Detective: Death in Ecstasy and a Side Excursion into Don't Open 'Till Christmas (1984)
A break from Ann Way season for this my Christmas blog post and as is my custom I'm still not blogging about Too Many Christmas Trees. Instead I've chosen an unseasonal mystery and a side excursion into a film which is actually Christmas themed.
Detective: Death in Ecstasy (1964)
Detective (1964-9) was an anthology series of dramatised crime stories by famous detective writers, which meant that its episodes tended to feature well-known fictional detectives. In fact some of them were introduced by Rupert Davies in character as Inspector Maigret. It also served as a source of pilots for series made afterwards. It partly remains in the archive but has never been commercially released as far as I know, and the episodes are as rare as hen's teeth so I was pleased to find this one on YouTube.
Death in Ecstasy is based on a novel by Ngaio Marsh published in 1936. Those familiar with her later writings will miss the complex characterisation and plotting for which she is known, here: instead the plot is much more straightforward and the characters more like the sketches we find in Agatha Christie. Inspector Alleyn's journalist friend shoves his way into the House of the Sacred Flame to see what is going on, only to discover that in the midst of the service the woman selected as the 'chosen vessel' collapses dead. He calls in Alleyn because he thinks he might be interested.
Even without my personal interest in cults and New Religious Movements, I would have to say that more murders should be set in cults because the group is an absolute gift to television. I am not sure whether we are intended to be shocked by the group and all its adherents or whether we are intended to think that they are just bohemian as you would expect. Probably it would have been more shocking in 1936 to find that the group's priest was dealing heroin than it would now. Even more fascinating to me personally is that the cult is based on a real one (which didn't have any murders) that Marsh knew in New Zealand in the 1890s and which I'm going to have to find out about.
The novel is also a gift to television in the sense that the entire story takes place in the group's church and the priest's flat so it only needs a small set. This doesn't come across as limited or cheap, because it's quite an exotic set!
I don't have any criticisms of this myself, however I see two criticisms are commonly made by Marsh fans, which is that Alleyn is too old and also that the show pronounces the name AllANE rather than ALlan, which is how Marsh wanted it pronounced. This may be an unpopular opinion but my own opinion is that if you want people to pronounce your detective's name in a particular way but spell it in a way inviting the public to pronounce it another way, you're inviting a lifetime of having to correct people.
My absolutely favourite bit is the place where the police re-enact the events of the murder and all kneel down around the altar (pictured).
Don't Open 'Till Christmas (1984)
Regular readers will know that I like nothing better than trying to rehabilitate some TV show which has been critically panned but I personally like and that is the pretext for one of my periodic side trips out of the world of TV and into film. Don't Open 'Till Christmas (1984) is an almost universally critically panned slasher film about a serial killer targeting people dressed as Father Christmas in London.
This is one of those occasions when I'm going to suggest viewers on't watch this film primarily for the plot, which meanders along in a rather confusing way. On one level it's fairly predictable because every time you see a Father Christmas costume you know some violence is on the way. On another level everybody says that this film is barely watchable and a complete 'turkey'.
The film took over a year to make. The reason for this is that it was plagued by conflict between the production and director who also starred in it. Ultimately he left and another director took over; unfortunately by this time most of the original cast were unavailable and large parts had to be cut or remade. The new director was then sacked. Helpfully the original director then returned and so much of the original footage could then be used again. If merely reading this is confusing it explains the impact of these events on the film, and their effect of leaving the film feeling like it's rather been stitched together from random stuff. Personally I don't dislike this effect, and honestly I think it enhances the numerous red herrings the film sets up about the identity of the Santa killer, but obviously the rest of the internet and the critics disagree.
Apart from this massive problem, honestly I think this film is just delightful. It has a marvellous atmosphere of a 1980s Christmas in London, juxtaposed with the terror of a serial killer loose in the city whom the police just seem unable to catch. I suppose it's one of those things where for me the atmosphere trumps the detail. Perhaps this could be some sort of personality indicator!
A happy holiday to all my readers.
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