Agatha Christie’s Poirot 3.09 The Plymouth Express (1991, TV) – 7/10 review

Writer: Agatha Christie David Suchet: Hercule Poirot Hugh Fraser: Captain Hastings Philip Jackson: Chief Inspector Japp Pauline Moran: Miss Lemon Writer (Dramatization): Rod Beacham Script Consultant: Clive Exton Producer: Brian Eastman Director: Andrew Piddington Executive Producer: Nick Elliott

Poirot, Agatha Christie’s 3.09 Plymouth Express, The (1991) When Florence Carrington, the daughter of a self-made millionaire, is murdered on the London to Plymouth Express and her extensive and valuable jewelry collection taken, Poirot becomes involved as he had been previously asked to cast an eye over her latest suitor. However, the two obvious suspects in her death, the latest suitor and her broke soon-to-be ex-husband, simply do not work for Poirot. The critical clue is clearly an insistent attempt to buy a late edition daily newspaper (as opposed to an early edition) by Florence shortly before her death but what can it mean? 7/10 There are less little pieces of character business in this episode (though I did enjoy Hastings almost calling a Frenchman a "frog" in front of Poirot) but the director paces the thing so beautifully that when Poirot starts preparing for the finalé you are sure you should still have a good twenty minutes of sleuthing to go. That’s the beauty of the one hour format, the episode are consistently crisp and fast-moving. When the series moved to the two-hour format, it lost much more than (the extra hour) it gained. This Poirot, Agatha Christie’s episode contains unpleasant description of death by knife and violent and unpleasant scene. Classified 12 by BBFC. Suitable only for persons of 12 years and over.