Agatha Christie : The Miss Marple Collection (12 Disc Box Set)

Joan Hickson does not play Miss Marple in this series, like other actresses before her and since. She IS Miss Marple. Just like Larry Hagman was J.R. This is a thoroughly absorbing set of jolly hockey sticks English murder stories that is contextualised by quintessential, romanticised notions of old fashioned English values: doing the right thing; knowing your place in this class ridden society where the maids are white but very thick or simple (or both) and the middle class are also white, privately school, well spoken, well educated and live off unearned income or pensioned from the services - having served as an officer, of course. English culture is also narrowed to an absurd degree to revolve around going to a picturesque Church on Sundays, nice cups of tea with home made scones and discussing the weather, sending invitation cards to announce social events, or gossiping about other villagers at the post office or whilst pruning the roses. In St Mary Mead, the home of Miss Marple, the poor don't exist, except as maids who speak very badly, nor do any ethnic minorities exist except as eccentric cooks who can barely speak English and thow fits of paranoia whenever a murder is uncovered - assuming, quite correctly, that they will be accused before anyone else is because they are 'foreign' and a have a natural bent toward dishonesty. But the butcher, the baker and candlestick maker do exist - as do village murders that can only be solved by reciting nursery rhymes not by calling the police. But, hey, who cares how politically incorrect and silly that is? By today's standards, and even during the time this series was made, the settings for each story was about as realistic and factual correct as the Lochness Monster is genuine, but it's fun escapism, nevertheless and makes great viewing - whilst tucking into freshly baked scones, home made jam and nice pot of tea on standby, of course!

As someone who has read all The Miss Marple short stories & 8 of the novels all I can say is that Joan Hickson captures the essence of The Miss Marple of the Agatha Christie books to perfection . All the other characters have justice done to them in this series as well - I know that its plot-lines take liberties with the books . But when you look at how depressing the more recent Poirot TV shows have been through sticking like a limpet to the books storyline this is perhapes no bad thing . The Joan Hickson episodes are very true to the period & her performance as the shrewd spinster is very engaging . The PC Miss Marple that ITV have churning out over the last few years shows that bringing in dodgy sexual behaviour ( that Agatha Christie never did in her books ) does not enhance anything . Watching ITV's Marple is a reminder of just how brilliant Joan Hickson's episodes where . In the this top draw series that ran from 1984 & 1992 all the Miss Marple novels are televised with enough running time to do them justice . The characters are from the novels are done very well by the cast of fine actors . Miss Marple's dry sense of humour is always a treat as is Chief Inspector Slack's comic bombast . Unlike Helen Hayes , Margaret Rutherford , Gerladine McEwan and even Angela Lansbury the late great Joan Hickson is Miss Marple and deservedly so . The settings of the series are very well done . This is a great way to pass a few hours on an otherwise dull Sunday afternoon !

This boxed set provides the viewer with not only the best Miss Marple portayal, but also that which is closest to the orginal written works. Joan Hickson, sadly no longer with us, gives a performance which in my minds eye is like the character that Agatha Christie describes. The later versions of this character, whilst well acted and produced, come nowhere near the understated version that Ms Hickson provides. All in all, a most enjoyable boxed set which provides my wife and I with entertainment on thos evenings when the rest of television is of poor quality.

If you love the books, these are simply the best adaptations because they are so close to the original books and Joan Hickson (Agatha Christie's own choice) just IS Miss Marple. Of course each episode is about several hours and leaves virtually nothing out of the written stories - that may be too much for some people, but personally, I think it is just the most wonderful homage to an amazing writer and one of her best and most loved characters. Settle down on a Sunday afternoon with a small(ish) sherry & lose yourself. There is some debate as to whether the box set contains all scenes from the original screenings. Personally, I can't remember every scene from the original programmes but as some reviewers have said, the Beeb confirmed the running time, which matches the box set. If however, after watching the programmes at the time they were shown, you then read the books, some scenes from the books would not be in the adaptations or might differ slightly, but you may well retain the programme images in your mind. So when you come to watch them again, there appears to be missing scenes. That's just my possible explanation, but at the end of the day, for fans of Miss Marple (especially the long-standing ones), this series is quite simply complete and perfect.

Very good value for the money

Als Agatha Christie im Jahre 1946 bei der Uraufführung der Bühnenfassung ihres Romans "Appointment with death" im Publikum saß, war sie von einer Darstellerin ganz besonders beeindruckt: Die damals 44jährige Joan Hickson spielte die konfuse, altjüngferliche Miss Pryce so überzeugend, dass Agatha Christie bei der anschließenden Premierenfeier äußerte: "Ich wünsche mir, dass Sie eines Tages meine Miss Marple spielen." 38 Jahre später wurde dieser Wunsch wahr, auch wenn Agatha Christie dies selbst nicht mehr miterleben konnte. Von 1984 bis 1992 verfilmte die BBC alle zwölf Miss Marple-Romane. Joan Hickson spielte die Hauptrolle, und mit ihrer selbst bis in die kleinsten Nuancen haargenaue Verkörperung der beliebtesten Amateurdetektivin der Welt, schaffte sie es, bei Fans wie Kritikern als die einzig wahre Film-Miss Marple in die Geschichte einzugehen. Man darf die BBC-Verfilmungen natürlich nicht mit den charmanten Krimikomödien der 60er Jahre mit Margaret Rutherford verwechseln, da diese sich in ihrer Absicht zu unterhalten vollkommen voneinander unterscheiden. Anders als damals die M-G-M bei den vier Kinofilmen achtete die BBC bei ihrer TV-Mammutproduktion auf absolute Werktreue. Zwar gibt es dennoch einige Änderungen, doch diese wurden äußerst behutsam durchgeführt und basierten auf Aufzeichnungen aus Agatha Christies Nachlass. So wurde bei "The murder at the vicarage" ("Mord im Pfarrhaus") die komplette Nebenhandlung mit dem Archäologen Dr. Stone und seiner Sekretärin entfernt, ferner verschwand die Rolle von Dennis, dem Neffen des Vikars. Doch dies war ganz im Sinne von Agatha Christie, die mehrere Jahre nach der Erstveröffentlichung Ihres Romans genau diese erwähnten Teile im Nachhinein als entbehrlich bezeichnet hatte. Am werkgetreuesten ist die Verfilmung von "A murder is announced" ("Ein Mord wird angekündigt"). Hier fehlt wirklich nichts - selbst die Dialoge sind in großenteils 1:1 aus der Romanvorlage übernommen worden. Alle zwölf Filme sind in der unmittelbaren Nachkriegszeit angesiedelt. Das passt sehr gut, denn die Ära von 1930 (hier erschien der erste Miss Marple-Roman) war zwar vorüber, aber noch nicht zu lange, um Miss Marples altjüngferliche, spätviktorianische Art deplatziert wirken zu lassen. Außerdem entsteht dadurch eine zeitliche Nähe zu dem letzten Roman, der 1971 geschrieben wurde. Immer wieder gibt es Hinweise auf Lebensmittelkarten und Rationierungen, wodurch des den Machern der Serie gelingt, nicht nur eine bloße Krimihandlung zu erzählen, sondern auch ein nachvollziehbares Sittenportrait einer sich wandelnden Welt zu entwerfen. Gedreht wurde fast ausschließlich vor Ort, d. h. auf Szenenbauten im Studio hat man soweit wie möglich verzichtet. Statt dessen hat man historische Gebäude und Museen angemietet und mit einer schier unglaublichen Fülle von epochegetreuen Möbelstücken, Gemälden und anderen Einrichtungsgegenständen ausgestattet. Vervollständigt werden die prachtvollen Verfilmungen durch fantastische Kostüme, ein Riesenaufgebot an Autos der damaligen Zeit und phantastische Schauspieler, die genau so aussehen und agieren, wie man es sich beim Lesen der Romane vorgestellt hat. Zur Box: Jeder Film findet sich auf einer eigenen DVD. Die Box selber ist detailgetreu wie ein dickes Buch gestaltet; die einzelnen DVD-Halter lassen sich wie Buchseiten umblättern. Es gibt nur eine englische Tonspur, was aber verständlich ist, denn die ARD hat es sich als Meister im Verstümmeln von ausländischen Produktionen nicht nehmen lassen, fast jeden Film um 10 bis 15 Minuten zu kürzen. Dies hätte am Ende wieder dazu geführt, dass bei den Synchronfassungen immer wieder einige Szenen gehabt hätte, die man nur mit Untertiteln hätte anschauen können. Außerdem sind zwei Filme enthalten, die nie für das deutsche Fernsehen synchronisiert wurden.

I got this product yesterday and was SO HAPPY to be able to play one of the movies last night. I was FINALLY able to play the movie that I have wanted to play for a long time now. From the Agatha Christie's Miss Marple (Collection 1 - 1975 - that I previously bought) I played the movie "A Caribbean Mystery". In that particular set, there WAS editing of this movie and I was quite put out about that so I got rid of it. I KNEW that it had been edited because I had the VHS version of it that was played on VISION a long time ago and knew that it had NOT been edited at that time AND that the cable system in those days didn't force you to watch as many commercials as they force you to do these days (GRRRRRRRR)!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well, now that I have a 'multi-region' DVD player I can play ANY KIND of DVD regardless of whether I buy it from Amazon in the .UK/.US or here in .CA. When I played the movie last night (A Caribben Mystery) I was able to finally sit back and relax to this mystery -- and guess what???? THERE WAS NO EDITS IN THIS MOVIE!!!!!!! I saw the WHOLE movie and was able to just really enjoy another great Agatha Christie movie without having the issue of the "edits" that were made in the previous set that I bought. What really turns me off of watching any movie these days on our cable system is when I can tell that the movie HAS been "edited" OR the way we get totally inundated by commercials!!!! To watch ANY movie these days on cable, the only way you CAN enjoy it is to record it first, then watch it!!!! (This set also has closed captioning available for those who use it). I find that now I don't watch ANY movie or TV show they try and play on our cable system because no matter what you try and watch these days on CABLE (whether it's new or not), is that you are FORCED to watch just as many commercials as the show itself. A perfect example of this is when they try and play "The Sound of Music". That movie is 2 hours and 54 minutes, but when ever a station decided to play it, they have to add at least another hour or more of just commercials. Why then is it worth even watching it if they cut out parts of the movie to do this???? It doesn't make sense! BOTTOM LINE: if you buy this product, you won't be disappointed! For "A Caribbean Mystery" it is ALL there and from what I see on the package of it saying how long each of the movies are, it tells me that this IS THE UNCUT VERSION!!!!! Now you CAN enjoy this set just as much as I have.

Questo cofanetto contiene tutti i film di Miss Marple di Agatha Christie realizzati ottimamente dalla BBC, un vero gioiello, nessun confronto con altre versioni con altre attrici. Fedeli al testo, ben recitati, questi film sono anche molto utili per chi intende esercitarsi nella comprensione della lingua inglese. Non occorre dire che il servizio di Amazon è stato perfetto, come al solito: grande rapidità nel fornire gli acquisti e puntualità nella consegna.

Die Verfilmungen sind etwas langatmig und bieder. Zum Teil lassen sich störende holländische Untertitel leider nicht ausblenden. Dass der Audioteil nur in Englisch verfügbar ist, wusste ich - kein Problem.