Cinema Wellman's Book Club: "And Then There Were Seven"

 Cinema Wellman’s Book Club: 

“And Then There Were Seven”

(This content is best appreciated by watching on our YouTube channel since most of this episode was unscripted)

    Hello and welcome to Cinema Wellman. I am your host, David, and we have Hannah in the studio with us today as we hold Cinema Wellman’s 1st ever “Book Club” of sorts.

Hannah and I have been doing a book club this year and have been reading novels by the great Agatha Christie.

So far, we have read; “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd,” “Murder at the Vicarage,” “Five Little Pigs,” and, most recently, “And Then There Were None.”

After completing “And Then There Were None” (also known as “Ten Little Indians”) we watched SEVEN different film versions of the novel from FOUR different countries.

If you haven’t read the source material (you’ve had since 1939, not sure what you’re waiting for) this episode is not for you since we’ll be spoiling anything and everything about the novel and the movies. 

All of which revolve around ten strangers being summoned to a secluded place by “U. N. Owen,” a person none of them are familiar with. The guests are then murdered one by one by this “unknown” person.

In Dame Agatha’s source material, all 10 characters are dead at the end of the book, and the killer was Judge Wargrave who faked his own death (at #6).

Not all decided to stay loyal to the source material’s bleak conclusion. As a matter of fact, only two of the seven films kept the ending of the novel.

We will be discussing the film adaptations in chronological order.

I’ll give you the usual CW rundown for each film before Hannah and I share some of our observations with you.

This project set a Cinema Wellman record since I screened four consecutive movies with the exact same title. No numbers, no after title taglines; the same exact title.

Four in a row. 

Never happened before.

New things are always happening at Cinema Wellman!

Let’s begin Cinema Wellman’s Book Club: “And Then There Were Seven” with a movie that was released six years after the novel was published.  

And Then There Were None (1945: US)

AP/97 min/IMDb: 7.3/directed by Rene Clair

*This film won “Best Film” at the Locarno Film Festival in 1946, the very FIRST year that film festival was held in Locarno, Switzerland.

*Features Oscar winners Barry Fitzgerald and Walter Huston in the two most prominent roles.

*Seems to set the tone for almost ALL of the film versions going forward, which is interesting since it doesn’t have the same ending as Christie’s novel. We were talking about how it seemed like film versions 2-7 were based more on film #1 than the original novel.

Ten Little Indians (1959: US)

NR-TVM/60 min/IMDb: 6.2/directed by Paul Bogart

*This was a live television recording captured on film, so it had a very different look to it, and it was also the shortest of the seven versions we screened.

*Mr. Naricott with the sandwich! 

Ten Little Indians (1965: UK)

NR-TVM/91 min/IMDb: 6.6/directed by George Pollock

*The scene switches to the Alps.

Ten Little Indians (1974: Italy)

PG/98 min/IMDb: 5.7/directed by Peter Collinson

*The scene switches to the Iranian desert.

*The cast features not one, but TWO Bond villains! Gert Frobe from Goldfinger and Adolfo Celi from Thunderball!

*Director Peter Collinson, at several points, sets up the camera with a wide shot and just holds it there as people move about. I love those lingering shots. One of my criticisms about new movies is the frantic editing. I just think it’s used to hide mistakes and distract us. 

Ten Little Indians (1987: Soviet Union)

NR/137 min/IMDb: 7.7/directed by Stanisiav Govorukhin

*Stunning costume design and music, but we had a major problem with it preventing it from being our favorite adaptation.

*First of these movies that followed the source material, and EVERYONE DIES!

Ten Little Indians (1989: US)

PG/100 min/IMDb: 4.7/directed by Alan Birkinshaw

*The scene switches to a safari equipped with tents that are able to be “locked?”

*Three acting classes, and I’m as good of an actor as Frank Stallone.

And Then There Were None (2015: UK)

NR-TV mini-series/180 min/IMDb: 7.8/directed by Maeve Durmody

*This one ended up being our favorite even though we had some issues with it.

To conclude, we have a few lists for you that Hannah came up with.

We have six “Icks” being negative takeaways, and four tips of the cap praising positive items. 

Hannah then re-cast “And Then There Were None” two different ways. We’re calling one “Shark(Nado) Casting” where Hannah has assembled the most chaotic cast possible for this film.

The other casting will be Hannah’s dream cast.

In case anyone is thinking about yet another version!

(This portion was unscripted, so you’ll need to watch the show on YouTube for Hannah’s content.) 

That is a wrap from here at Cinema Wellman for our first ever “Book Club” episode!

We hope you’re here next time for more of our usual programming as we break down the Best & Worst of the month of July.

Until then, take care.