Death On The Nile Film Review

Kenneth Branagh once again shows there is seemingly no end to his talents as he directs and stars - as Agatha Christie's famous detective - in the follow-up to 2017's Murder On The Orient Express, casting an equally star-studded ensemble to play in another perplexing whodunnit.

Branagh squeezes palpable tension from a screenplay that waits patiently to claim its first victim, set against beautiful, yet ominous, backdrops of Egypt and the Nile; the water is still, the wildlife is subdued, but we can sense someone somewhere is waiting for their opportunity to strike. The party playing host to the inevitable killing spree is a wedding celebration spearheaded by Gal Gadot's Linnet Doyle, who rents out a cruise ship to ensure that their celebrations are not spoiled by an obsessive ex-lover of her husband Simon.

That is not to say that the first half of the feature is a dull affair; rather, by the time the body count begins piling up, the audience is juggling a list of potential perpetrators and their motivations. With less time spent focusing on the central conundrum than your conventional murder mystery, Death On The Nile allows more time to grow acquainted with the characters and is therefore actually easier to play along with than its predecessor. When the inciting incident finally occurs, audiences are equipped with sufficient information to keep up with proceedings while the list of suspects is gradually whittled down. The setting in which the majority of the plot unravels is beautiful in its opulence, yet Branagh cleverly renders the cruise ship a claustrophobic crime scene despite its many clear windows and spacious walkways.

In keeping things so simple, Branagh's film hardly flips the genre on its head, instead following convention perhaps too closely for some. With stories as classic as Agatha Christie's, however, there is really no need to strive to subvert expectations; the audience merely wants to feel as if they're in Poirot's shoes, and here you only ever feel one step behind him. Branagh also gets to convey a side to Poirot that brings levity to the character, endearing him to viewers as something more than a detective with a tremendously keen eye for detail.

Timelessly classic and clever, foreboding yet undeniably fun, Death On The Nile won't disappoint fans of the genre who simply want to play detective. While Rian Johnson's Knives Out did, in the intervening years, offer an innovative slant on the whodunnit, Branagh's second outing in the well-travelled shoes of Poirot is a firm reminder that the classics can never grow old.