Alfred Molina stars as the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot who even in a modern age of computers still prefers his little gray cells even though one of the suspects in this modernized 21st century remake of Murder On The Orient Express is a dot com millionaire. The little gray cells still work pretty well and as we know Molina comes up with two solutions for the murder.Which is of Peter Strauss a rather crass and wealthy American who is getting death threats and he wants to know the source. When Molina turns him down later that night on the train Strauss is stabbed several times in his sleep. The officials on the Orient Express ask Molina to take charge of the investigation while a landslide blocks their path.For anyone who has seen the big screen version which contained an all star cast I won't go into details. But that version is set at a time when traveling on the Orient Express was a matter of class and elegance and you got performances of the cast reflecting that. Agatha Christie stories be they Miss Jane Marple, Hercule Poirot, or Tommy&Tuppence should always stay in the period they are written in. They lose so much when they are not.Standing out among the passengers are Meredith Baxter as a minor American TV actress and Leslie Caron as the widow of a South American dictator.Compared to the big screen version this one is good root beer as opposed to elegant champagne.

Whoever controlled the rights to Agatha Christie's work and permitted this awful movie to be produced should be flogged. Updating a Christie classic and setting it in the present could have worked really well. However, instead of sharp plotting and good dialogue, the writers chose to do this by endlessly beating us over the head with pop culture references such as the Popiel Pocket Fisherman and Elton John. Alfred Molina is a decent Poirot except for his constant musing over his problems with his hot girlfriend. And lest we momentarily forget that this is a SUPER MODERN take on the story, the clues have been updated as well: notes are replaced with VHS tapes and diaries with Palm Pilots. All of these innovations don't actually do anything to advance the plot in any way. The cast is largely unknown save for a few recognizable faces such as Meredith Baxter who hysterically chews through the scenery, and Leslie Caron who just looks embarrassed to be there. Stick with the Oscar winning 1974 version, or better yet, read the book.

Taken out of its 1930s setting and horribly modernised, lacking almost a quarter of the characters, on the wrong train (they used a diesel-hauled train of British Pullmans owned by Venice Simplon-Orient-Express instead of the Wagons-Lits), stopped by a rockslide instead of a snowdrift, and featuring the character of Vera Rossakoff--a love interest from a pair of short stories.Meredith Baxter as Mrs Hubbard wasn't too bad, but the rest of the cast left something to be desired. A poor attempt to remake a great story. Hopefully LWT will do a decent remake with David Suchet in the near future.

If you like the Agatha Christie films to be faithful to the book or view them as period movies then forget this one. However ! If you like whodunit movies no matter what, then this one is OK. It's not the best of it's kind but you'll have a nice 90 (or so ) minutes. Yes it's updated ( computers, mobiles) and yes Poirot has a love interest. But that does not mean that it's a bad movie. I liked the 1974 one better and the book even more so but i can see that this movie is entertaining as well, just not as good as the 1974 one. As for Poirot i have to say that i did not care much for Finney's portrayal and Molino does not do it any better. Suchett and Ustinov are my favorites. For those who would like to have the DVD : it's for sale in The Netherlands. Together with the TV movie The Pale Horse it has been released as the DVD box "Agatha Christie Mystery Box ".