Murder by Death (1976)

Starring: Truman Capote, Peter Sellers, Peter Falk, Alec Guinness, David Niven, Maggie Smith, James Coco, Eileen Brennan, Elsa Lanchester, and James Cromwell
Grade: B-

If you liked Clue, chances are you’ll probably like Murder by Death.

Summary

In a mansion, the mysterious Lionel Twain (Capote) writes a letter inviting those who receive it to a “Dinner and a Murder” at his home on Saturday evening. The guests are all parodies of famous sleuths. They are as follows:

1. From New York, there’s Dick (Niven) and Dora Charleston (Smith) and their pet dog Myron; parody of Nick and Nora Charles from The Thin Man franchise.
2. From Catalina, Inspector Sidney Wang (Sellers); a parody of Charlie Chan.
3. From Brussels, Milo Perrier (Coco); a parody of Hercule Poirot.
4. From San Francisco, Sam Diamond (Falk); a parody of Sam Spade from The Maltese Falcon.
5. From Sussex, England, Jessica Marbles (Lanchester); a parody of Miss Marple.

Lionel Twain gives the letters to his blind butler Jamessir Bensonmum (Guinness) to stamp and mail, though he stamps the table rather than the letters because he’s blind. On the day of the special evening, Dick and Dora Charleston get lost in the rainstorm and call the mansion. It rings until the phone lines are cut by Twain himself. Sidney Wang travels with his adopted son Willie (Richard Narita), who is driving him. Just as Twain messes with the hinge of a random door inside the mansion, Wang and Willie are getting lost too. Wang sees Dick’s dog and recognizes it. Following this, Dick goes over to greet the two, and they talk about how they’re both trying to find Twain’s house and how it’s weird that two premier detectives like themselves are invited. At the same time, Milo Perrier travels with his French chauffeur Marcel (Cromwell) to the event and chastises him for buying him a chocolate bar with raisins instead of nuts. After this, Twain breaks the hands off his clock in his mansion. Just then, we see Sam Diamond drive with his secretary Tess (Brennan). She gives him all the information she found out about Twain such as how he was born in San Francisco in 1906, his mother was Roman Catholic, his father was an Orthodox Jew, they were separated two hours after the marriage, he has one 32-year-old daughter named Irene, but she calls herself Rita, and he was arrested in 1932 in Chicago for selling pornographic bibles. The DA couldn’t make the charges stick when the church refused to turn over the bibles.

That’s a great joke.

Additionally, in 1946, he was picked up in El Paso, Texas, for trying to smuggle a truckload of rich white Americans across the border into Mexico to pick melons. He was sent to the Dallas state hospital for mental observation. Also, he doesn’t have any pinkies. He still has ten fingers but just no pinkies.

Odd.

Funnily enough, Tess says she found all of this out by writing to Twain and asking him. Following this, they run out of gas. Tess says there was a gas station five miles back, so Sam gives her the gas can to get it herself. Sidney and Willie come to a bridge, but Sidney steps out before they cross it in case the bridge collapses. Willie makes it, but Sidney demands he drive back to pick him up. After this, they arrive to Twain’s mansion. When they get up to the front door, Sidney feels an uneasiness about the scene and tells Willie to stop and jump on his command. Right after, Twain pushes the gargoyle statue on top of his mansion over the edge right where the two are standing. Sidney and Willie jump out of the way at just the right time. Sidney knew what to do after pointing out the chalk outline of feet right where he was standing. He’s starting to realize this introduction is leading to some kind of elaborate plan. Despite Willie knowing someone is trying to kill them, Sidney only sees the possibility as exciting. The strange happenings continue, as they ring the doorbell and hear a woman screaming. Willie is freaked out, but Sidney points out that this is just the sound of Twain’s doorbell and he has a bit of a macabre sense of humor. Blind butler Bensonmum greets them and incorrectly guesses them to be Dick and Dora Charleston. When questioned about the roof, he passes this off as the whole house needing repairs. As they walk in, Sidney sees the weather being completely different from one side of the house to the other by seeing the rainstorm through the window and no rain being on the side they entered from. Apparently, Twain controls this by some sort of electronic device because he likes the atmosphere murky.

Bensonmum shows the two to their rooms and says Twain will meet everyone after dinner because he prefers to eat out. As this goes on, Twain cleans the mess of the gargoyle statue, erases the chalk outline of the feet, and draws a new chalk outline of the feet to the left of it. Upon entering their room, Bensonmum says they started a fire for them, which turns out to be a literal fire started in the center of the bed. Sidney and Willie quickly put it out. Before leaving, Bensonmum says dinner will be at 9PM and Twain will prefer them to be dressed up. Dick gives Dora a drink, as they’ve let themselves into Twain’s mansion. She’s a bit shaken up by almost being killed by the gargoyle statue. She attributes their survival to their dog barking at the right moment, but Dick sees the statue thing as a warning rather than someone trying to kill them. Bensonmum shows them to their room and says he’ll get their luggage once he parks their car. As they walk up the stairs, Dora notices moving eyes in one of the portraits on the wall. Their room is Mrs. Twain’s old room. She died nine years ago by suicide, and Twain left the protected room exactly as it was ever since. They walk in to find cobwebs everywhere and a mouse is seen scurrying across the floor. Dora refuses to stay in the room, so Bensonmum promises to attend to it during dinner. Once he leaves, Dick investigates the room a bit and notices that the “dust” is actually baking flour, and the cobwebs are candied sugar. It was placed there to frighten them. Seeing this, Dick assumes the mouse is a toy, but he quickly finds out that it is indeed real after picking it up with his hand and throwing it. Milo Perrier arrives with Marcel, but Marcel is forced to clean the chocolate off his face before they exit the car.

Just then, the newly hired cook Yetta (Nancy Walker) knocks on the back door. Bensonmum answers the door, but she doesn’t say or acknowledge him. She just walks in. Since Bensonmum is blind, he just assumes the person left. He bumps into her right after, and he realizes she’s the new cook. He starts questioning her, but she holds up a sign that says she’s deaf and mute. Since he can’t read it, he just assumes she’s shy. He shows her the menu for ten that she has to make, but she holds up another sign that says she can’t read English either.

Great hire Twain.

Milo and Marcel show up and Marcel was hit by the gargoyle. Milo tries to use the phone, but Bensonmum says it’s been out of order for a week. Challenging him, Milo picks up the wire and concludes that the wire has been snipped no more than an hour ago, which begs the question why he would even attempt to use the phone knowing this, but I digress.

Milo is already agitated and goes on a mini-rant about the gargoyle and how Marcel needs a cold compress since they can’t call a doctor. Plus, he requires a hot chocolate, so Bensonmum goes to ring the maid, who can’t hear the bell. He says he’ll get it himself but wants to show Milo and Marcel to their rooms first. Before they follow him, Milo says he doesn’t trust Bensonmum because of his eyes. Marcel notes that he’s blind, but Milo dismisses this. As Sam gets mad at Tess and goes on a monologue about a past love he lost in 1940 in France, Milo tests Bensonmum by doing a bunch of funny faces in front of him. Finally, he comes to the conclusion that he is in fact blind. Sam and Tess arrive, and they notice the eeriness of the scene. Tess wants Sam to kiss her to make her feel better, but he refuses. Bensonmum opens the door, and Tess immediately starts yelling that Sam is dead because of the gargoyle and she falls on the ground. Turns out, this is all an act. Sam pulls out his gun on Bensonmum and threatens him for the mishap that was clearly planned, mentioning how his “kid” brother died of a similar incident two years ago when working on a case. He would have been 63 on Tuesday. Just as Tess calms down the situation, Twain puts away his leather gloves in private. Bensonmum tells Yetta that it’s 9PM and he’s wondering how dinner is going, but she hasn’t made a thing. He gives her more instructions on how to prepare the food and then he gets ready to serve cocktails. Now, all the guests are dressed and exiting their rooms to get ready for dinner. They all run into each other at the same time, and they all already know each other, with the exception of Willie and Marcel. Dick asks Marcel about his injury, which everyone is surprised that he knows about, but he shows off his detective prowess as to how he knows, noting small details.

Sidney does the same by calling out Dora for supposedly dying her hair because he saw blonde hairs on Dick’s suit. They’re confused by this, so Sidney points out the other potential possibility in that Dick was with another woman, though he stops himself before he straight-up says. Unfortunately, he says enough to where it’s obvious and Dora storms out of the room.

All the guests walk and talk on the way down the stairs. Dora asks if Marcel’s hip removal hurts, something that Dick brought to the attention of everyone. As he says it only hurts during damp weather, the thunder crackles outside and he falls down the stairs. Willie tries to point out that the portrait of a dog has a real tongue and eyes in its place, but Sidney isn’t impressed because he already notices this. As the guests enjoy their cocktails, they discuss what’s going on. Milo sees this is a collection of the world’s greatest detectives. This is no coincidence, but Sidney notes there are still two guests missing. Just then, Sam shows up with Tess. He starts insulting each detective with what he knows about each of their private lives. Once he excuses himself, Tess apologizes on his behalf, as he was shot in the head a week ago and he shouldn’t even be out of the hospital. Bensonmum enters the room to present Jessica Marbles and her wheelchair bound nurse Miss Withers (Estelle Winwood), who Marbles takes care of because she’s too old now. As Sam rejoins them and happily greets Marbles since they’re friends, they hear the sound of a man dying coming from a statue of a head on the wall. It’s the signal that dinner is done, so Bensonmum brings them to the dining room. At dinner, Dick holds a toast while laying out the facts. Twain has gathered the world’s five greatest detectives to solve a crime that has not yet been committed, and he has set traps for them (the falling statue, the almost collapsing bridge, etc.). It was never to kill them because he could have done it at any time. It was merely to whet their appetites for this upcoming game of sorts. He wanted five detectives instead of one because he wanted to take them all on. With this, he wants to toast to the weekend. Before they do, Sidney stops them because he thinks the wine is poisoned. He proves it by pouring it out and it burns a hole in his napkin. Everyone freaks out and thanks him, but Milo gets everyone’s attention by drinking his anyway. He’s fine because as he notes, Sidney was the only one who could figure this out so that’s why he was tested.

Sam questions if Bensonmum was the one who poured the wine and thinks he sniffed out Sidney because of his race. Bensonmum shows up and admits he poured it, but it was because the wine was placed in the fridge for him by Twain. Plus, he was told to give Sidney a specific glass with a sticky stem. Bensonmum never asked why because he was lucky enough to find the fridge. Bensonmum brings out the soup, but Milo has to show him there’s no soup in the bowl. As Bensonmum goes to the kitchen to yell at Yetta, Sam points out the human eyes on the moose head on the wall watching them. In the kitchen, Bensonmum fires Yetta, but she doesn’t understand what’s going on. Back in the dining room, Dick says the seating arrangement is wrong because as Dora’s husband, he should be sitting across from her, not next to her. The two stand up to switch seats, but when they get to their feet, two swords come down and stab both chairs. It just misses them, with Dick realizing this was yet another test. When they try to take the swords out of the chairs, the lights are turned off. Everyone starts to panic. Finally, Twain reveals himself when the lights turn back on, and he’s seated at the head of the table. The frustration starts coming out with everyone because of the attempts on their lives and the lack of dinner, and Milo and Marbles threaten to leave. Twain refuses this and presses a button on his chair that locks them all inside. Twain says he is out to prove he is the greatest criminologist in the world and brought them all there to prove it. None of them have ever had an unsolved murder. Their reputation exists on this fact, but what would the world say if the five greatest detectives were trapped in a house only to discover a dead body on the floor stabbed 12 times in the back with a butcher’s knife, and not one of them could solve the crime?

At midnight, someone in the house will be viciously murdered. The victim and the murderer are in the room. Twain knows who will be both, how the crime will be committed, and exactly the time it will take place. When Dora suggests Twain is the murder, he says he refuses to discuss this with wives. When Dick tries to talk about how this wouldn’t be much of a challenge, Twain offers $1 million in cash to whoever solves it. In addition, they get all the paperback rights and film sales. Right now, it’s 11PM. They have one hour. Twain presses another button on his chair and the lights turn off. When they turn back on, he’s at the other side of the table, so Sam threatens him. Twain tries to play with him by saying he’s still on the other side of the table on account of a mirror trick, so Sam pulls out his gun to test him. Twain backs off by saying sometimes it doesn’t work, admitting Sam wins this round. Twain finishes by saying his round comes at midnight. Pressing another button on his chair, the doors behind him open and his rigged chair shoots like a rocket backwards into the other room until the doors close and he’s gone.

Let the games begin!

My Thoughts:

Though less talked about compared to his other works as a screenwriter, Neil Simon’s Murder by Death is a very fun comedy with a premise for the ages. Gather fiction’s best detectives, put them in one location, and force them to solve a murder on a time crunch to see who’s the greatest of them all. It does sputter in its introductory and closing sequences, but once the story starts to take shape in the second act, it’s a very entertaining mystery with a cast fully committed to their well-defined characters, some being more over-the-top than others. If you get the references, you’ll appreciate the movie on its intended level and see how good of job Simon does in poking fun at the genre’s clichés. If you aren’t as familiar with certain characters the film is making fun of or some of the works of writers such as Agatha Christie or Dashiell Hammett, it’s still a blast, as though there is an underlying intention with certain gags, characters, and moments, it’s still an original story and is written in a way to allow anyone to be a part of the fun. Plus, if you’ve seen or read enough mystery fiction, you will be just as in on the joke as everyone else because some tropes used in within the genre are that hard to ignore. The main purpose of Murder by Death is to remind you of it. Neil Simon’s writing works on several different levels, as a comedy, a legitimate murder mystery, and a pure parody, balancing all three well. Director Robert Moore, who directed many of Simon’s Broadway hits, does a very good job in getting the most out of the stationary location while dedicating enough time between its characters for everyone to get their chance to shine in the time given, despite the main point of the movie being that it’s all for naught.

In a movie like this, the best part are the characters. Murder by Death‘s biggest positive is that it feels like an example lecture at an improvisation class by veterans of the field. They are just given their brief characterizations, a minute to collect themselves, and are told to act as they see fit based off what was written for them. It’s the best way to explain the random outbursts and details thrown in throughout the story for comedic effect and how committed everyone is to the bit, no matter how bizarre certain happenings are like the mansion employing a blind butler and a deaf, mute, illiterate cook. Peter Falk’s Sam Diamond is the prime example of this, as his over-the-top Humphrey Bogart parody is both a hilariously accurate portrayal of Sam Spade, Rick Blaine in Casablanca (due to his refusal to engage sexually with Tess), and the hardboiled detectives of that era of film, but the monologues and insults he effortlessly rambles off are very much reminiscent of a acting expert who knows his character inside and out and is just reacting how he thinks “Sam Diamond” would. In doing so, he makes the outlandishness of Sam an entirely new character who could easily be the star of his own spinoff. He steals the show and is downright hilarious with his inability to trust anyone, pull out his gun at a moment’s notice, and spew off the funniest quips of the film in a masterful deadpan performance. Acting chameleon Peter Sellers is more of an outright parody, as he’s in yellow face and false teeth for the Sidney Wang character, but his constant telling of Chinese proverbs as a way to sound wise in any situation was a very amusing bit if you are familiar with Charlie Chan as well as many other stereotypical Hollywood-created Asian protagonists in the genre. Though it’s outrageous in hindsight, Sellers as Sidney Wang does make sense as a parody since so many non-Asians played the role of Chan before him, adding another layer to the well-written parts of the comedy.

Though this isn’t really important in the grand scheme of things, I’d argue Sidney as being the best detective out of everyone there just by seeing how his mind works, how he moves, and his reaction to everyone else. He is very much a few steps ahead of everyone else, evidenced numerous times throughout the picture like his nonchalant “I saw it” response to his adopted son Willie, a fact he reminds everyone every chance he gets (getting funnier each time), when questioned about the moving eyes on the portrait on the wall. It’s like he’s just waiting for the game to begin. It’s a feeling he has as soon as he’s on the entrance steps to Twain’s mansion, telegraphing the gargoyle statue crashing down on them beforehand. Despite this character, and all the characters in the movie for that matter, making fun of other star detectives, they are still their own person for the sake of this film. With this in mind, Sidney Wang is actually pretty cool to get to know throughout the process of the story. The only one who was a bit too much was the sweets-loving Milo Perrier. James Coco embodied what the character is written to be, but he’s so over-the-top that he’s not as funny as his cartoon overacting would suggest. There are a few decent gags involving him like him actually being bald, but it’s mostly because James Cromwell’s Marcel was a good straight man to play off of. Other than that, he’s just complaining about eating something and it just doesn’t click like the others. On top of that, he never really proved himself as a detective who’s considered to be among the “Best” in the world like the others do. Actually, Jessica Marbles didn’t do much at all following her amusing introduction. The ensemble was led purely on the backs of Sam, Sidney, and Dick.

Though they aren’t detectives, Maggie Smith’s aloof delivery as Dora Charleston (“That’s tacky” when Dick whispers to her about necrophilia was hysterical) and Eileen Brennan’s Tess being frustrated with Sam’s erratic behavior did more for the movie than Coco or Elsa Lanchester as Marbles. It becomes quite obvious which characters Neil Simon liked writing for and which ones were added just to make sense of the premise.

Above all else, what intrigued me more than anything about this mystery comedy was the rarity of seeing how literary icon Truman Capote did in a major acting role. Playing the all-encompassing villain against so many acting heavyweights was an important role to cast to make sure the movie reached a higher level than other parodies of the era. Though Capote attracts eyes to the product because of his name, he was definitely not what I was expecting. He’s dressed like what a maniacal, eccentric millionaire would look like, there is a certain mystique about the way he carries himself, and he’s got a really cool chair. Other than that, his highest point is his psychedelic entrance into the movie because of the visuals. Once the smoke and mirrors clear, his whiny voice and presence just isn’t as threatening as it should be considering what Lionel Twain is making these people go through. He doesn’t have the aura of an antagonist who’s going up against the likes of the “World’s greatest”. Also, there are some lines written that would have killed had the right person said them. For instance, Twain telling the others that they will win the rights to the book and film rights along with the money if they succeed is the first one that comes to mind. With all of this being said, Capote’s off-kilter performance is still highly memorable because of how much it sticks out for better or worse, so credit is given purely for how different of a flavor Lionel Twain is compared to what could have been a boring antagonist alongside so many acting greats. We got to take the good with the bad here. There’s also the general question that’s never answered as to why Twain thinks he is in fact the world’s greatest detective when he’s not one. They explain some backstory about how he’s a former criminal and a bunch of other irrelevant facts for comedic purposes, and somehow, he’s now inexplicably a millionaire. I can understand why Twain has an ego, but what qualifies him to genuinely think he’s better than people like Sidney Wang or Dick Charleston?

Despite the praise I’ve given a lot of the writing for specific scenes and characters, the antagonist is noticeably underwritten. Now, Simon’s script clearly left a lot of room for the actors to act, which is fine, but since Capote doesn’t have the experience the others do, this luxury doesn’t really benefit him. In general, his role needed more to it to develop onscreen. There needed to be more of an idea in mind of who or what Lionel Twain is supposed to be. This is why the cop-out ending was such a disappointment. Without spoiling it, the entire movie leads to the big finish that is essentially calling out authors and other writers for famous bullshit endings that basically insult the reader/viewer because of twists and last second characters introduced that change the trajectory of the movie to throw you off from being able to predict the ending. However, in doing so, they purposely do the same exact thing in this film’s ending as a way to further the point. The point is not lost on the audience, but this choice for a bathos conclusion ruined the payoff of the entire movie. It completely unraveled amidst the comedy and the decision to prove a point rather than write a satisfying finish. Murder by Death can still make fun of the mystery genre and its authors, and its penchant for twists and turns when it’s not necessary without having to sacrifice the payoff to a good movie. Unfortunately, the decision was made to go all-in on its commentary and the air was let out of the room in the final ten minutes, getting less and less amusing with each follow-up reveal. If you’re telling future writers to not do this, why do you make your point by doing the same thing? Maybe I’m taking things too seriously, but it bothers me because of how hard the movie works for 75% of it only for it all to lead to an ending that basically tells us that this was all a waste of time. Yes, there are a lot of inconsistencies and ridiculous moments in mystery fiction that have deserved to be made fun of for years, especially the tropes of certain characters. Murder by Death does a great job at showing us how laughable it can be. It just went a step too far with its choice of an ending, though it did lead to Sidney’s great line at the end with, “Yes, killed good weekend”.

Can someone tell me if the gimmick involving identical rooms was supposed to be funny or an added element to make things interesting? The explanation behind it didn’t make any sense and only seemed to waste time, but since there have been moments like this in other mystery movies, I’d imagine it was supposed to be a part of the parody. If it was, well, as you can see, the joke did not land. I just thought it was cool.

Because of how long it takes to get into the thick of the plot, and it’s middling ending, the movie moves at a much slower pace than you would think for such a short runtime. In the beginning, the characters all getting to the mansion and going through the first test regarding the gargoyle statue seems like it takes forever. It’s there for a reason, to establish the detectives, their personalities, and the people they’ve brought along for the ride, but it does drag a bit. It’s even more noticeable in hindsight because you realize how much the movie would have benefitted with more mansion-related shenanigans and misdirection comedy. You can tell too because you don’t pick up on the tightly written dialogue and jokes until Twain leaves the picture. It’s as if Simon was writing the first part out of the movie out of obligation just so he could get to the fun section smack dab in the middle. Once the murder mystery begins, it’s as entertaining as advertised. It’s consistently witty and even gets you to laugh-out-loud at some points, with the revelations of Sam probably being the best joke of the film. THIS is when the genius of the writing starts to hit you, as the first act’s writing doesn’t hook you as much as you’d expect it too despite the cool premise. The “motive” sequence where they all reveal how they’re tied to Twain was hysterical, and the lead-up to the final reveal was great. They just should have picked one instead of the actual ending they went with.

It should be noted that David Niven is welcomed in any movie, but his classy and comical performance as Dick Charleston is just an important to the movie as Falk and Sellers. He’s so different from the others that he plays off them very well, getting a litany of one-liners in, with each one being better than the last. His discussions with the peculiar Sam Diamond in particular are understated and laugh-out-loud funny (“bizarre little twit”).

Maybe the entire screenplay isn’t fully realized, but the things done correctly are done really well. For every shortcoming of the story or underutilized section to be pointed out like with set pieces and a bit more important action leading to something, there are a lot of bits and jokes that may go unnoticed on the first viewing, allowing you to appreciate more of the screenplay on a revisit. Murder by Death delivers on its promise, sending up the mystery genre to colorful results with an exciting premise and a wonderful cast of characters that exudes loads of laughter. Nevertheless, it takes a while to find its groove and derails its own potential with a finale focused on bitterness of its peers rather than closing a solid comedy.