Murder by Death (1976)

(CTV Streaming, July 2020) I recall seeing bits and pieces of Murder by Death as a kid, so I was more than curious to re-watch the film, only remembering that it was about parodies of fictional detectives being set up to solve the perfect murder. Going in the film otherwise almost entirely unaware, I was amazed at the cast of the film: Peter Sellers, Alec Guiness, Peter Falk, David Niven, Maggie Smith and none other than a very young James Cromwell! Then I was bowled over once over again, as I recognized the archetypes they were playing—Falk imitating Humphrey Bogart’s Sam Spade, Niven as a pitch-perfect incarnation of William Powell’s Nick Charles, and so on. I could have done without the casual racism of Sellers’ Charlie Chan, but it does get us the rather wonderful spectacle of having him going toe-to-toe with his inspiration Alec Guiness in a scene or two. None other than Truman Capote shows up as the main antagonist of the film, setting up a perfect murder that none of the world-class detectives will be able to solve. As Murder by Death is working from a Neil Simon script, you can expect a steadily amusing script and dialogue—although the film doesn’t quite get as hilarious as it could have been. The structure of the story seems lopsided as well, with a very long time spent on introductions and setting up the premise, then zipping to a conclusion. It doesn’t get any better once we realize (after an android or two) that the film is absolutely not meant to make conventional narrative sense. There are six successive plot climaxes in a row getting more and more absurd, the joke being turned on the viewers expecting this comedy to make any kind of narrative sense. Murder by Death becomes a letdown after such a promising start, but the result is still worth a look if only for the cast and the playfulness of the script as it charges forward, determined to upend most expectations.