The struggle Poirot goes thru...before he puts forth his "solution to the murder of Ratchett"...is complex. He is torn...as he is asked to do something he has never ever condoned nor done...in his long life of crime solving. Thus, this movie corrects a flaw in both the book and in the 1974 movie. Poirot would not come to such a decision...easily. Despite my "spoiler" check, I'm trying to not give away the solution to the crime which is perhaps being avenged here (the original crime is based on a real life crime of the 1930s which horrified the world).---------------- But this movie is WORSE because...(listen up playwrights) Some do NOT really understand the protestant/catholic Christian faith. So some errors and UNREALISTIC behaviors show through...like the scene where Ratchett is "praying" and where Poirot is praying.Ratchet repentant? Really? Sounds like he's just hedging his bets with some "fire insurance". And the way he hits on a young woman and...tries to bully Poirot into doing a job for him...sounds like the old, brutal unrepentant Ratchett.And the Swedish woman "with Jesus"? Weird. Bizarre. As she describes her religious experience, I was repelled. Persons of faith I know don't really sound like her!!! More and more in some TV/movie scripts you can see....that Too many writers/directors/actors have either left their childhood faith training behind...or maybe were born to parents who were lightly or non religious...and the lack of basic knowledge of how persons of faith think/act SHOWS THROUGH.Thus, while I agree with the protracted agony Poirot goes thru (surely the biggest faith/ethics/justice crisis of his life)...the movie gets a mediocre 6/10 rating for their POOR and somewhat ignorant portrayal of various persons of faith.I'm a person of faith also. Respecting those who research this topic, even if they are not religious. A lack of research/experience with genuine persons of faith...shows thru in this partly flawed film.

In the U.S. there are two types of people — those who are played by the establishment media's morality tales of Political Correctness, and those who are not. I am of the latter, and that is why this episode of Poirot at long last has ruined the entire series for me, because the writers sleazed such a pathetic morality tale into an Agatha Christie classic, where such a tale does not exist — nor anything like it in her entire body of work.The vignette about the stoning of the Istanbul adulteress was entirely made up — "exo tou dramatos." It was to set up Poirot's contrived statement later (about the then-used English death penalty) that was so ignorant and lacking reason it would prove he could never be able use reason well enough to detect his way out of a wet paper bag. Christie made Poirot's entire raison d'etre to send murderers to the gallows. Then these lame TV writers come along and morally equate the basis of their own gravy train to ad hoc street stonings of adulterous women.

This is a later Poirot film, from 2010. What happened to the early Poirot? The one with Hastings and Miss Lemon? This sad, miserable, angry man is not the Poirot of the books. Poirot was always charming and pleasant and let his little gray cells do the work.In this version of "Murder on the Orient Express," Poirot has just had a murderer he caught commit suicide, and he is tremendously upset. He receives a telegram to return to London and boards the Orient Express, in spite of the fact that everyone tries to keep him from boarding.A businessman is murdered, and Poirot investigates. It doesn't take him long to figure out that nearly everyone in that particular section of the train has some connection to the kidnapping and murder of a little girl, Daisy Armstrong.The emphasis here is on faith, religion, and retribution - making for a dark story indeed. The back story of a little girl dying, based on the Lindbergh kidnapping, and the tragedies that followed in her family as a result is sad enough without darkening it up even more.Of course this doesn't compare to the 1974 film, which emphasized the sumptuousness and beauty of the train and the scenery. The production values here remain excellent, but the scriptwriter has really tampered with the character of Poirot to a disturbing and uncomfortable extent. And the writer felt the need to eliminate a very important line: "They couldn't have ALL done it!" The whole investigation process was truncated.Disappointing. Gee, I hope this was just an aberration and Poirot lightens up.

I must say that even though I do not particularly enjoy the latest episodes of this series (the light, the filming, the twists... I am a fan of the earlier seasons), I absolutely loved this version of the old classic. I do know Poirot looked way too moody, perhaps too sullen, but my, doesn't this add an extra flair to the movie!I personally didn't expect anything from the latest series, and yet Murder on the Orient Express took my breath away. To my mind, this version deserves a right to exist. David Suchet was fantastic as per usual, the cast was great. Depth and moral dilemma, excellent!The final moment when he walks away from the passengers is worth gold, truly inspiring!