Murder on the Orient Express

Murder on the Orient Express is a 1974 British mystery film directed by Sidney Lumet and based on the 1934 novel of the same name by Agatha Christie.

It has an all-star cast including Lauren Bacall, Martin Balsam, Ingrid Bergman, Jacqueline Bisset, Sean Connery, Albert Finney, John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller, Anthony Perkins, Vanessa Redgrave, Richard Widmark and Michael York.

The film received six Academy Award nominations.  Bergman won for Best Supporting Actress.

On a budget of $1.4 million, the film grossed $37.7 million at the box office.  

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 89% based on 46 reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "Murder, intrigue, and a star-studded cast make this stylish production of Murder on the Orient Express one of the best Agatha Christie adaptations to see the silver screen."

In December 1935, Hercule Poirot travels from Istanbul to London on the Orient Express. His old friend, Signor Bianchi, a director of the company that owns the rail line, arranges Poirot's accommodation after all the first-class compartments are uncharacteristically sold out during the off-season. 

Other passengers include American socialite Harriet Belinda Hubbard; English governess Mary Debenham; Swedish missionary Greta Ohlsson; American businessman Samuel Ratchett, with his secretary/translator Hector McQueen and English valet Edward Beddoes; Italian-American car salesman Antonio "Gino" Foscarelli; elderly Russian Princess Natalia Dragomiroff and her German maid Hildegarde Schmidt; Hungarian Count Rudolf Andrenyi and his wife Elena; British Army Colonel John Arbuthnott; and American theatrical agent Cyrus B. Hardman.

The day after the train's departure, Ratchett requests to hire Poirot as a bodyguard as he has received death threats, but Poirot declines despite a very generous fee. During the night, a snowdrift in Yugoslavia strands the train.  

Poirot is awakened by a moan from Ratchett's compartment. Conductor Pierre Michel is told through the door that it was just a nightmare. Ratchett is dead the next morning; drugged and stabbed twelve times.

Who done it?

 

Macy

Macy Bea Lasky was born in Jacksonville, Florida on Saturday, January 17, 2026.  She is my first granddaughter.  And Macy is MARVELOUS.  

On Saturday, March 21, 2026, Cristina and I flew to Jacksonville (via Miami) to meet Macy face to face.  What a joy to hold her in my arms, whether she was sleeping or she was awake and moving her arms and legs.

As I have said, the key to happiness is choosing your parents well.  And Macy's parents, my son Bret and Pam, are doing a great job.  I was very impressed.

In addition to the above three, my daughter Rachel, son-in-law Mike, and grandsons Nate and Leo flew from New York to complete the family get together.  I had opportunities to have heart to heart conversations with each.

I enjoyed watching Bret, Rachel, Mike, Nate, Leo and Pam play pickleball at a nearby court. The first pickleball game was played 50 years ago, on Banbridge Island, Washington. Three fathers decided to use a badminton court, paddle tennis rackets, and a plastic wiffle ball. 

By coincidence, my friend Joe was driving to St. Augustine on the very same day as Cristina and I were as well.  We were able to meet that evening.

When I travel, I enjoy eating different food, especially food in the USA unavailable in Brazil.  Top of my list were the pancakes Bret made for me served with real maple syrup.  

I should also mention shrimp and grits at the St. Augustine Fish Camp, a hamburger at Harry's Seafood and Grill, chocolate ice cream at Kilwin's on St. George's Street, a waffle at Waffle House, soup and sandwich at Panera Bread, a chocolate chocolate doughnut at Parlor Doughnuts and Cold Stone Creamery ice cream.

We also enjoyed going up and down every aisle at Publix Supermarket in St. Augustine, buying a few things like Jello pudding, Paul Newman's salad dressing and an apple pie.

Cristina and I have said where ever you go, you always find a Brazilian.  Four times in St. Augustine, we had the same Uber driver, Paulo, originally from Brazil.

This time, flying Sao Paulo to and from Miami, we chose American Airlines Premium Economy.  It was worth the extra price with more space and amenities including a total of three small bottles of Bailey's The Original Irish Cream.  We also took advantage of wheelchair service (once without a driver) in Miami and Sao Paulo airports.

When will be our next trip to visit my family in the USA?  Or when will they visit me in Brazil? 

Paladin, Chapter 17

EXT - DAY. RANCH

POLLYANNA arrives at the ranch on horseback riding fast.  Her husband is waiting for her.  She dismounts.

BIG DAN: Where you been?

POLLYANNA: In town.

BIG DAN: Doin' what?

POLLYANNA: None of your business.

BIG DAN grabs her.

BIG DAN: Tell me the truth.

POLLYANNA: Let go of me, you big ape.

BIG DAN slaps her face.

POLLYANNA:  You'll pay for that.

BIG DAN: I'm waiting for answers.

POLLYANNA: My business is my business.  You'll get nothing from me.  Why don't you hit me again?  Does that make you feel like a big man?

BIG DAN: I am a big man.  I don't need you for that.

BIG DAN throws her down on the ground in frustration and heads into the ranch house.  POLLYANNA dusts her self off, gets up and sits on the porch.  In her anger, she recalls an event from her past.

EXT. UNKNOWN LOCATION - DAY

POLLYANNA is alone in isolated location with only some targets in the distance.  A revolver is strapped to her waist.  Every few seconds she rapidly draws her revolver and quickly fires it, successfully hitting the target.  After emptying her gun, she reloads and continues practicing rapidly drawing, firing and hitting the target.

__________

I will be on vacation next week.  Next blog post will be April 5th.    

Ides of March

Today is March 15th.  In ancient Roman culture it would be the Ides of March.  

The Ides were a monthly reference point falling on the 15th day of March, May, July, and October, and on the 13th day of all other months. Derived from the Latin for "to divide," the Ides originally marked the full moon. 

I learned about the Ides thanks to my Oswego High School Latin teacher, Ruth Young.

In modern times, the Ides of March is best known as the date on which Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. Caesar was stabbed to death at a meeting of the Senate.

Julius Caesar was assassinated because a group of Roman senators feared his immense, unprecedented power would destroy the Roman Republic and restore a monarchy.  

As many as 60 conspirators, led by Brutus and Cassius, were involved. According to Plutarch, a seer had warned that harm would come to Caesar on the Ides of March. 

On his way to the Theatre of Pompey, where he would be assassinated, Caesar passed the seer and joked, "Well, the Ides of March are come", implying that the prophecy had not been fulfilled, to which the seer replied, "Aye, they are come, but they are not gone."

This meeting is famously dramatized in William Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, when Caesar is warned by the soothsayer to "beware the Ides of March."

Barbra

Barbara Joan (Barbra) Streisand was born April 24, 1942 in Brooklyn, New York City, to Diana Ida (née Rosaen; 1908–2002) and Emanuel Streisand (1908–1943). Her mother had been a soprano in her youth and considered a career in music, but later became a school secretary.  Her father was a high school teacher at the same school, where they first met.  Streisand's family is Jewish.

In August 1943, a few months after Streisand's first birthday, her father died at age 34 from complications from an epileptic seizure, possibly the result of a head injury years earlier.  The family fell into near poverty, with her mother working as a low-paid bookkeeper. 

As an adult, Streisand remembered those early years as always feeling like an "outcast", explaining, "Everybody else's father came home from work at the end of the day. Mine didn't."  

Her mother tried to pay their bills but could not give her daughter the attention she craved: "When I wanted love from my mother, she gave me food," Streisand says.

In September 1960 Streisand auditioned as a singer at the Bon Soir nightclub in Manhattan, after which she was signed up at $125 ($1,368 today) a week. It became her first professional engagement, where she was the opening act for comedian Phyllis Diller. 

She recalls it was the first time she had been in that kind of upscale environment: "I'd never been in a nightclub until I sang in one."

Streisand opened on Broadway on March 26, 1964 with an acclaimed performance as entertainer Fanny Brice in Funny Girl at the Winter Garden Theatre. The show introduced two of her signature songs, "People" and "Don't Rain on My Parade".

Eight months later I almost had a chance to see Barbra at the Winter Garden, but didn't.  If I had played my cards right, I think I would have.

I was dating, off and on, another Jewish girl from Brooklyn.  I called for a date, but she couldn't because she was going home that weekend (from Penn).  

I hatched a plan.  I would go to New York as well, but to see the Penn-Columbia football game.  I would call her after the game to say hello.  I did and she invited me to have dinner with her and her parents at Barbetta's.  She said if she knew I would be in New York I could have joined them at the Winter Garden to see Barbra.  

When I called for the date, I should have invited her to the football game.  Even if she couldn't go, she would have known I would be in New York and I would have had my evening with Barbra.  I'm smarter today than I was in 1964 at age 19.  

Suddenly

Suddenly is a 1954 black and white American noir crime film.  The drama stars Frank Sinatra and Sterling Hayden.

The story concerns a small California town (by the name of Suddenly) whose tranquility is shattered when the train of the president of the United States is scheduled to make a stop there.  A hired assassin takes over a home that provides a perfect vantage point from which to assassinate the president.

This is Sinatra's first film after his Academy Award winning performance as Angelo Maggio in From Here to Eternity in 1953.  In Suddenly, he portrays a hired assassin, John Baron.

Baron boasts about the Silver Star he won in WWII for killing a large number of the enemy. He explains that he has nothing against the president but is being paid $500,000 (over $6,000,000 today) to kill him and money is his only motive.

It is worth noting that the president's name is never mentioned.

Sterling Hayden is the local sheriff of Suddenly.  He is also romantically involved with the widow who lives in the house Baron takes over.

Hayden's memorable films include The Asphalt Jungle (1950), The Killing (1956), Dr. Strangelove (1964) and The Godfather (1972).  

Paladin, Chapter 16

INT. GENERAL STORE - LATER IN THE DAY

CHARLES walks in.  GRACE is busy with a customer.  CHARLES retreats to his office.  Shortly, GRACE enters his office.

GRACE: Where were you?

CHARLES: I went for a walk.  To clear my head.  That's all right, isn't it?

GRACE: Were you alone?

CHARLES: What's that supposed to mean?

GRACE: Were you alone?

CHARLES: What if I was, what if I wasn't?

GRACE: Were you with POLLYANNA?

CHARLES: Why are you so obsessed with her?

GRACE: Why don't you answer my questions?

CHARLES: Why should I?  My business is my business.  Forget about POLLYANNA.

GRACE: I can't.  I'm jealous of her.  She's stealing my husband.

CHARLES: You're being ridiculous.

GRACE: Do you love me, CHARLES?

CHARLES: What a silly question.

GRACE: Well, do you?

CHARLES: Of course.

GRACE: Of course what?

CHARLES: (without emotion) Of course, I love you.

GRACE: Do you wish you were married to POLLYANNA?

CHARLES: (laughs) Don't be ridiculous.  

They hear customers enter the store.

CHARLES: Why don't you take care of the customers, GRACE.

GRACE: This discussion isn't over.

GRACE leaves office to deal with customers.

GRACE: (talking to customers) How can I help you?