Miss Marple: A Caribbean Mystery (1989)

While on vacation at a resort hotel in the West Indies, Miss Marple correctly suspects that the apparently natural death of a retired British major is actually the work of a murderer planning yet another killing.

Director:

Christopher Petit

Writer:

T.R. Bowen (screenplay)

Stars:

Joan Hickson, Donald Pleasence, Adrian Lukis

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Joan Hickson	...	Miss Marple
Donald Pleasence	...	Jason Rafiel
Adrian Lukis	...	Tim Kendal
Sophie Ward	...	Molly Kendal
T.P. McKenna	...	Dr. Grahame
Michael Feast	...	Edward Hillingdon
Sheila Ruskin	...	Evelyn Hillingdon
Frank Middlemass	...	Major Palgrave
Robert Swann	...	Greg Dyson (as Robert Swan)
Sue Lloyd	...	Lucky Dyson
Barbara Barnes	...	Esther Walters
Stephen Bent	...	Jackson
Joseph Mydell	...	Inspector Weston
Valerie Buchanan	...	Victoria
Isabelle Lucas	...	Aunty Johnson

Storyline

Feeling poorly, Miss Marple's nephew sends her to Barbados for a bit of a holiday. She finds the holiday a bit of a bore and nowhere near as interesting as life in St. Mary Mead. Things get a bit more interesting when one of the guests, the elderly Major Palgrave, is found dead. The death is put down to natural causes until one of the maids finds medication belonging to another guest in the late major's room. When the maid is also found dead it is clear that the Major's oft-repeated tale of knowing a murderer - he was in the colonial police after leaving the army - convinces Miss Marple that the murderer is someone at the hotel.

---

Plot Keywords:

miss marple | maid | resort | hotel | stabbed to death | 

---

Genres:

Crime | Drama | Mystery

---

Certificate:

TV-14

Details

Country:

UK USA Australia

Language:

English

Release Date:

25 December 1989 (UK)

Also Known As:

Miss Marple: A Caribbean Mystery

Filming Locations:

Barbados

Company Credits

Production Co:

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), A&E Television Networks, 7 Network

Technical Specs

Runtime:

104 min

Sound Mix:

Mono Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

A TV movie made for the A&E network.

---

Goofs

Major Palgrave and Inspector Weston both refer to the Major as having been a member of the St Kitts (or St Christopher) and Nevis Police around 1948-51. St Litts Nevis & Anguilla never had there own force until 1960, before then they were part of the Leeward Islands Police Force,

---

Quotes

Jason Rafiel: I had to think about this quite a bit before mentioning it to you.
Inspector Weston: And why is that, Mr. Rafael?
Jason Rafiel: It wasn't my idea, and the person who had it - the idea, I mean - is a little old lady who knits and wears lace. She also has a mind like a bacon slicer.
Inspector Weston: Why didn't she come to me herself?
Jason Rafiel: She didn't think you'd take her seriously.
Inspector Weston: I might have done.
Jason Rafiel: I doubt it. It's a very good disguise. She even had me fooled for a minute.
[He laughs]
Inspector Weston: Better have her name for the record.
Jason Rafiel: Miss Marple.
[...]

---

Connections

Follows Miss Marple: The Moving Finger (1985)

User Reviews

Murder in Barbadoes

The casting of Donald Pleasance as one of the guests would probably immediately make you think he's the guilty party in A Caribbean Mystery. After all look at his career and the roles he's played for the most part. But this much I will give you, he's not the perpetrator in this Miss Marple mystery starring Joan Hickson. Oh, he's a disagreeable individual, but murder isn't in his makeup this time around.

Not like you haven't got a whole resort hotel filled with likely suspects. On doctor's advice Joan Hickson has left St. Mary Mead for the sunny climate of Barbadoes and she's booked into a hotel run by the husband and wife team of Adrian Lukis and Sophie Ward. A Colonel Blimp like guest played by Frank Middlemass who makes a crashing boor of himself to Hickson and the rest of the guests is found dead in his room the next day after he tells Hickson he's on to a murderer from back in his days in the colonial service. Some blood pressure medicine is found at the scene that doesn't belong to him. That sets Hickson's little gray cells inside her gray head working.

Two more murders follow before Hickson figures it out. And figuring prominently is the glass eye that Middlemass had.

Hickson as Marple is the oldest Marple out there unless someone tells me different. She was in her 80s doing this role. But her powers if anything seem to increase with age.

Jane Marple is always good viewing for anyone wanting to get their little gray cells in action.