Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
 

Murder by Death (1976)

Director: Robert Moore

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Essentially a filmed play (the world's most famous fictional sleuths summoned for a weekend by Capote's eccentric electronics wizard and invited to solve a murder due to happen at midnight), Murder by Death is entertaining enough, even though the joke wears a little thin. As plot loses importance and parody reigns supreme, Falk and Maggie Smith get the best lines. However, unlike Murder on the Orient Express - so stylised as to be virtually a parody - here director Moore and writer Neil Simon seem to have no real affection for either the characters they plunder mercilessly for laughs, or the locked room puzzle they turn on its head. Introductions over, the film slides downhill.

Author: PH 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide

  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Robert Moore

Producer: Ray Stark

Cast: Eileen Brennan, Truman Capote, James Coco, Peter Falk, Alec Guinness, Elsa Lanchester, David Niven, Peter Sellers, Maggie Smith, Nancy Walker, Estelle Winwood, James Cromwell full cast

Genre(s): Comedy

Duration: 95 mins


Features

Making a name for himself

Making a name for himself

Sin Nombre's Cary Joji Fukunaga learned his lessons well.

To the letter

Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.

Mind over matter

David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.

Fool's gold

Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.

We are the championed

Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."

A history of violence

Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.

True romantic

James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.

Playing in the dark

MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.

Junk bonds

Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.