Among them is Mark Easterbrook ( Sewell), a widowed antique dealer whose first wife took her own life and is now newly married to Kaya Scodelario’s wonderfully cynical Hermia, who turns the stuffing of a vol-au-vent into a powerful expression of pent-up rage. One of these elderly practitioners of the dark arts is found dead at the start of the story, with a hand-written list of names stuffed in her shoe. Set in 1961, when the original Christie book was published, the title is both a biblical reference to the animal on which Death rides, as well as the home of three modern-day self-identified witches, located in the gloriously named Surrey village of Much Deeping. Within the first few minutes of this two-parter, there are glimpses of a snake preserved in a jar, a dead rat in a sink, and a stuffed polar bear, all adding to the overall tone of dank, queasy depravity. Dead creatures abound in The Pale Horse, the latest in a remarkable run of Agatha Christie adaptations by Sarah Phelps.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |