6.6 | / 10 |
Users | 2.5 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
A group is invited, under false pretenses, to an isolated hotel in the Iranian desert. After dinner, a cassette tape accuses them all of crimes that they have gotten away with. One by one they begin to die, in accordance to the Ten Little Indians nursery rhyme. After a search is made of the hotel, they realize that the murderer is one of them. A few members of the group attempt to trust each other, but the question still remains, who can one trust? And who will leave the hotel alive?
Starring: Charles Aznavour, Maria Rohm, Adolfo Celi, Stéphane Audran, Alberto de MendozaCrime | Insignificant |
Drama | Insignificant |
Mystery | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.67:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
BDInfo
None
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 3.0 | |
Audio | 2.5 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
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.
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.
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.
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.
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