Poirot (TV Series) Death in the Clouds (1992) User Reviews

Typically absorbing, deliberately paced Agatha Christie murder mystery

[gridoon2024 · 7/10 · 25 January 2008]

Hercule Poirot investigates the murder of an old woman which happened during a flight from France to England - a flight on which he was also on board! The victim seems to have been killed by a poisoned dart shot on her neck, and Poirot's investigation takes him (along with Inspector Japp) to Paris, where the woman lived.

Before seeing "Death in the Clouds" and without having read the book, I was under the impression that the action would be almost entirely confined inside the plane, but no - the murder happens there, but most of the action takes place on land (and most of it in Paris). There is ingenuity in the way the murder is carried out, but some of the coincidences revealed by Poirot at the end to explain the motive seem a bit strained. The pacing is also quite deliberate (this is a feature-length episode). Nevertheless, the production (including the Paris location shooting) is up to the usual high standards, and the cast is well-chosen; in the absence of Captain Hastings, Inspector Japp gets a lot of screen time and has some good moments, and Sarah Woodward, as an air stewardess who was also on board the same flight, makes a very likable sidekick for Poirot. (***)

Absorbing and stylish, not Poirot's best, but a rock solid outing from the series

[TheLittleSongbird · 8/10 · 6 January 2010]

I only have vague memories of the book, so I can't judge properly by how faithful this adaptation is. That said, this is very absorbing and stylish. There are parts when the pace is a tad too sluggish and the final solution feels a bit more strained than it usually is. Even with the failings this is still a rock solid outing from the brilliant Poirot series. This adaptation is sumptuously filmed, with fine locations (Paris looked amazing!) and costumes, and the music is gorgeous. The acting is also very well done; David Suchet is impeccable as always as Poirot, and while Hugh Fraser as Hastings is noticeably absent, Phillip Jackson as Japp gets more screen time, and makes the most of it in a truly delightful performance. Sarah Woodward is very pretty and likable as Jane Grey, and Shaun Scott does a good job as Norman Gale. All in all, very well done. 8/10 Bethany Cox

Lots of intrigue in this Poirot mystery between Paris and London

[SimonJack · 9/10 · 29 July 2018]

"Death in the Clouds" is another superb film of Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot. As always, in this long series of films and TV shows, David Suchet is in top form. In this story, Poirot is joined by Chief Inspector Japp. After flying back to England from Paris, Poirot must solve a murder that happened right under his nose. Madame Giselle was murdered on the plane as Poirot dozed.

Poirot and Japp fly back and forth a couple times in this stickler of a mystery. Not until the very end is it clear "who dunnit." This is an intriguing mystery with a number of detours that come up almost as red herrings.

Poirot is afraid of flying and grimaces when he looks out the window of the plane. He closes his eyes for takeoff, and puts some sort of body wrap around himself. The French police get involved in unraveling this mystery. But, the super sleuth and police are too late to prevent a second murder.

A couple of humorous situations occur in this film. When Japp works with the French police, he takes over Inspector Fournier's office. Before a return flight to Paris, Japp joins Poirot for breakfast. The waiter asks for his order and Japp, rubbing his hands together, says cheerily, "Full English, please." Poirot's smile fades and he looks down. Will he never be able to get Japp to try real cuisine? This is always good for a chuckle.

A must see for all lovers of top quality drama, murder mystery buffs and Christie fans alike.

[jamesraeburn2003 · 8/10 · 8 February 2018]

On a flight home from Paris, Hercule Poirot (David Suchet), finds himself investigating the murder of a notorious moneylender, Madame Giselle, who is found poisoned by a native South American dart and it happened right under the noses of all the passengers on a busy plane. Poirot and Chief Inspector Japp (Philip Jackson) have no shortage of suspects to probe including a celebrated murder mystery writer called Daniel Clancy, an archaeologist, Mr. Du Pont, a dentist, Norman Gale and the former actress and society woman Lady Horbury. Poirot enlists the help of airline stewardess Jane Gray to help him solve the case and the famous sleuth soon discovers that Lady Horbury has massive gambling debts. Madame Giselle was blackmailing her by threatening to tell the world about them unless she kept up repayments on money that she had borrowed from her. As a result of these revelations, Lady Horbury becomes Japp's number one suspect and, worse still for her, Giselle's maid reveals that she had seen the two women together on many occasions. Meanwhile, a young woman claiming to be Giselle's daughter, Ann Richards, appears to claim her inheritance. She turns out to be genuine, only she was born an illegitimate child and abandoned by her mother as a baby, and disappears once she has settled her affairs. Jane Gray has been developing a close relationship with Norman Gale and Poirot asks whether their friendship is really new or have they in actual fact known each other for a long time and are connected to the crime. In any case, Poirot is not as convinced about Lady Horbury's guilt as Japp is and another murder is committed before he can unmask the culprit...

A must see for all lovers of top quality television drama, murder mystery buffs and Agatha Christie fans alike. Death In The Clouds (first transmitted in 1992 - over a quarter of a century ago!) has all the hallmarks of quality that distinguished this series as the best ever adaptations of Christie's works to be committed to celluloid. The French locations are well chosen, the feeling for the 1930's era is well conveyed through the set design with its spiffing art deco interiors. As usual great care was taken with the cinematography, which reinforces the authenticity of the settings and creates an air of the mysteriousness augmented by Christopher Gunning's incidental music. The dramatization by William Humble is, on the whole, first rate and plays fair with the audience laying out all the red herrings and clues that will keep you guessing right up until the end when Poirot assembles all the suspects in his rooms to present them with the solution to the case. Every member of the cast was selected on their suitability to play Christie's characters and that alone and, as a result, they are all believable. David Suchet, by now, had established himself as the definitive Poirot accurately portraying his eccentricities, his razor sharp intelligence and understanding of human nature. One regrets that he never played him on the big screen as virtually all of the feature length TV films he made of the Poirot novels were good enough to have been put on to cinema screens. Alas, it was not to be. The very able direction is by Stephen Whitaker.

Death by Wasp sting?

[Sleepin_Dragon · 8/10 · 4 May 2017]

It seems Poirot can't go anywhere without being embroiled in murder, while travelling on a Plane from Paris to London the murder of Madame Giselle takes place a few seats behind him. Naturally Poirot assumes it's one of his fellow passengers, and with the help of Stewardess Jane Grey he sets out discovering who the guilty party is.

I really like this one, I like the mystery, the setting, the characters, and the overall style of the episode, the fact that the murder occurred so close to Poirot gives it a very different feel. The French setting also changes it up. I like the casual pacing of the story, Poirot certainly isn't rushing, and the dynamic between Japp and Fournier is great.

I absolutely love the imagery and style of the episode, it has the streets of Paris, the French Open, the Art from the surrealists, there are so many stylish aspects to this episode, it's a treat to watch.

Possibly the best thing I've seen Shaun Scott (Norman Gale) in, and Cathryn Harrison is tremendous as the glamorous and spoilt Lady Horbury.

A very pleasing watch, 8/10

Rather different to the book

[Sulla-2 · 4 June 2019]

In Poirot the short stories are fleshed out to make a hour episode and the books are slashed to make 2 hour episodes.

IN this episode which is still very watchable, it's like all the pages have been cut out of the book and mixed up. A large section of the episide at the Tennis match was never in the book. Several characters have been chopped and one character has been given a different role.

The death occurs after about 15 pages in the book but in the programme it's after half an hour.

At least they keep the same killer.

I must stop reading the book at the same time as I watch the programme.

Intriguing

[grantss · 7/10 · 17 May 2016]

Hercule Poirot is on a plane from Paris to London when one of the other passengers, Madame Giselle, is murdered. The murder weapon appears to be poison, delivered from a dart fired from a South American blowpipe. On board was Lady Horbury who owed the murdered woman a great deal of money - she is the prime suspect. Soon after Madame Giselle's death is announced, her daughter appears in Paris to claim her inheritance, but then soon disappears. A cross-channel investigation into Madame Giselle's murder, involving Chief Inspector Japp, the French police and Poirot, commences.

Intriguing, as always. However, too complex though to figure out for yourself. The best Agatha Christie stories are where you can figure it out for yourself, or at least come close to figuring it out, before Poirot reveals the plot. This is not one of those. Still very entertaining though.

Poison darts and wasps on a plane

[blanche-2 · 8/10 · 4 October 2014]

Wouldn't you just know it, there's a murder on the plane on which Poirot is traveling from Paris to London. One Madame Gisele is killed via poisoned dart. Madame Gisele was a moneylender to the upper crust and also a blackmailer. Poirot has seen her with the haughty Lady Horbury, but Lady Horbury claims never to have seen Madame Gisele before. Poirot is troubled. A wasp is found on the plane, killed by one of the passengers with his coffee cup. Poirot wonders what the wasp was doing there. And how did someone kill Madame Gisele with a dart in front of all the passengers? It's a knotty problem, which Poirot finally solves, but it's much more complicated than it appeared in the beginning with situations involving bigamy and fake identities.

Excellent mystery with Poirot and Japp working together, and Poirot enlisting the aide of the female flight steward as well. The usual high production values abound.

The Train is Safer.

[rmax304823 · 7/10 · 30 May 2014]

There is usually a bit of humor in each episode that is smile worthy, but one bit of business in "Death in the Clouds" made me laugh out loud. Poirot and Japp are on a flight to Paris. The cabin is silent. No one is talking to anyone else. Poirot rises from his seat, walks to the front of the cabin, then turns around, puts an ornate little blowpipe to his lips, aims it in the general direction of the passengers, and his cheeks puff out slightly as he blows through the pipe. There is a cut, and we see the dozen other passengers staring up at him in amazement. Unwittingly, Poirot has given an indelible impression of a maniac. I'm still chuckling.

I don't think I'll go too much into the context of the act. The plot is complicated, as it almost always is. An old lady has been found dead on an earlier flight, a small wound in her neck, as from the sting of a wasp. But a poisoned dart is found near her on the cabin floor. The diverse passengers are all suspects in one way or another except for the delightfully chipper stewardess, Jane Grey (Sarah Woodward), who becomes a kind of helper and confidante in the absence of Captain Hastings. I wish I had a helper and confidante like Sarah Woodward. My ex helper and confidante wasn't named after a beautiful queen but after a Nazi armaments factory -- Hephzibah van Krupp. Her legend looms large in the annals of psychological vivisection.

Well, enough of that. It's always marvelous to see how spic and span everything is in these episodes. I mean -- the wardrobe is easy enough, and the tchotchkes on the shelves, and even the perfectly buffed parquet floors. But how did they get the façade of whatever is passing for Le Bourget Airport in 1936 so sparkling clean? Inside and out? Did they give everything a fresh coat of paint and polish the brightwork? Why are there no dustbins in sight, no garbage on the streets? Gives you the willies just to look at all that Listerian cleanliness.

Among the suspect passengers is one snooty aristocratic blond who uses a cigarette holder, drinks too much, and gambles away lots of money at the roulette table. Everyone will want her to be the guilty party but they'll be disappointed. Beautiful shots of a DC-3, a marvelous airplane.

Death in the Clouds

[coltras35 · 8/10 · 19 July 2023]

Within the confines of a commercial passenger plane, Hercule Poirot was ideally placed in a seat to observe his fellow air passengers. Over to his right sat a pretty young woman, clearly infatuated with the man opposite; ahead, in seat No.13, sat Lady Horbury; across the gangway in seat No.8, a detective writer was being troubled by an aggressive wasp.

What Poirot did not yet realize was that behind him, in seat No.2, sat the slumped, lifeless body of a woman, killed by a poisoned dart.

A really buzzing Poirot mystery with a murder in a confined space, greatly etched characters, and a series of clever misdirection. It's well-paced and full of tension. Death in the Clouds is an underrated novel, and was adapted well here, though reading Agatha's books is a real treat. The genius is in her writing.

Enjoyable even though sluggish in parts

[Paularoc · 7/10 · 13 September 2012]

Although there are no bad Poirot shows, this one was, for me, a lesser entry in the series. I prefer the shorter entries to the feature length ones and this entry suffers from a lack of humor and a more than usual number of plodding scenes. However, there were some bright spots as well. Chief among them was the Paris setting and the excerpt from a tennis match in Paris between Fred Perry and Gottfried von Cramm, which Perry won. It was von Cramm that Perry beat at Wimbledon in 1936. The same day I watched this show, Andy Murray won a grand slam event and Perry's name was in the news again. What a cool coincidence. The murder took place on an airline flight with Poirot as a passenger making for an unusual and interesting setting for a murder. The reveal of how it was done was good even though the identity of the culprit was not particularly satisfying. Another highlight was that Japp had such a big role (and who nicely provided what little humor there was) and as Poirot's one-show sidekick, Dorothy Woodward did a very nice job indeed. Of the supporting cast, Cathryn Harrison gave the most memorable performance as the thoroughly unpleasant Lady Horbury.

A bit far-fetched

[TigressLils · 8/10 · 2 January 2022]

As an another reviewer said, Cathryn Harrison was tremendous as the glamorous and spoilt lady Horbury. So far so good. My question is: would such a character allow her maid to mingle among high society??????

Maybe not the best, but still very enjoyable

[bensonmum2 · 7/10 · 10 March 2017]

A murder occurs on a flight from France to England. The murdered woman was hit in the neck by a poisoned dart from a blowgun. While that may be an odd way to die, the more amazing thing about the murder is that it occurred just a few feet from where Hercule Poirot was sitting. How could this happen? Quite naturally, Poirot begins investigating.

For me, Death in the Clouds is a good, solid episode of the Poirot series, marred only by a problematic method of murder that I don't care for. I can't for the life of me remember if the murder is committed in the same manner in the movie as it was the book, but it doesn't work the way it's presented here. The murderer has to rely on way too much luck in not being recognized by any of the passengers or being spotted by the flight crew in order to get away with it. And the plane is too small for that much luck. Regardless, the episode is still a lot of fun. The mystery is interesting and the various red herrings work nicely. Suchet is in fine form. The rest of the cast is top-notch. Sarah Woodward as Jane Grey and Cathryn Harrison as Lady Cecily Horbury stand out to me. And there are those little things that I so enjoy – like Japp's dealings with the French police. Finally, I think that Death in the Clouds is as good an example of period detail as you'll find. I'm not sure whether the plane was 100% accurate, but it fits the period. The airport and airfield are perfect. Costuming, sets, and other details really bring the period to life. It's all masterfully done.

One little annoyance

[murermarius · 5/10 · 17 August 2017]

*Spoiler*

Very nice episode, and of course i know it is fiction, and taken from a very well written book - but what kind of ruins it for me is, why could she not just scream when the killer stuck the needle into her throat? Poison takes a little while to take effect, and with so many people around there, screaming for help should reveal him instantly, although she would have died anyway. I imagine they do not have antivenom on airplanes like that.

Just thought i should mention it.

A Bee In Japp's Bonnet

[balldave · 8/10 · 15 November 2020]

A fine episode with all the usual cast of trope characters...the arrogant aristocrat; the frumpy ladies maid; the over fawning nice fellow; and on. The Murder setting on a plane from France to England is a nice change from the Mideast or Greek islands or whoever Poirot travels; which is odd in itself since he does not travel well. Death occurs as a result of a small poison dart. The cabin was also home to pesky wasps. What sticks out to me is the rather cool, even antagonistic back and forth between Poirot and Cheif Inspector Japp. In earlier episodes they are quite amiable; almost close friends. But here, they show no initial pleasant surprise on meeting and thereafter no real sign of any previous history. Strange.

Stylish, But Unexceptional

[atlasmb · 6/10 · 15 May 2022]

This whodunit, adapted from an Agatha Christie story, stars David Suchet as the fastidious Hercule Poirot. Like Poirot, everything about this production is subdued and mild-mannered, resulting in a "drama" that feels rather undramatic.

The solution to the crime hinges on a couple of apparently-inconsequential clues which Poirot ferrets out in a leisurely manner. The motive feels almost irrelevant. This is not one of Christie's best inventions, but it provides some enjoyable scenery and costuming.

Detective procedurals with more passion-if only a modicum or if seething below the surface-are more interesting.

Death in the Clouds

[Prismark10 · 5/10 · 4 March 2018]

Hercule Poirot is admiring the Sacré-Coeur Basilica in Paris. On the flight from France to England while Poirot was asleep an old lady has been killed. It seems a poisoned dart was used.

Among the suspects is a crime writer and a snooty aristocrat, who was in Paris to see Fred Perry at the French Open and gamble. It seems she was in debt to the old lady.

Poirot and Japp visit Paris to find out more about the victim and seek out a woman who claims to be the victim's long lost daughter.

This feature length mystery has wonderful production values of vintage Paris and the recreation of the French Open. However it is padded more than a psychiatric cell. I know we have moved on from the Agatha short stories but really you can see the director falling back on various tricks just to drag the story out such as the scenes on the plane which go on for ages. We even have a character telling Poirot to get on with it during the denouement.

Read the book, it's much better.

[epacrisimpressa · 3/10 · 18 April 2022]

This TV film looks fabulous of course, with splendid settings and costumes. But oh, the script! It reduces a typically complex Agatha Christie novel to utter banality. The joy of Christie's Poirot is to follow the workings of his mind as it holds up the case like a crystal and examines each facet in turn. There is none of this in the film: Poirot just happens to bump into the key characters while wandering aimlessly around Paris, apparently stalking Jane Grey. It's just silly.