A Haunting in Venice: Another Serviceable Murder Mystery

It has become apparent that Kenneth Branagh, like most writer/directors, has been building his career to the point where he can have the ability to make the movies he really wants. In this case, those movies are adaptations of Agatha Christie's novels where he gets to run around in a funny mustache and solve murders. A Haunting in Venice is his third outing as Hercule Poirot and, while it may be the best of this crop of murder mysteries, it still has a few issues across the film from a technical and narrative standpoint.

A Haunting in Venice follows Hercule Poirot (Branagh) who has once again retired to live his life without solving any more mysteries in Venice. A mystery novelist and old friend named Ariadne (Tina Fey) shows up and tells him about a Halloween party where a séance will be held that even she cannot figure out how the medium is pulling off the effects happening. When the two attend the party, a murder occurs and it is up to Poirot to figure out who committed the crime. Jamie Dornan, Michelle Yeoh, Kelly Reilly, and Kyle Allen also star.

What sets this film apart from Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile are the stylistic choices that A Haunting in Venice makes to drive home the more paranormal aspects of the plot. The movie uses Dutch angles and POV shots (to the point where one could argue that they are overused) and plays into horror tropes one would expect from a paranormal horror film. It leans far enough into these aspects to the point where it influences the plot in meaningful ways. There is also some interesting world-building (which Death on the Nile previously explored), namely Poirot’s background in both World Wars and what it was that made him famous in the first place.

There are two major issues that plague the film, one on the technical level and one on the narrative level. The technical level is that there are a number of strange cuts between scenes that do not feel organic. These moments feel like there wasn’t a clear transition between scene one and scene two, so there’s just a hard cut between them, which, compared to the rest of the movie, feels a little weird. The narrative issue is that in a good murder mystery, the viewer should be able to either figure out what happened alongside the detective, or on a subsequent viewing understand the climax enough where there are things pointed out throughout the investigation that end up making more sense. The climax of the film and explanation of who actually committed the murder make for a situation where the viewer has no way of figuring it out unless they have a very specific background in either the culinary arts or botany that, even watching a second time, may not be clear.

Despite some of these issues, the movie is still fun enough to warrant a trip to the theater to see it if someone is a fan of a murder mystery film. There is enough style and flair to make the movie consistently entertaining, even if the ability to solve the mystery alongside Poirot is held back by the film withholding key information from the viewer. On a final note, viewers should know this movie may have scary elements but is not a horror movie despite some of the marketing.

Final Rating: 8/10