Death on the Nile
Short description
Death on the Nile is a mystery set largely aboard a river steamer travelling through Egypt. A wealthy young American heiress, Linnet Ridgeway Doyle, has married the man her closest friend, Jacqueline de Bellefort, had intended to marry, and the couple's honeymoon cruise is shadowed by Jacqueline's presence. Other passengers also have reason to resent Linnet, and after she is found shot, the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, who happens to be on the same boat, takes charge of the investigation. As the Karnak continues up the river, he questions the travellers and begins narrowing down the suspects.
John Guillermin directed the film, which followed The Towering Inferno and King Kong in his filmography. Anthony Shaffer wrote the screenplay, adapted from Agatha Christie's novel, and John Brabourne and Richard Goodwin produced it. Peter Ustinov plays Poirot, with Lois Chiles as Linnet, Mia Farrow as Jacqueline and Jane Birkin, Bette Davis and Jon Finch among the large credited cast of twenty-two.
Made on a budget of eight million dollars, the film took a similar amount at the worldwide box office. On IMDb it holds 6.2 out of 10 from around 4,000 votes, while on TMDB it has 7.2 from just under a thousand, and its critics' rating of 6.2 from fifteen reviews sits level with the IMDb figure.
What's left behind the scenes
- Angela Lansbury played the role of writer Salomea Otterbourne. Later, the same actress would become famous for playing another writer – Jessica Fletcher. Lansbury also starred in the Agatha Christie adaptation "The Mirror Cracked," where she played Miss Marple herself.
- The film featured no fewer than five actors who would later become Academy Award winners: Peter Ustinov (1960 and 1964), George Kennedy (1967), Bette Davis (1935 and 1938), Maggie Smith (1969 and 1978), and David Niven (1958).
- The film was released in Soviet cinemas under the title “Fatal Voyage” in 1981.
- Mr. Pennington, as in the novel, says the phrase, "I always take a gun with me abroad." Prior to the Second World War, the circulation of personal firearms within the British Empire was regulated relatively leniently, and carrying one like this was quite possible.
- Due to the limited space on the paddle steamer, the actresses shared a single dressing room.
- A film adaptation of the novel of the same name by Agatha Christie, published in 1937.
- Due to the hot climate, Albert Finney refused the role of Poirot, as he had problems in the previous film, "Murder on the Orient Express," with the long makeup process, which was very hot under the artificial lighting. For the same reason, Poirot, who was always a brunette in Agatha Christie's works, was portrayed by Peter Ustinov as a blond with wheat-colored mustaches – otherwise, the actor risked heatstroke.
- James Ferguson (John Finch) in the scene with Rosalind Otterbourne (Olivia Hassie) in the sphinx alley, holds a book in Russian titled "The Technology of Film Production" (author B. Konoplev, year of publication 1956).
- According to the actors and crew members themselves, the filming conditions were simply atrocious. The film was indeed shot on the Nile, in Egypt and Sudan, on the real paddle steamer “Memnon,” one of the few surviving Nile cruisers of that era. Practically, filming took place “in one take” between 4 and 6 a.m.; by noon, when the temperature reached 54 degrees Celsius, it was sometimes halted for 6-8 hours.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
