Murder on the Orient Express
The mustache has got to be real. Right? Everything else about Murder on the Orient Express—Kenneth Branagh’s stodgy, grandmother-friendly adaptation of Agatha Christie’s 1934 mystery novel—is so sumptuous that there’s no way they would skimp on such an obviously fake-looking mustache, not when it’s plastered to Branagh’s face so prominently. The cast is overstuffed with prestige, the sets are detailed and geographically consistent, the dramatic mountainous backdrop is computer-enhanced at great expense, and the 70mm camerawork is fancy-pants as all get out. And yet Branagh’s mustache, a gratuitously frosted thing that emerges from his nose to bisect the entire front half of his skull, looks so absurd and unnatural that it takes you out of the movie every time the actor/director is onscreen.
by Ned Lannamann