and he killed Bindler, so they are both murderers anyway). He then rushed back for the curtain call at the theatre.
He had said previously that his mother died in childbirth. Truth is: that Greenshaw woman died indeed in childbirth, but the baby died too; her husband remarried and had a son. So, Cresswell is his mother, but he is not 'a nephew', he isn't related to Catherine at all.
Cracken the butler died because he had found out that they were mother and son, and Bindler because he had discovered that Catherine had a son of her own, someone that would inherit everything.
It turns out that Alfred is Catherine's own son, although he didn't know. He had sent him away to keep him safe because she was afraid of her father, something like that.
Alfred owns everything now; he'll help the orphanage and he asks Louisa to stay, as the secretary he says of course, it's quite too early to talk about feelings :-)

Marple - A murder is announced - 2004

I didn't like this episode very much, I'm afraid. I liked the actors, I liked some things so similar to the original story, so I can't exactly put my finger on the problem. I simply didn't "feel" it.
The story: A strange advert on the local newspaper reads: "A murder is announced, and will take place on Friday, September 25th, at Little Paddocks, at 7.30pm. Friends please accept this the only intimation". Quite bizarre indeed, so much so that even the owner of Little Paddocks Miss Letitia Blacklock (Zoe Wanamaker) knows nothing of it. Of course at 7.30 a group of people comes knocking at her door to see what it is all about, dying with curiosity. In the house live Letitia with old friend Dora "Bunny" Bunner (Elaine Page, so nice), plus two young women and a young man, but this part is a bit confusing to me I'm not sure I remember it correctly. Half the time I kept confusing the two women, never knowing who was who, and even at the end I'm not sure I got it right. Let's try : a woman pretended to be a cousin of Letitia, but she was in fact the only living relative (she and her brother, if he's alive, which I think he is if he is the husband of the other woman) of a man who's left Letitia all his money. So, she's Emma, and the other woman is the wife of Pip, a deserter she wants out of her life, and away from her son. I think. Not sure about the man, maybe he really was her cousin??  The only 'help' seems to be a maid, escaped from Poland or something: Mitzi(Catherine Tate!! I thought all time long that I knew her, I knew this actress, but had not recognized her!! Amazing!)
The guests are Amy (Claire Skinner) and her friend Hinchcliffe (Frances Barber): I liked them so much in the book, their relationship was heartbreaking. Colonel Easterbrook (Robert Pugh), Sadie (Cherie Lunghi) with her son Edmund (Christian Coulson) - well, at least I think that Edmund was her son, or was Edmund the name of the 'cousin'? Fact is, I remember only one name, I have no idea what the other was. They are all gathered in the same room, and at 7.30pm the lights go out, a man barges in with a torch, shouting, then gunshots are heard and at the end we see a young man, dead. He was a Swiss clerk, Rudy something.
Miss Marple (Geraldine McEwan) gets herself invited to stay over at Amy's house, as she's the daughter of an old friend. This way, Marple can follow the investigation up close and help the police :-p
D.I. Craddock (Alexander Armstrong) is at first very annoyed by her interference, but then realizes she talks no nonsense, and starts listening to her :-) The first question, since Letitia has been slightly hurt, is : where they trying to kill her? She explains it makes no sense because she has no money now, but she will inherit a lot of money after the death of a woman in Scotland; still, if Letty dies first, then another family will inherit, with twins Pip and Emma.
Bunny is a dear old friend of the Blacklocks, she knew both the sisters. There's only Letty now because Lotty died in Switzerland. Having tea with Miss Marple, though, Bunny keeps referring to Letty as "Lotty".
One night, at Bunny's birthday party, Archie (the colonel) after a few too many drinks, insists on reenacting the night of the murder, saying that the murderer must be one of the people in the room that night, and he realizes that from where she was standing, Amy was the only one not blinded by the light, so she could see who of them was not present in the room in that moment. He presses her, they all look at her, and she can't remember and is really agitated.
Archie had a sort of relationship (in the making, maybe one might say) with Sadie, who that day went to Letty's house to steal a meat dish "to treat Archie" and she saw Letitia coming home early. Her son is jealous and possessive, and also doesn't like the colonel because he is a drinker, so he tries his best to break them up. The colonel drinks even more now because he saw the gun that killed the poor guy, and it was his gun, but he did not have a license for it so could not go to the police. Her son learns about this and tells the police. He admits everything, that he hasn't seen his daughter in ten years after her mother divorced him because of the drinking, and that "Sadie is the best thing that ever could have happened", poor colonel he didn't want her to know that he had been thrown out of the army (again because of the drinking).
The morning after the party Bunny is found dead. On a rainy day, Amy suddenly remembers something and goes out to tell Hinch. She shouts "she wasn't there" but Hinch has work to do and doesn't go to her immediately. Amy gets strangled while she was trying to get the laundry in. Marple sees her from a window, on the ground, and goes out to her, and cries in the rain. With her, Hinch too. I remember in the book that when she died her girlfriend was devastated. She didn't look as much here, actually: sad, yes, without any energy left, maybe, but in the movie it didn't have the same impact on me as in the book.
Miss Marple puts all the pieces together and explains to everybody how it went. First she lets out the secrets of those young women that had nothing to do with the murder. They had lied to get close to Letitia, yes, but only in hope that after getting to know them, maybe becoming friends, Letitia would have provided for them with a small allowance. Then Marple goes on to serious things.
Mitzi barges in with a knife shouting at Letty, shouting that she had killed Amy, that it's always the innocents who suffer. How true actually. And she was right on the spot.
Let's explain it all: Years ago, in Switzerland, it was Letty, Letitia, who died. Lotty, Charlotte, pretended to be Letty to inherit the money, because that man was not related to them in any way. He had worked with Letty and she had helped him when he was in need, so he thought of leaving everything to his wife first, because he loved her of course, then at his wife's death everything would go to Letty, so Lotty pretended to be Letty, and went where nobody knew them. Except for Dora.
Letty killed the Swiss guy because he had recognized her one day, and he knew them back in Switzerland, and he probably could tell which sister was she, and she killed Bunny because of all the careless mistakes she kept making that "could reveal too much". Letty loved her very much, such an old friend, so she gave her a wonderful party and then drugged her. Of course Letty also killed Amy, for the obvious reason that Amy had rememberer that Letty was non in the room where she should have been, that night.
At the end, I was glad to see that Sadie goes home with one hand on Archie's arm and the other on her son's.

ITA un delitto avrà luogo

Marple - The murder at the vicarage - 2004

I liked this one, the actors and the story, and they also put Mark Gatiss in it, which is always a good and proper thing to do. I also liked Jason Flemyng (how he talked and his voice) and Janet McTeer very much.
We see Marple's past, when she was a girl (Julie Cox) in love. We see captain Hemsworth having his picture taken (December 1915), while Mrs Hemsworth is there, a bit sad that he doesn't want her to go to the station to say goodbye. Then we see him meeting young Jane at the station, and if in the scene before he had said "my darling Lizzie" now he says "Jane, my darling" ... come on Jane Marple, a married man?? Apparently he had a word with the photographer to have a copy of the picture sent to her, that's how she has it. Anyway, she loved him and cried, but made her choice: I've had to make a choice, I've chosen to do my duty. Come back safe but for your wife not for me"

Marple's house is right in front of the vicarage, so she story starts with her seeing the vicar "early for a change" and then meeting everyone in the church. Right after, troubles arise when Marjorie is sure she put a pound in the church box, but apparently the church raised less than a pound so where did it go? Colonel Protheroe (Derek Jacobi) is a judge and also warden, so he wants a full investigation.He is a very unpleasant man, shouting at everybody and breaking poor Mr Hawes' bike with his car,  although in this particular case he is quite right. What happens when a priest does something wrong somewhere? They send him somewhere else, where nobody knows him, they still do it, but I'll come back to Mr Ronald Hawes (Mark Gatiss) later. We know all the characters before anything bad happens. The vicar Leonard "Lenny" Clement (Tim McInnerny) and his wife Griselda (Rachael Stirling), the colonel's wife Anne (Janet McTeer) and his daughter Lettice (Christina Cole), plus painter Lawrence Redding (Jason Flemyng) and mysterious Mrs Sylvia Lester (Jane Asher). Mr Hawes being "a bag of nerves" and always taking pills, Lettice being painted in a bathing suit to the anger of her father, Marple reading Raymond Chandler's novel "the simple art of murder" :-p We see the colonel/judge sending the vicar's maid's young man to prison for 29 days, and Redding keeping his gun loose in the house for anybody to see.
Things start getting complicated when the vicar sees Anne and Lawrence kissing in the shed, and also all the women in Marple's house see what happened, so their secret relationship's not secret anymore.
Sylvia Lester meets the colonel and tells him about his wife's affair.
Redding talks to Marple and says "I do love her you know", because now everybody knows about it, and he also says "nothing gets past you Miss Marple, does it?" - "hardly ever", the quite proud reply.
Anne is a friend of Marple, so she goes to her house because Marple has hurt her ankle and can't walk  as before. She receives a phone call calling her to the vicarage. Redding had just spoken to the vicar and stated that he was going to break it up and go away, so when Anne goes in the shed it is assumed that the two of them are about to break up. The vicar also got a phone call and went away, and when he came back he found the colonel shot dead in the study.
Inspector Slack (Stephen Tompkinson) comes to investigate and at first he treats Marple like an old stupid, but quite soon he'll have to change his opinion :-p
Lettice suspects Anne for the murder, but Redding goes to confess. His story however is not satisfying. The murder is supposed to have taken place at 6.20pm because the clock was knocked off and broken, but Marple says "I'm afraid I must put a cat among inspector Slack's pigeons" (:lol: that's another book), and also "it's the clock. I happen to know Mrs Clement put it a quarter of an hour fast on Sunday to improve the vicar's punctuality". Anne confesses too, but Marple saw that she had no bag and no way to conceal a gun in that dress. The bullet came from Redding's gun, though.
Anne and Lawrence play it heartbroken now, for their story is supposed to be over. Stranger Sylvia reveals to be Lettice's mother who now wants her back in her life. Sylvia divorced the colonel because she liked parties and had a little fling (actually, how she came to marry such a man in the first place??), then her second husband died and she finally found the courage to look for Lettice.
I loved that when the vicar found Anne's earring in the study  (Lettice put it there) he told Marple instead of the police :-) and he also shows her the anonymous letter "watch your wife" :-p it's very easy for Marple to discover (somehow, we are not told how) that it was Marjorie, she had seen Griselda with a young man, plus she was not where she said she was.
The vicar's jealousy was quite sweet. "I'm so lucky, she could have had anyone"; Marple says "she chose you" but he's probably worried that she might want something more that a life at the vicarage. Now he's jealous, afraid she might have a fling with Redding who is making her portrait. Sweet silly man :-) Griselda had kept a secret knowing how gossipy the village is, and had consulted a cousin doctor to be sure. She's pregnant, and they're happy together again :-)
There's a French professor staying at the Colonel's house with his granddaughter. He was there to find proof against the colonel: during the war he betrayed his grandson who died, tortured and killed. The girl was actually in special operations, and was to marry him. The professor that day went to kill the colonel but was too late as he found him already dead.
I like Mark Gatiss a lot, I like how he says his lines :-) when that old gossipy woman asked him "was there much blood?" and he replied "how would I know that?" I so liked the way he said that :-)
Miss Marple finds out that Mr Hawes was sent away (from where he was before..) for 'fiddling with the accounts', and not it appears he has committed suicide because the colonel had accused him of stealing, but luckily he is saved. The inspector tells Marple "nothing gets past you Miss Marple , does it?" and again she replies "hardly ever", and now she understands everything, how they had tried to play her. "How clever!" she exclaims almost in admiration, then "how wicked" with reproach. She has Dennis take her to Ronald's house in a sidecar :-p to tell the inspector the whole truth.
Anne had hurt Marple's ankle on purpose, to have her stay at home. Redding hide his gun with a silencer in the study, then quietly had his talk with the vicar. It had been all deliberate, to have the vicar find them together. Then Redding phoned twice: to send the vicar away from home and the second to Marple's cottage for Anne. She had on purpose that dress on, so that Marple could see she had no gun with her. Anne went into the study, took the hidden gun and shot her husband dead. Redding later removed the gun and put the fake note, and took the colonel's real note, and reset the clock "knowing it was fast" and broke it, and then he used the colonel's real note to implicate Hawes in the murder, when he tried to kill him (it wasn't suicide of course).
Redding was no stranger to Anne when he came to St Mary Mead. He was her great love that "didn't come back from the fighting", unless he did come back, four years later when she was already Mrs Protheroe. He kept away, apparently he was too decent to look for her now that she was married, so she found him.
At the end, she talks about it with Miss Marple who thought of her as a good friend, and then she asks: "what did we do wrong?" - "you ask me that?" - "what mistakes did we make?" :-/ she still doesn't consider what she did wrong, apparently :-/
Anyway, Marple says "when you came out of the shed with him you were the same woman, you hadn't said goodbye to the man you loved?" - "you could tell that?" - "you think I've never... I've lost someone in the war who got a medal for dying. His wife will have cherished it"- "His wife? Easier for you then Jane, he was dead, you didn't have to choose between right and wrong"
Of course we know that she did choose, before he left, but Marple says nothing to her.
At the end, Marple is reading a new book (we had seen that the other was at the final pages) and it is "farewell my lovely" :-p

Marple - The body in the library - 2004

One of the best episodes, for sure, although I haven't seen all of them. This was a good one, I liked it from the start. I really enjoyed Joanna Lumley as Dolly Bantry, a real pleasure. Marple was Geraldine McEwan, both funny and intriguing. It starts of course with the maid finding the body of a dead girl in the library, at Gossington Hall, and Dolly phoning Miss Marple right away :-p
I love scenes like the one with the policeman telling Dolly "nobody is allowed inside" and Dolly replying "oh nonsense" and going right in with Miss Marple :-p  so English-upper-class-superiority-complex :-p
Colonel Melchett was fun too (only at bits a bit exaggerated).
Arthur Bantry (James Fox) "I don't know her"- Melchett"the question is then, what the hell is she doing in your library?" I liked how he said that :-p
Of course the next thing to do was to find out who she was. A guest of the Majestic Hotel, Mr Jefferson (I think) reported missing a young dancer, Ruby Keen, and her cousin Josie (Mary Stockley) was able to identify the body, so the investigation moves to the hotel where Mr Jefferson stays with his son-in-law Mark (Jamie Theakston) and his daughter-in-law Adelaide (Tara Fitzgerald) and her son Peter. His son and daughter died seven years ago when a rocket hit nearby their house; now he's an invalid who feels lonely, therefore he befriended Ruby, finding her young and lively; he grew so fond of her he had decided to adopt her and leave her his money.
Another body, of a young girl, is found in a burned car, the one that guest Bartlett (David Walliams) reported missing. The superintendent (Jack Davenport) asks Miss Marple a little favour: he had her present while he was questioning all the young girl's friends, and she saw which one of them had more to tell: apparently poor Pamela had gone to a screen-test before disappearing.
I liked Marple a lot here, giving unrequested help to colonel Melchett (Simon Callow) before stating innocently "but please don't let me keep you", and asking questions about the fingernail clippings found in Ruby's room. I like how she looked with that thing in her hair, a nice Charleston-look, very nice, although she also looked exceedingly white. My gosh how white she looked!
She talked to Mark (I liked him, sort of) who said he liked Josie, while Dolly was talking to Adelaide, who said she liked Mark.. but apparently the like the same thing, because the solution is this: the "body in the library"'s fingernails were bitten, not cut, therefore she was not Ruby, so of course suspicions fall towards Josie who lied in identifying her: why? Because she had a lover who wanted Ruby gone. Josie and Adelaide had fallen madly in love, but because Josie hurt her ankle and called Ruby to replace her as the Hotel's dancer, Adelaide's son Peter was about to lose his inheritance (Peter was her first husband's son, not blood related to Mr Jefferson) so she planned to get rid of her. Adelaide looked for a young girl and pretended to be a film producer to get her where she wanted, then Josie did her make up and her hair (she made her blonde like Ruby) then they drugged her. That night, the only one to leave the table had been Adelaide, who took Pamela to Basil Blake's house and there she strangled her and went back to the hotel where Ruby was still alive and dancing.
At 2am Blake (Ben Miller with a dreadful hairdo) came home leaving Dinah Lee alone at a party, and upon finding the body an idea came to his mind: "it seemed quite good at the time". He took the body to Gossington Hall to "implicate Arthur as a sort of joke"- Dolly"I'm not bloody laughing!" :lol: She's great here :-)
I did not like at all Blake's hair and drunk scenes, but I did like Marple understanding that Basil and Dinah (Emma Cooke) were married and not simply living together: "the kind of quarrels you two have..". I loved that bit in the book too :-)
So, poor Pamela goes from : drugged and brought to the hotel room, to strangled in Blake's house, to dumped in Bantry's library, dressed obviously with one of Ruby's dresses. When Ruby went to change for the next dance, she went to Josie's room as told and fell asleep because drugged, and Josie killed her with an injection, then Josie changed and went to dance in her place. In the morning, she dressed Ruby as Pamela, cut her nails and put the clippings in her room, then put her in a car and set the fire. There, the plan was: Basil will be suspected and nobody will think of the Majestic guests, and anyway Josie had apparently no motive, and Adelaide had apparently an alibi. Still, Marple has no proof, so she has Mr Jefferson tell Adelaide he wants to leave his money to charity, so Josie tries to kill him but is stopped and arrested, and the almost last scene sees Josie and "Addy" shouting their love for each other through a locked door. It might have been heartbreaking, had they not been so evil. Marple:"when you're in love you think you're invincible, it blinds you"
It ends with Mark hugging Peter (I didn't like that scene) and Marple looking at the old picture of a man in uniform, her lost love.
I loved when Dolly said "isn't she marvelous?" and also when she described Marple as having "such a refreshingly low opinion on human nature" :lol: I liked her a lot, and her presence plays a big part on why I enjoyed this episode so much more than many others.

ITA c'è un cadavere in biblioteca

Marple - A pocket full of rye - 2008

Here Miss Marple is Julia McKenzie, but she's so different from the previous actress that I'm not going to make any comparison between them. I like them both. This is one of those times when the story follows quite well the original plot in the book, I think.
The story begins with orphan Gladys (Rose Heiney) leaving Miss Marple after working for her for some time. They are clearly fond of each other: Marple says "be careful, specially of the young men"; Gladys says "you've been ever so good to me Miss Marple", then off she goes. Nine months later we see Rex Fortescue feeling very bad and shouting "what the hell did you put in the tea?" to his secretary, but luckily for her after the man's death it is proven that he was poisoned much earlier, and her tea had nothing to do with it. They find his pocket full of "cereal, rye it looked like to me" which explains the title. The investigation moves to his house where he had his breakfast (well, his first breakfast apparently, Englishmen are all hobbits it would seem). When questioned, Gladys (now working here as a maid) says first thing "I didn't do it sir, I didn't really", and on why she left Miss Marple she says "I wanted to change, I wanted to see the world". Poor girl.
After Rex, his young wife is poisoned too, and Gladys is found dead in the garden, because this apparently fits with some nursery rhyme the murderer is enacting. Marple reads of her death in the papers, and comes knocking at their door offering her help as someone who knew Gladys. She talks to the inspector, trying to have her way by the means of flattering: "you have the look of a young Errol Flynn about you", and also "you strike me as a most intelligent and if I may say so impressive young man" all this to get what she wants "would it be presumptuous if I were to offer assistance in some very humble way (..)people do tend to confide in old ladies, don't you think?" :-p
So she starts investigating, looking around and talking to people in the house. There's the cook Mrs Crump and her husband, a disgusting old drunk. There's Mary Dove (Helen Baxendale) who sort of run the house: "it's a job, one I do to the best of my ability; people would pay anything, anything, to be spared the domestic worries". She also says "take no notice of me, I'm a malicious creature", and at the end it apparently turned out that every household she worked for was robbed after she left, implying I gather that she was part of the gang, informing the thieves, which is quite bad, and I was sorry to hear that because I kind of liked her. I don't remember what was of her in the book...
Little warning, lots of spoilers right ahead.
In the house now there are late Mr Fortescue's sons and daughter. Percival (Ben Miles) who worried about the family business that Rex was destroying, affected by dementia he had been losing money for the last 18 months, selling good stocks and buying bad ones; Lancelot (Rupert Graves) come back  from Kenya, and their wives; also Elaine, who was in love with a man that had disappeared because her father strongly disapproved, but is back now ready to marry her.
Inspector Neele (Matthew MacFayden) suspects Percival, because since his father would not admit to being ill ("I don't need no bloody doctor!") his sudden death saved him from sure bankruptcy. Lancelot is the black sheep of the family, but his wife is quite lovely: she already lost two husbands, and as Marple puts it "she's the kind that always marries the bad lot".
The nursery rhyme thing was all a pretense, a distraction, to throw attention and suspicion on a family that hated Rex Fortescue.
When Mr KcKenzie died (of a fever, Rex said) Rex took his "Blackbird Mine". Mrs McKenzie once came to the house with her children, and raised them to hate him. Now her son is dead, and her daughter has changed her name and married Percival as a kind of 'subtle vengeance', and she was the one to put dead black birds in his office, but that was it; the murderer was Lancelot, who had met and easily seduced Gladys, and sent her to work there after telling her a pack of lies. Gladys poisoned Rex not knowing it was poison, than Lancelot killed her. Marple explains it all to the inspector, and then she goes away, although it looks like to me that there are no proof yet against him, and yet it would seem like they're about to arrest him.
Once back home, Marple sees a letter that, exactly like in the book, has arrived late because it had been delivered to the wrong address. It was from Gladys, seeking her advice after Rex's death, and the letter told her exactly what she had suspected and told the inspector, plus it included a picture of her man Albert, a picture of Lancelot. If necessary, she has now all the proof they need.
The reading of the letter was quite a touching moment, and Marple herself was rather touched by poor Gladys' words and fate. Poor silly girl that had believed every word he had said to her..
A curious detail: Mrs McKenzie says "nothing is settled until it is settled right", the same words Dr Calgary said in "ordeal by innocence".
One more thing: it rather surprised me that I did not like Rupert Graves here, but maybe it is a compliment to his acting, that I found him as much slimy and unpleasant here as he is gorgeous, funny and generally lovely in Sherlock.

ITA polvere negli occhi

Marple - The moving finger - 2005

I liked it. Marple (Geraldine McEwan) is staying at a little village (the name I can't remember) to attend colonel Appleton's funeral (I think it was he who many years ago told her that her young man had died in the war... so they were somehow official??). Jerry Burton (James D'Arcy) and his sister Joanna (Emilia Fox) come to live here in the country for a while: doctor's orders after he injured himself (he had an accident while riding his bike utterly drunk). Anonymous letters are received by almost everyone in town, and when Mrs Symmington is found dead everyone thinks of suicide, believing the letter true. Her maid, however, is found clearly murdered a week after the "suicide".
Other characters are: Mr Pye (John Sessions) who I believe implied that the colonel killed himself because of all the gossip concerning his relationship with Mr Pye himself... I'm not sure though, this is what I thought , so the colonel was not killed.
Next person to die is Mrs Symmington. Her daughter Megan (Talulah Riley) is invited to stay at Joanna and Jerry's house, so Megan and Jerry spend a week together and secretly fall for each other, so when she discovers poor maid Agnes' body she goes to him.
Another important character is Elsie Holland, Mr Symmington's boys' nanny, a beautiful girl (Kelly Brook) who has never received one of those nasty letters, maybe the only one in town who hasn't.
Spoiler warning, now the final solution.
Jerry is afraid Megan could be the one who wrote those letters because she herself admitted very candidly that she doesn't like anyone in town "because they don't like her", but Miss Marple knows the truth and asks for her help.
She goes to her stepfather to blackmail him, and that night he tries to kill her, but the police (and Jerry) stop him and save her. Mr Symmington had written those fake letters so that everyone would believe his wife committed suicide, but in truth he killed her, and the maid too because she had not seen anyone deliver any mail to their house that day. He wanted to keep his good reputation but also wanted Elsie (I say, Marple understood this when she saw him looking at Elsie's breast, when they were all gathered at a funeral). At the end, Joanna stays in town, probably to stay with the local doctor, while Jerry wants to go away, but before going he takes Marple's advice and goes to Megan. It's a very nice scene: in the garden, she has a pair of black trousers on and 'ballerina shoes' in a sort of Audrey Hepburn style, and he's quite dashing in his red shirt (he looks good in colours) and he makes a nice speech and then he kisses her. Quite a pretty scene, with Marple looking at them through the window with an awww expression on her face :-)
The thing goes like this: he says he's going away, and Marple says "perhaps what you're looking for is right here under your nose". He understands she's talking about Megan and says "she doesn't want me Miss Marple", then she talks about the man she once let go and never came back from the war, encouraging him to try again. He goes to her. Megan:"thanks for pulling me out of the oven" :-)
She didn't know what else to say :-p
Jerry: "I'm absolutely sure, you see, quite quite certain that to look after you, to make you happy and keep you from harm is now the purpose of my life. Is there anything I can say or do to make you reconsider?" she shakes her head but keeps looking at him, as if waiting for more, then he has her stand up and he kisses her and she kisses him, and Marple watches at the window :-)


ITA il terrore viene per posta

Marple - Murder is easy - 2008

Well, not the best one but I did like it, a lot, because it had its good moments and good acting performances , plus it had Benedict Cumberbatch in it, which is always a nice touch. My favourite thing of it all, though, is the scene in the train, at the beginning. Perfectly done scene, lovely acting by Julia McKenzie (Marple) and Sylvia Syms (Lavinia Pinkerton). I liked it very much. Marple reading her newspaper, sort of embarrassed by this other passenger who starts talking to her. She replies barely looking up, then Lavinia says "I have to report a murder" and Marple stops reading and takes off her glasses, suddenly interested :-p It's Lavinia that says "murder is easy you see, as long as nobody thinks it is murder. Which they don't. Except for me" then she talks about it in a rather confusing manner, and Marple finds it hard to follow: "you suspect this humble bee to be the murderer?" or something like that :-p and here again I liked a lot the way they both said their "oh nonononono" :-p I don't know why, I find it very funny and lovely. Lavinia explains "I suspect he's going to be the next victim" then starts worrying about being herself in danger. It was  a sort of touching scene when Lavinia said "I will be alright, won't I?" and Marple replied "I do hope so"-"so do I" It was very well done.
Then the story begins. Marple reads that Lavinia died before even leaving the station, let alone talking to Scotland Yard, so she goes to her funeral, pretending to know her (although her pretense is mostly made of untold-facts. She never says she was a friend, she never actually lied). She pays a lot of attention to everybody, then pretends to miss the train in order to stay there (I know a lot of fangirls who would do the same, just to take Benedict's arm :-p ).
Luke Fitzwilliam (Benedict Cumberbatch) is the first to approach her, and being an ex police officer he sees right through her little scheme, so Marple tells him everything. At first he doubts her story, but she says Dr Humbleby might be the next victim and the doctor dies, so he joins her in investigating the matter.
Now to the ending, otherwise it'll be too long to explain. It's all about something that happened 22 years ago (because of this, since it was so long ago, I find exaggerated the scenes when they worry about Honoria's feelings for Hugh; I mean, did they spend 22 years apologising every day? Anyway, as you watch it the first time you don't know it's a 22-year-old story).
Back to what happened: 22 years ago Hugh Horton (David Haig) asked Honoria (Shirley Henderson) to marry him, but she had to look after her mentally retarded brother Leonard, so she refused. When Hugh and Lydia (Anna Chancellor) fell in love and got engaged, it was hard for her. One night Leonard went to him, to ask why she was so downbeat, and Hugh tried to explain about attraction, what Honoria meant (or had meant) for him, and they drank a lot and also talked about sex "I had to convey some basic stuff, he wanted to know what he was missing", says Hugh. So utterly drunk as he was, Leonard went home and "forced himself" on Honoria, he raped her, but she could not tell the police because she didn't want them to lock him away, and yet she had to do something or else he might do it again, so in the morning she pushed him in the river and he drowned. A few weeks later it all started: she asked dr Humbleby about abortion "for a friend", but he wouldn't help, so she went to Florence, a woman who knew everything about herbs and potions. At last, though, she could not go through with it, and hide until the baby was born, then she put it in a basket and let the river take him away. Lydia found it (at the nearest village, or something) and gave it to a childless American couple to take care of. They left for America and all seemed forgotten, until Bridget Conway (Margo Stilley) came here to find out the truth. She is that baby, all grown up and making Luke drool, and she wants to know at all costs. Honoria "knew my sin must never see the light of day" so she tried to prevent Bridget from finding out what happened: she put bad mushrooms in Florence's  stew and stirred (how could she know nobody else would have eaten it? Well, she probably didn't care at all, as long as Florence died too) then she killed the vicar, because when he saw her crying, back then, she had confided in him. He had promised to keep the secret and never speak of it to anyone but "how could I be sure..".
The doctor was obviously one to kill (and not just because he was a hateful man) so Honoria made sure he cut his finger, then she touched the band with her sick cat's puss. Lavinia was too chatty, plus she had spoken of it to her cat (:-/) and Honoria had heard everything, and gone after her and pushed her down the stairs (these were the times when being pushed down the stairs or stabbed once was enough to kill you right away. Not like nowadays movies, where the hero is thrown against walls, stabbed, shot, but can still win in an hand-to-hand combat :-p)
Then we come to Amy who was now pregnant (that hideous James Abbot). Amy knew of her abortion (she thought Honoria had had one) and asked for her help, so Honoria killed her too by replacing her cough cure with hats-dye. Last one was Lydia, who knew who Bridget was because had recognized the birth mark on her neck (sure, but how did she know it was Honoria's baby? I mean, she must have known because she sent Hugh to tell her "Lydia asked me to tell you she's decided to do the right thing" so she knew Honoria was the mother, but in this case, it means Lydia knew more than anybody else, so why wasn't she killed first??)
Honoria infected her with lots of insuline and drowned her in the bathtub. That's all, I think.
A photo of Lydia was the only thing Bridget had to go on. Hugh had felt bad about drinking with Leonard, thinking that because of this he had slipped and died, so he bribed the coroner at the inquest to hide the fact. Mrs Humbleby was Jemma Redgrave, and her daughter Rose could finally love her Jeff, Dr Thomas (James Lance), after her impossible father's death.
The officer in charge was PC Terence Reed (Russell Tovey) who accepted Miss Marple's help : "I feel I just took an exam"- "you passed!" :-p
What else? Bridget said Luke was "gorgeous", and when he asked her "why did you come? what are you looking for?" she replied "not you. yet" :-p
The bit about the book was not clear to me. "Nature's poisons" was missing from the library, and I understand that Amy took it and left it in the church where the new vicar found it and returned it. Now, it had been missing for five years, apparently, so why the girl (was it Rose?) kept noticing its absence now? and why Amy took it five years ago if she was pregnant now? I missed something here,  too many characters and facts and faces I find it hard to remember with my bad memory; it was the first time Amy was pregnant or she wouldn't have asked for Honoria's help, she would have known what to do. So who took the book? Amy had spoken to Marple about how her "mom and uncle Henry" helped people, so Amy knew about that herbs that induce abortion...
I am clearly missing something here...


ITA E' troppo facile

Marple - At Bertram's Hotel - 2007

A complicated one, there was everything in it: murderers, thieves, spies, organizations, even Nazi criminals and Nazi-hunters, and of course so many people I had trouble putting together faces and names. It all starts with Miss Marple (Geraldine McEwan) staying for a nice little holiday at the Bertram's Hotel that she remembers from when she was a little girl ( I think in the book she was older and interested in boys). A lot of things going on there: she meets her friend Lady Selina Hazy (Francesca Annis) who is secretly quite broke and will be disappointed to know that her late cousin left her nothing so her last chance is to sell her mother's precious necklace (just one necklace? how long can that money last? At least she'll be spared Bertram's bill, I guess); there's young Elvira Blake (Emily Beecham) the heiress, who's going to inherit a third of her late father's fortune, and her dear friend Brigit (Mary Nighy) whose right arm is useless since she contracted polio swimming in contaminated waters (Elvira had insisted in going swimming but then she stayed out of the water reading and now feels guilty and responsible); Lady Bess Sedgwick (Polly Walker) hasn't seen her daughter Elvira in six years, and has always been quite distant to keep her safe (she was a spy, or something like that), and she's to inherit another third of her ex-husband's fortune (the rest to some charity foundation).
Who else is there.. a couple of twins, who turn out to be jewel thieves, but once found out they'll give Selina's necklace back (found out because they wear their watches on different wrists, since-very conveniently- one is left-handed and the other right-handed. While one was stealing, the other impersonated both of them, changing the hand that held the newspaper or the hat and of course the clothes, but they didn't think of the watch. A bit silly, frankly); there's a nazi hunter, a nazi criminal posing as canon Pennyfather and a hatter who actually does all the nazi-hunting while the other man does nothing. The hatter recognizes a painting that was stolen from his father's house, he takes pictures of all the guests and sends them to someone who can identify the criminal and finally he's the one who points his finger to canon Pennyfather.
Who else.. a jazz singer: the hotel was not only protecting war criminals, it was also a base for selling stolen paintings, and the singer bought one. Basically all the paintings at Bertram's were real, but everybody believed they were fakes because they were hung on the walls with nonchalance, in plain sight. The lawyer who had been entrusted with the fortune of Lady Sedgwick's late husband was not only stealing from it, but also part of the stolen-paintings-business. I think that covers them all.
Now to the murders. First, a maid is strangled: Tilly, who had more money that a maid could have because she was blackmailing someone. Then doorman Micky Gorman is killed in a shooting, while trying to protect someone (did he think it was Bess?). He was Bess' first husband, but they never divorced; now, I know Elvira knew of his existence because of some letters that she found, but how did she know that there never was a divorce? Well, anyway, she was afraid to lose her inheritance, so she killed Micky and Tilly who blackmailed her (yes, Tilly learned it from Micky, so she probably told Elvira to blackmail her.. yes, it's all quite alright).
Elvira was helped by Brigit, so Elvira was the shooter up at the window, and Brigit was in the street pretending to be her. Elvira ran down dressed as a maid, because "nobody takes notice of the staff" ... how sad..
When they exchanged place, again nobody noticed they used the gun with different hands (Elvira the right one, Brigit obviously the left one).
To "help Miss Marple" in the investigation we have inspector Larry Bird (Stephen Mangan), quite nice, and Jane Cooper (Martine McCutcheon) a maid quite brilliant. At the end, they'll go live together, and maybe she'll apply to become a police officer, since "times are changing" :-)
There's a useless gag of Lewis Armstrong practicing at the hotel quite loudly, that was totally unnecessary.
One last thing: I haven't seen all the films (15-16 so far) but I think Stephen Mangan is my favourite policeman right after John Hannah, I liked him here :-)


ITA Miss Marple al Bertram Hotel

Marple - Towards zero - 2006

It wasn't bad, although with too much things and people there's never a real chance for characters to get real: I couldn't "feel" for them: maybe just a little for Ted. The ending was awful, I so don't like that, terrible.
The story: a lot of people reunite at Gull's Point, Devon, in September. It's Lady Camilla Tressilian's (Eileen Atkins) house. Mary (Julie Graham) lives there because she has no money of her own. Famous tennis player Neville Strange (Greg Wise) who was raised by Camilla, goes with his second wife Kay (Zoe Tapper). His first wife Audrey (Saffron Burrows) is there too. Also, old friends Thomas (Julian Sands) and Mr Treves (Tom Baker). Miss Marple (Geraldine McEwan) knows Camilla since their school days. Ted Latimer (Paul Nicholls) is there too because Kay is there and he's totally in love with her. He stays at a hotel, like Marple and Treves.
Kay hates Audrey because she's jealous. Thomas loves Audrey.
Kay owns a beautiful black dress, quite beautiful. I don't care about the red one, but the black one is delightful.
Treves is the first to die. The "murderer" put a  "out of order" sign on the lift, so Treves went up the stairs and his very weak heart didn't make it. After that, Camilla is (clearly) killed, her head smashed. The inspector (Alan Davies, the one form QI, it seems like someone finally tamed his hair) finds lot of clues against Neville, but it seems like he has an alibi, then he finds clues against Audrey, but Marple has somehow figured out that Audrey has no hate for Neville because he did not leave her, she had left him before but he "took the blame". Then Marple involves the inspector in a little play in order to obtain a confession from the murderer. Before that, a few details:
1-it's up to Treves and Marple to quote the title: he says that things move, converging towards the zero hour, the murder at the end, towards zero. Treves remembers an old case, a child killing another child with an arrow because he felt he had been wronged. It was ruled an accident, but Treves is sure it was intentional, that the boy trained day after day planning the accident quite carefully, and he would recognize that boy even now, all grown up. 2-the inspector knows Marple's reputation, because colonel Melchett spoke of her :-p 3-Miss Marple can draw nice portraits, her talents never end 4-I liked how Marple kept stopping the inspector giving him all her thoughts, wanted or not, only to end with "please, do not let me detain you" 5-Camilla was fun, and she says about Marple: "no doubt she'll be poking her nose in everywhere, she was just the same at school" :-p She also says "with any luck I'll be dead by September :lol: well, wish 'almost' granted. 6-quite realistic and yet a bit annoying, how everyone is mistaken in judging the others: everyone believing Neville could never do anything so bad, because he's such a sporty character; Kay believing Audrey to be after Neville, and Camilla disliking Kay for breaking Audrey and Neville's marriage: "I blame her entirely", and also everybody believing Audrey to be heartbroken because of the divorce. 7-not one but two almost-suicide-scenes: first Marple thought Neville wanted to kill himself but he didn't: "I've always tended to stand too near the edge", and then Neville stops Audrey from killing herself, I guess this was too easy a death. 8-Ted and Kay together were just so lovely; did he ever propose? because she was extremely fond of him, she clearly loves her "Teddy".
Now to the end, having Audrey arrested and taken away, then taking the others on a boat trip. Marple says that someone saw the murderer: he swam back and forth and used a rope to reach Camilla's room. Thomas has one arm, Ted can't swim (and Marple pushes him in the water to prove that. Nobody said a word but Kay shouted enough for everyone :-p ) which leaves only Neville. They provoke a reaction, saying that they went along with his silly attempt at deception while laughing all the time and Marple adds that he thought he was being so clever when in fact he was "rather stupid", and this cracks him: "stupid? stupid? it was the perfect plan" and this is the beginning of one of the worst speeches I can think of right now. So over the line, so fake and (to me) unemotional, plus he should have played it angry, not whining. Maybe they did it to connect with the other story, to show that he was still the same boy that could not forgive any wrong done to him, I don't know, but I so didn't like to see him whining like a baby "wééé she dared leave me wééé you've got to hang her wééé" it was terrible. I did not like it one bit.
The end sees Audrey in Thomas' arms, which is not so flattering for him: her husband a murderer and his brother dead, he's the only one left. I did not like Thomas, here. I should have, I felt all the time, but I didn't. Like Neville, I didn't like the way they spoke. Audrey's laugh at the end is quite charming and lovely. I like the girl with the dog Donald; I didn't get her name, but I liked her, and Mary too.
Another scene I didn't like was the one when Neville gives the magazine to Audrey, not Kay. That scene was in the book too, it's how he acted it that I don't like. Why did he have that "come on you annoying thing take it if you want it" attitude towards Audrey? That's so wrong. He chose to give it to her. I would have liked it somehow more natural, softly.

 ITA verso l'ora zero

Marple - Ordeal by innocence

It's not bad, but there's nobody here that appealed to me. It's a sad story that ends with the murderer discovered, justice done, but there's no happy ending here. It's all sad.
It starts introducing the Argyle family: Rachel (Jane Seymour), a tyrant with lots of money: hard on her husband and generally unpleasant, not showing any love for anyone. Leo (Denis Lawson), the husband, a quiet man who works on a history book with Gwenda (Juliet Stevenson) to help him, and we can already see that she is in love with him. Since Rachel could not have children, she adopted six of them, one way or another. They are Mary (Lisa Stansfield) who seems to be cold and obsessed with order; Tina (Gugu Mbatha Raw) a lively girl; Hester (Stephanie Leonidas) a fragile girl; Micky (Bryan Dick) who has a temper and still resents Rachel because she "bought him for 100 pounds"; Bobby (Tom Riley) the responsible one who seems troubled by something, and his twin brother Jacko (Burn Gorman) who's always been the black sheep, always lying and getting himself into trouble.
In the house there are also Mary's husband Philip Durrant (Richard Armitage, quite charming himself, but an unpleasant character) who seems to be having an affair with Hester and that nobody likes, and Kirsten Lindstrom (Alison Steadman) who not only works for them but seems to have been for this children the "mother they never had", giving them the love they longed for.
When Jacko is in desperate need of money because he has to repay a debt or he'll be killed, Rachel refuses to help him. He threatens her, then goes away. That same night Rachel is killed and he is arrested. He's confident, smiling, because he says he has an alibi, they just need to find the man who picked him up when he was hitchhiking. Nobody believes him and nobody comes forward to conferm his alibi, so he's found guilty and executed. Two years go by, and without Rachel and Jacko the family is finally happy. Leo and Gwenda are engaged to be married and she calls her dear Miss Marple to share her happiness, but it won't last long. A stranger comes to the house, Dr Calgary (Julian Rhind Tutt) who has just found out about Jacko and has come to reveal the truth: Jacko was innocent, he was his alibi but had left for an expedition and had not heard about any of it. Dr Calgary thought his news would make them happy, but he was wrong, because for them it was all over and they were happy, but now the whole investigation has to start again and they are all suspects.
As Hester says "it's not the guilty that matters, it's the innocent who would suffer now". Marple of course joins the investigation, and she's sad when everybody seems to suspect Gwenda. Kirsten is the first, and her most strong accuser.
Jacko had known the identity of the real murderer, but had kept it to himself, doing "the best thing I've ever done", knowing that not been able to repay his debt, as a free man he would have died soon. Leo wants Gwenda to go away because the family has to stay together, thus making her feel Not part of the family. Marple will come back to this after Gwenda is killed and the inspector would have to notify her family but Gwenda was an orphan, didn't have any, she thought she had found here her family.
Long story short, the murderer was Kirsten, in love with Jacko, and he had told her what to do. She loved the other kids but was in love with Jacko. She spread suspicions around, speaking of Rachel who gave the children "money and attention" but "was not capable of love". Leo who turned alive after Rachel's death. Gwenda more than anyone suffered from her direct accusations.
She didn't try to save Jacko from death because she had thought she was the only one. She said to Miss Marple, about Jacko "we didn't know half of what he was up to. We didn't know he was married".
She killed Rachel for him and Gwenda because she thought she knew something (she told Marple: "if Gwenda found out something and she told you..." pretending to be worried for her..)
That's not all, however. It is discovered that Bobbi had lost all their money (so if Philip had really married Mary for money, he'll have nothing now) and he kills himself (why did he steal the silver things if he was planning to kill himself so near the house??)
Tina & Micky are in a relationship, but nothing will lift the sadness of the situation. No marriage, Gwenda dead. Bobbi dead, Kirsten arrested ( and soon dead, hanged, I guess). No happy ending here.
Marple will go home and Calgary will join another expedition. Last things I want to write so I won't forget them: "nothing is settled until it is settled right" by Kipling, I think. Miss Marple and Calgary say that.
They all agreed that Rachel and Jacko dying was the best thing that had ever happened to their family.  They brought unhappiness, without them, they were happy and close.
Last thing: Miss Marple knows how to pick a lock! She opens Rachel's safe with a hairpin :-p
I forgot: Camille Coduri is in this film, she plays Mrs Lindsay who knew Jacko had other women but still liked him and is sad he's dead. She had way too much makeup here, as the role demanded I suppose, but she's always nice :-)


ITA le due verità / prova d'innocenza (?)

Marple - Nemesis - 2007

Not too bad, I liked many things, it's just that the story, put this way, is kind of absurd. The beginning I mean, not the final solution. It starts with Jason Rafiel's obituary, and what he left Miss Marple (Geraldine McEwan): 500 pounds, on the condition that she accepts to go on a mystery coach-trip to investigate a "possible crime". I liked the man telling her "you're not terrifying after all"-Marple:"should I be?"-"Mr Rafiel called you Nemesis" :-)
So, she accepts and since she can choose a companion, of course she goes to Raymond West (Richard E. Grant)who is quite happy to help his dear aunt Jane. :-)
Now, the absurd thing is that ALL those involved in the story are invited to the tour, all of them, so how did Rafiel now who to invite? How could he know who was or wasn't involved? A few of them are obvious choices, but for example why did Rafiel think that survivor-captain was involved? Because he himself, for some reason, not at all clear since he was supposed to have lost his memory, and by the way he was in a coma when Verity nursed him, advertised for informations on Verity? I mean, how could he remember her name? He remembers nothing about his past life, and while Verity was there he was in a coma, it was someone else that was with him when he was recovering. What's more, how could Rafiel know that nobody else was involved? There were only two nuns in that convent?Nobody else? He says "the pieces of the puzzle he assembled himself" : how? How could he know that nobody else in that convent (other nuns or patients) or in the vicinity of it for that matter, was even remotely involved?
Anyway, moving on. Marple accepts. The girl who drives the bus was also hired by Rafiel because at some point she has them listen to a recorded message from him. The purpose is to found out what happened of Verity Hunt 10 or 11 years ago, when she disappeared. The other guests are: Michael Faber (Dan Stevens: wasn't he called Michael in Downton Abbey too?) who will turn out to be Rafiel's son. Verity nursed him, they fell in love and wanted to escape together, but she didn't show up and he was found and put in a war-prison-camp because he was German (it was 1940). He asked his father to look for her but he refused and Michael has never forgiven him that.
Sydney Lumley (Johnny Briggs) who was her landlord before she went away after he asked her to marry him. Margaret Lumley, Sydney's wife, who looks a lot like Verity (Laura-Michelle Kelly, same actress for both characters). She once pretended to be Verity to get money. Laurence Raeburn (George Cole) who was Lord Forrester's butler and very fond of Verity who worked there too, and he gave her a necklace that she swore to wear until her dying day.
Amanda (Ronni Ancona), Lord Forrester is her uncle and she will inherit everything. She sent Verity away because she knew that Verity was Lord Forrester's love-child. Derek (Adrian Rawlins) is her solicitor and generally does everything for her. It was he that Amanda sent to pay off the girl who said to be Verity but was really Margaret: he recognizes her now and tries to blackmail her "come to my room" but she takes her husband and Sydney hits him on the nose. Well done.
Martin Waddy (Will Mellor) is the war survivor that advertised for informations on Verity, and Rowena (Emily Woof) is his wife. Sister Agnes (Anne Reid) is the Mother Superior, and with Sister Clotilde (Amanda Burton) is the last "guest". The two nuns took Verity in when she went to the convent.
The tour: first stop is Lord Forrester's house, where we see a picture of Verity. I didn't like the scene when Raeburn stops to sit down and Marple stops too, to talk to him, and Raymond simply goes on, not even looking at her, never lowering his eyes; that somehow doesn't seem right. He should have acknowledged the matter in some way, a brief exchange of smiles maybe, or a touch of her arm, anything. Anyway, moving on.
Thirty minutes in, and we discover Michael's real identity, when they stop for the night and Marple talks to him. She speaks of Rafiel's son as having "frighteningly intelligent eyes" and after that Michael admits it's him :-p
Mr Raeburn falls down the stairs, and when they all assemble to see what's happened he looks up and says "Verity". Rafiel told Marple "find where Truth lies", truth=Verity. In the morning Raeburn is found dead. Raymond's fan and wanna-be writer Colin is Detective Constable Hards (Lee Ingleby) who listens to Marple's advice (after Ray promised to read his story) and finds out Raeburn was poisoned.
:-p When he fell Marple was reading "not quite dead enough" :lol:  I like that she always read mystery novels :-p
At lunch Marple asks about Verity and the connection between all them and Verity (all but Michael and Martin) comes out.
Then Marple keeps asking questions and investigating for the rest of the tour. The old nun knows about Michael being Rafiel and not Faber, and she believes he killed Verity because she thinks that Verity went to him to tell him she could not go away with him because she was now a novice.
During a day out, Rowena is killed, and it is discovered only later when Martin can't find her and asks around "has anyone seen Rowena?". Poor woman. Martin feels bad and guilty because he doesn't "feel it" as much as he should, and he wonders if he ever loved her at all. His memories are so messed up.
The last stop is the St. Elspeth convent, where the truth comes out. At first Michael is arrested, but he frees himself, they all talk then go to bed and Clotilde brings a cup of cocoa to Marple. If that's not clear enough for everybody, next comes the final solution.
Verity had chosen Michael, she wanted to leave the convent to go away with him because she loved him, so Clotilde killed her and then she "prayed every day for a week", my gosh what a face! Finally she thought of a solution to her problem. She had to hide her, but first she told on Michael and had him captured, then she took a comatose patient she believed would have died soon, and put him in Michael's room, than she wrapped Verity in bandages so nobody could find her. The patient didn't die, but Clotilde said that he did and buried Verity instead; he recovered, but she could not say it to anyone. She read on a newspaper that Rowena Waddy was never going to believe that her husband had died, so Clotilde took him to her, telling them both he was her husband Martin. Rowena wanted so badly to believe, that she believed it.
Rowena had recognized her, that's why she was killed. Raeburn had seen her wearing Verity's necklace, and that did it for him. She tried to kill Marple too, but she knew and didn't drink the cocoa with the poison. It was all quite theatrical. Marple saying "I am Nemesis", and having Margaret wear a novice costume to look exactly like Verity. Pity for that "I found a clue, a piece of straw" ... :-/ I didn't like that line. Come on. I found a clue?? A piece of straw?? Come on.
Last scene is quite nice though: Martin and Michael both looking at Flying Officer Ralph Collins' grave, for different reasons I'd imagine. Michael because Verity was buried down there, and Martin because now he knows he's not Martin at all, he is actually Ralph Collins. After he's left alone, a woman comes to put flowers on the grave. Ralph's "widow", and they look at each other, and I imagine they'll have a lot of things to talk about, a chance for a new life. She never forgot him, and now he's come back to her :-)
So, I liked Michael, I liked Amanda and Raymond. Not bad, no.

P.s. I like Margaret's black dress, quite pretty.

Dawn O'Hara (the girl who laughed) by Edna Ferber

I liked this a lot, it was very well written, with a spark :-) It's an old book, but it's still a very enjoyable reading. The first chapters made me think of Sophie Kinsella: now, it's not at all the same thing, but this book is a century old, so maybe she was the Kinsella of those times :-p
The story: when Dawn was 20 she worked for a newspaper in New York, and there she met great reporter Peter Orme. She was totally charmed by this man and she married him because she was young and she had no experience of the world. Already the "hand that always shook a little" is something worrying, but then Dawn goes on describing him "never was a girl so dazzled, so humbled, so worshipped, so neglected, so courted. He was a creature of a thousand moods to torture one". Dawn was so young, she fell for this guy and she would found excuses for everything: his drinking, his "hot flashes of uncontrollable temper", the "fits of abstraction and irritability", as she put it "my worshiping soul was always alert with an excuse"
A few months and they got married, and in less than a year she regretted it. He got worse, tired of her, drinking more, shaking more; he neglected his work and got fired. He went home and got angry at her. She was thinking already of divorce, as soon as he was well again and back on his feet, but Peter disappeared for days and came back a madman. Ten years in an asylum for him.
Dawn struggled to move on, she kept her work, she would laugh instead of crying, using her sense of humour as a shield; at 28 she was a nervous wreck, ended up in a hospital and her sister Norah came to take her home with her, in Michigan. Living with Norah, her husband Max and their children was wonderful but she was still a nervous wreck, so Max called for help. His friend Doctor Ernst Von Gerhard, the famous nerves specialist. He is serious, with steady hands and a rare smile, very solemn but with twinkling eyes.
Dawn obeys to them all, she eats, she rests, she walks, until she's tired of doing nothing and wants back her job, but New York's life would be bad for her, so Von Gerhard suggests Milwaukee where he lives, apparently the most German city in America. She goes and she loves it.
She works for the local post, and finds some friends: Blackie from work, and Frau Nirlanger, a noble Austrian who left all to marry a young common man who treated her badly.
She likes the Knaupf couple and it'll be hard on her when they'll have to close the boarding-house. She getson beautifully here, but the knowledge of not being free is a great burden. The love between her and Von Gerhard grows by the day, but she feels she can not divorce a defenseless man, until it happens that Peter is set free and comes looking for her. It's hard but she has Ernst and Blackie to help her, and also Norah comes. Peter is nasty and selfish, but also still mad. He can talk and reason, yes, but he's mad nonetheless. During a car drive with Blackie and Dawn he shows it. Wisely Blackie didn't let him drive, but then Peter told him to go faster until he tried to take the wheel and they crashed: Peter and Blackie die (Blackie had but a few months to live anyway) and well, Dawn is free. She leaves the job to concentrate on her book-writing, and plans to go to Vienna with Ernst. She says goodbye to her friends in Milwaukee and goes away with him :-)

Gentle warrior by Julie Garwood

I admit I liked it; it's a romance novel with a bit of medieval drama. Set in medieval times, 1086 England, it starts with Geoffrey Baron of the land, preparing for battle to regain Montwright. We don't see the battle, but we know he won and from there we move on. Elizabeth lived at Montwright until her family was brutally killed. She saw her parents and her sisters die, but ran away to protect her little brother Thomas. Now she hears that her home has been freed by the Baron's men. She enters again into her home as a healer, intent on finding her brother who she knows is in there. She cures Geoffrey then leaves, but he finds her again and marries her. Just like that. He's her Baron and she belongs to him so he "tells her" about it, he never proposes or asks anything. He doesn't even remember his parents, he was brought up by the King and his warriors, so has no knowledge of love, and thinks it foolish. She doesn't know him and believes he only married her out of duty, but dreams of a marriage like her parents had, with love and complicity. She has a lot on her mind though, because she is convinced that her uncle Belwain killed her family to get his hands on her home and land, and wants to kill him. She is a Saxon with a wild spirit, he is a Norman who values duty and discipline above all. They fight a lot during the days but love each other at nights, so she calls him her gentle warrior.
It will take a long time for them to realize they love each other. Geoffrey kills Rupert, her brother-in-law, because it was him who planned the attack. Vicious Belwain is not killed because of lack of proof, but he does not get Montwright; the land and house is given to Elizabeth's beloved grandfather Enslow, who will also look after Thomas. The book ends with Elizabeth giving birth. Geoffrey now has his little warrior, called Mary like Elizabeth's mother :lol:
Very well written indeed, I enjoyed reading it. Maybe one day I'll look for more of her books, I liked how this one was written :-)

The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain

A nice story for kids, but I had never read it before. It starts introducing the two boys: Edward the young Prince and Tom the poor, unfortunate boy who shares a room with his mother, father, grandmother, plus a brother and two sisters. Tom's father has no intention of finding a job, he prefers to send his boys out to steal or beg for money, and if they come back without it he beats them. Tom likes to play with other children and to swim in the river, but he also dreams of being a Prince, so he goes every day to the gates of Edward's Palace hoping to see him. Edward notices this and one day he comes to his aid when the guards are beating him to send him away. Edward wants to speak with him and after hearing his story he thinks he'd like very much to play and swim, free for once, so he proposes to exchange clothes and roles. They are very much alike and nobody can see the Prince under the beggar's clothes or the pauper under the rich ones Edward has given him.
Edward has no chance to play or swim though, because he is soon treated like a poor beggar. He is found by Tom's father (John Canty) and taken home. Canty hits an old man who dies, so now he wants to run away to escape justice, and he wants to take his family with him, but Edward escapes as soon as he can. Luckily for him there's a man, just back after seven years of war, willing to help him, although he believes him mad like everyone else for saying he's the Prince.
Together they try to send a message to Tom. Everyone is about to send them away but Tom hears about it and orders them in, so they manage to explain the truth and regain their true role. As a king, Edward will help the soldier to get back the land and the woman his brother had stolen from him, and Tom will be his best friend and able to provide for his mother and sisters. It's very short and written so simply it is an easy read for boys and girls, but at the same time it's tougher than I thought. It has a happy ending of course, but also it has people beating kids, a crowd mob, a king dead of illness and a good old man dead, it has a man betraying his brother and also Edward  who died very young.
Mary followed him as Queen, and then there was Elizabeth I.