The best thing about this movie is the opening scene. We meet Hercule Poirot and his unique personality, and moustache in the middle of avoiding a religious war at Jerusalem’s Wailing Wall, and things are off to a great start. The story flows and so does the action, and before we know it, we find ourselves along with Poirot on the Orient Express from Istanbul to London.
The James Bond franchise is now 53 years old and is in its 24th movie and sixth actor. With such a weight of history it is hard for the film makers to be too bold: they have a rigid set of expectations to meet and a $300 million budget to recoup.
In this small-scale drama, Judi Dench both narrates and stars as Barbara Coveet, a teacher reaching the end of here career in a rough London comprehensive school. A stone is thrown into the calm pool of the teacher’s common room in the form of the beautiful Sheba (Cate Blanchett), a new and inexperienced art teacher. While the male teachers sniff around the already married Sheba, Barbara shows her kindness and befriends her.