Murder with Mirrors *** (1985, Helen Hayes, Bette Davis, John Mills, Leo McKern, Dorothy Tutin, Tim Roth) – Classic Movie Review 9653

Veteran stars Helen Hayes (aged 85) and Bette Davis (aged 77 and returning to filming after a serious stroke that impaired her appearance and mobility) make their first appearance together in director Dick Lowry’s 1985 mystery film Murder with Mirrors, a modestly engaging, if only so-so adaptation of Agatha Christie’s 1952 thriller novel They Do It with Mirrors. Murder with Mirrors is the novel’s American title.

In her second Miss Marple movie, following A Caribbean Mystery (1983), Hayes plays the spinster sleuth setting out to find the murderer in her old chum Carrie-Louise Serrocold (Davis)’s country manor house Stonygates.

Miss Marple is persuaded her to visit the estate of Carrie-Louise, whose devoted husband Lewis (John Mills) has turned the manor into a halfway house for young men with criminal records, and says he suspects someone is slowly poisoning his wife with arsenic. One of the delinquent teens, Edgar Lawson (Tim Roth), claims to be Lewis’s illegitimate child. Then a gun goes off and Miss Marple’s visiting lawyer Christian Gilbranson (John Woodvine) is found murdered.

Murder with Mirrors is tolerably well made in England with amusing work from the fine home-grown cast, particularly Leo McKern as the grouchy policeman Inspector Curry, as well as John Mills as Lewis Serrocold, Liane Langland, Dorothy Tutin, Anton Rodgers, Frances de la Tour, Tim Roth and John Woodvine.

The main mystery is why executive producer George Eckstein’s script is so plodding, not bringing out the best in Christie’s unusual plot and characters, but it is no surprise that the high-calibre players keep it alive.

Also in the cast are John Laughlin, James Coombes, Christopher Fairbank and Amanda Maynard.

Murder with Mirrors is filmed entirely on location in England. Brocket Hall, Lemsford, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, England, features as Stonygates. Several locations in London are used, including Carlton House Terrace, Trafalgar Square and Westminster Bridge. Turville, Seer Green and Skirmett, all in Buckinghamshire, are also used.

It was remade basically faithfully by the BBC as Miss Marple: They Do It with Mirrors with Joan Hickson as Miss Marple in 1991. It was remade again with many changes by ITV with Julia McKenzie as part of the TV series Agatha Christie’s Marple (2010). The cast include Penelope Wilton as Carrie-Louise, Brian Cox as Lewis Serrocold, and Joan Collins as Ruth van Rydock.

Murder with Mirrors is directed by Dick Lowry, runs 100 minutes, is made by Hajeno Productions and Warner Bros Television, is released by CBS (1985) (US) (TV), is written by George Eckstein, based on the novel They Do It with Mirrors [Murder with Mirrors] by Agatha Christie, shot by Brian West, produced by George Eckstein (executive producer) and Neil Hartley, and scored by Richard Rodney Bennett.

It was Helen Hayes’s last movie, though she lived on till 1993, aged 92.

They Do It with Mirrors was first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1952 as Murder with Mirrors and in UK by the Collins Crime Club on 17 November 1952 under Christie’s original title of They Do It with Mirrors.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 9653

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