David Farnor | On 12, Nov 2023

Director: Kenneth Branagh
Cast: Kenneth Branagh, Kyle Allen, Camille Cottin, Jamie Dornan, Tina Fey, Jude Hill, Emma Laird, Kelly Reilly, Ali Khan, Michelle Yeoh, Amir El-Masry
Certificate: 12

The Queen of Crime. The Mistress of Mystery. The Duchess of Death. Agatha Christie has gone by many names over the years, but it’s the latter that resonates the most with A Haunting in Venice. Kenneth Branagh’s trio of Hercule Poirot adaptations, while not always successful, have consistently dug into different aspects of the human condition – while the first (Murder on the Orient Express) drilled into justice and order and the second (Death on the Nile) tapped into love and desire, A Haunting in Venice is anchored in grief and loss. Branagh adjusts accordingly, dialling up the horror vibes for a mystery that’s chliling as well as thrilling.

Branagh and co-writer Michael Green take some serious liberties with the source material, whisking us to Venice in 1947, where a retired Poirot avoids people pestering him with possible cases – kept at arm’s length by Portfoglio bodyguard (Riccardo Scarmarcio). But when an old friend, crime writer Ariadne (Tina Fey), implores him to debunk a seance led by the infamous Mrs Reynolds (Michelle Yeoh), he acquiesces. Needless to say, the evening’s dark entertainment gives way to added darkness – and death.

The events unfold in the palazzo of opera singer Rowena Drake (Kelly Reilly), who’s long been mourning the death of her daughter, Alicia. Also in attendance are Rowena’s housekeeper, Olga (Camille Cottin), chef Maxime (Kyle Allen), Alicia’s ex-fiance, the
Drake family doctor, Leslie (Jamie Dornan), who’s suffering from PTSD after the war, and his son, Leopold (Jude Hill), who says he sees dead people. The fact that the palazzo was reputedly once an orphanage where all its kids were locked up during a plague only adds to the gloomy portent hanging over their heads.

At the centre of them all, Michelle Yeoh is clearly having a ball as Mrs Reynolds, who arrives complete with mask, cape and put-upon assistant – Desdemona (Emma Laird) – and immediately begins to make dramatic and enigmatic statements. If she’s underused by the script, Yeoh makes up for it by turning up the theatrics to 11, and the whole production follows her lead. Tina Fey leans into Ariadne’s calculating screwball wit, Jamie Dornan laces his role with pain and regret, Kelly Reilly digs deep into Rowean’s protective streak, and Jude Hill is unnervingly adult as the precocious, observant child caught in a grown-up nightmare.

Behind the camera, Branagh is in his element, harnessing his knack for a dutch tilt to keep the palazzo’s crumbling interiors feeling eerily off-kilter. He and DoP Haris Zambarloukos craft a sumptuous and sinister atmosphere, bolsted by the breathy, dread-filled music from Hildur Guðnadóttir. The judiciously sprinkled jump-scares are anchored by Branagh’s grounded Poirot, who takes everything seriously enough – including the supernatural flourishes – for the horror-tinged tone to linger all the way to the end credits. The result is the most distinctive Agatha Christie adaptation since the BBC’s And Then There Were None, and draws out the darkness of the Queen of Crime with old-school panache.

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