Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie’s starring John Moffat as Poirot
Dramatized by BBC with a whole cast playing different members of the cast so in affect this is not a pure audiobook but an audio play which helps since this is a murder mystery.
Listening length around 2 hours but it seems much less since the story is so well known!
I have read the original book when I was a teen and did not understand it that much! This was when my friend already told me the ending and how things get solved in the end!
Then I saw the BBC series and it felt better! Finally when I saw the two movies (at least the famous ones since there are too many versions!); I understood that this is an epic!
The latest movie made in 2017 has Kenneth Branagh playing Poirot with a host of characters and it starts with the famous Armstrong Baby kidnapping and cuts to the scene! Having seen most of the other versions I can safely say that this version is the best!
This audiobook is close to that in depiction of that fateful train journey!
The series and the other movies also has some minor variations in the beginning which can be attributed to creative Liberty!
Of course it all ends up with a dead man with 12 stabs with a knife in a train with so many strangers! And then the chase begins as Poirot finds out more and more about everyone and like how we are all related to one another by some connection a common connection presents itself!
Unless you have been living under a rock I am sure that you would have read or known about this book!
Don’t worry; the thrill is not in the spoil but in the chase and you will definitely enjoy the chase of the little grey cells of Poirot!
One single word in the beginning of the book actually spoils the book in case you are wondering! When Poirot is asked where else would you see such a mix of people of different countries and profession in the same place!
And then Poirot answers, “America!”
Of course that was true only in those times since this mix can now be seen in many parts of the world!
The thrill of the train journey with individual compartments and room service was really good though! In fact this is one of the rare instance when the movie is better than the book since you can feel the snow laden tracks and the train whistle and the constant sound of the train on the track! To be fair this audiobook gets you halfway there!
Unlike Holmes, Poirot takes it slow, he is not athletic or in a hurry. He is slow, polite and stout! I guess it is a deliberate contrast made by Agatha to bring out the point that Poirot is not Holmes! In fact you have so many remixes of Holmes where he is shown sometimes as a reckless drug using goon! But Poirot is a class apart! He is decent and well mannered and moves around in posh circles! So much so that any depiction of Poirot would always depict like this only!
Of course the crux of the book and the murder mystery and investigation is on the point of questioning the suspects and re evaluating what they said or did not say or the things they try to hide! It is the way Poirot works, to listen and not just hear! And as a result solve the case! At voila!
Enjoy the nostalgia!
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