Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		3.0
Audio		2.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

Ten Little Indians Blu-ray Movie Review

And then there was yet another version of this story.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 11, 2018

Harry Alan Towers’ name may not be that familiar to even some diehard film fans, but he had a long and rather interesting career that saw him producing and at least occasionally writing (under various synonyms) a rather wide array of films. One of Towers’ weirder set of credits is the fact that he produced three different versions of Agatha Christie’s inimitable novel Ten Little Indians, including the 1965 version which takes place at an isolated ski resort, this 1974 one currently under review (more about the locale of this one a bit later), and (just for good measure) a 1989 version which rejiggered some plot elements and posited the story’s now famous characters on an African safari (of all things). There’s a certain hilarity to this 1974 iteration since Towers decided to just port over the screenplay from the 1965 version (at least in large part), down to and including the fact that the main hero’s name remains Hugh here, rather than Philip, an obvious reference to the 1965 version’s star, Hugh O’Brian, whose name was tacked on to the character perhaps for “marketing identification” reasons. This version takes place at a really luxurious Iranian hotel, and in fact the film’s opening views of deserts and huge apparently ancient columns may remind some Christie fans of some shots in the 1978 version of Death on the Nile, which featured Peter Ustinov as the immortal Hercule Poirot. This particular Ten Little Indians (which, like many other adaptations of this Christie piece, was released in various markets as And Then There Were None) perhaps owes a bit of its flavor, or at least its marketing materials, to what was in 1975 (when this film was released in both the United States and the United Kingdom) a major film sensation, the 1974 version of Murder on the Orient Express, which at that point in 1975 would have either already been trumpeting either its six Academy Award nominations or (a bit later) its eventual win for Ingrid Bergman as Best Supporting Actress. (In terms of marketing similarities, take a look at this film's key art as reproduced on the Blu-ray cover, and then take a gander at this poster for 1974's Murder on the Orient Express and there are undeniable similarities.) Towers was something of an expert in multi-national co-productions, and Ten Little Indians boasts a suitably international cast that includes Oliver Reed as Hugh Lombard, Elke Sommer as Vera Clyde, Richard Attenborough as judge Arthur Cannon, and Herbert Lom as Doctor Edward Armstrong (interestingly, Lom would return as a different character in Towers’ 1989 version of the tale). Rounding out the cast are Charles Aznavour as Michel Raven, Gert Fröbe as Wilhelm Blore, Stéphane Audran as Ilona Morgan, Adolfo Celi as André Salvé, and Alberto de Mendoza and Maria Rohm (Towers’ wife) as servants Otto and Elsa Martino.

There have been so many adaptations of this remarkable piece of writing that it’s almost daunting at this point, but I give a bit of an overview in my recent The Beast Must Die! Blu-ray review, since that film is certainly one of the odder outings with at least a tangential connection to the Christie opus. And that very familiarity is actually what probably hobbles this film the most — the fact that its story is so well known and that this version basically just ups and sets the 1965 version more or less on repeat. Now, there have been changes made here, including probably most notably the location (as well as the fact that this was the first version of the tale filmed in color), but for anyone who knows the basic outlines of Christie’s original (and/or her stage adaptation, upon which this and the 1965 version are more securely based) is going to have a virtual absence of surprises in watching this take. In a way, it’s the same kind of problem that the recent version of Murder on the Orient Express probably faced, since its story is probably more or less as well known as this one. In fact, I’ve steered clear of reading anything about the Branagh film simply because I want to see what if anything has been changed (I’ll be reviewing it soon).

Some may recall that the David Suchet Poirot: Murder on the Orient Express did try to inject some arguably needless religious subtext into the proceedings, and another more recent British enterprise, the television version of And Then There Were None, at least attempted to get back to the much darker ambience of Christie’s original source novel (a darkness she perhaps unavoidably had to abandon for the subsequent stage version). But this 1974 Ten Little Indians is for all intents and purposes pretty much exactly like both the 1965 version and René Clair’s And Then There Were None, at least in broad outline.

Still, this is a rather stylish outing on several levels. Director Peter Collinson and cinematographer Fernando Arribas utilize the main hotel locations extremely well, finding a variety of unusual framings that subliminally up the already present anxiety levels. Note, for example, how often they shoot their characters from below, allowing for expansive views of the levels of balconies behind the characters. In fact a lot of the film offers really interesting successive planes of depth within the frame where characters further and further back are either reacting or even responding to events at the foreground. Performances are a little uneven, as perhaps might be expected from such a motley international crew, but Attenborough really does a fantastic job as the judge, even if Collinson unwisely telegraphs the by now famous denouement by cutting to the character for glowering reaction shots. How Attenborough or the special effects team achieved the riveting last visual of the character may be as enticing a mystery as Agatha Christie herself ever devised.

Ten Little Indians Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Ten Little Indians is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Scorpion Releasing with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.67:1. The element used for this transfer has obviously undergone little to no restoration, and so there is quite noticeable and fairly recurrent damage, including flecks, specks and scratches. The opening credits sequence is fairly ragged looking (and interestingly at a little more so than the also included Italian credits sequences), and the bulk of the film looks just slightly faded, often toward the brown end of things, something that tips reds into oranges and can give flesh tones a slightly muddy quality. Some of the day for night material looks pretty hazy, with only minimal detail levels evident. In brighter lighting, detail levels improve, but are never at totally excellent levels. There are occasional signs of what looks like some artificial sharpening. I'm not sure if this was an issue with original release prints, but occasionally the corners of the frame appear slightly out of focus (more so on the right side than the left, for some reason). All in all, this is certainly watchable, but just as certainly not optimal.

Ten Little Indians Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Unfortunately Ten Little Indians' DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono mix doesn't fare much better than the visuals, and in fact some may argue comes off at least slightly worse. There is ubiquitous hiss throughout this presentation, along with a rather surprisingly constant series of pops and crackles. Those issues, accompanied by a cast which features several performers with very heavy accents and a disc which sadly doesn't offer subtitles, meant that I personally had some problems along the way figuring out exactly what was being said, even upon rewinding and replaying certain moments. That said, the majority of this offering is decipherable, if hobbled by inadequate fidelity and too much age related wear and tear.

Ten Little Indians Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary with Nathaniel Thompson and Howard S. Berger is fun and informative, even if fidelity is a little wonky (it sounds like these two are phoning it in from some distant planet). The two are obviously major film nerds (and I consider that a compliment, just to be clear), and go into the many adaptations while also talking about this production and Towers at great length. They also debunk some information on sites like Wikipedia, including claims that there was a prelude and epilogue at one point. (I also take issue with the Wikipedia claim, perhaps parroted by the commentators, that Towers had something to do with the Margaret Rutherford Miss Marple films. I spent quite a bit of time doing background research on this in preparation for this review, and the only real connection I could find is that Towers hired George Pollock, the director of those films, to helm his 1965 version of Ten Little Indians.)


• Italian Credits (1080p; 2:52) offer the opening (which looks a lot better, perhaps closer to the negative, than the English language version) and closing credits.


• Play Trailers contains a patently odd assortment of trailers which does include two (480i; 2:38 and 480i; 00:39, the second of which suffers from some really bad video stuttering anomalies).

Ten Little Indians Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I'm something of a Christie completist, and was entertained enough by this version that I was willing to overlook the deficits in this disc's technical presentation. This is a pretty "by the numbers" accounting of Christie's tale, at least within the context of her stage adaptation and the Clair and previous Towers versions of the story, but the Iranian location gives it a bit of an exotic flavor, and the cast has some good performances. I can't outright recommend this release, but the commentary is a lot of fun and if you're a Christie completist and don't mind some technical issues, you may well want to check this version out.