Product Description

Dame Christie's most popular character, prim and proper Miss Jane Marple, is adored worldwide by mystery fans for her razor-sharp mind, intuitive understanding of criminal behavior, and trademark knitting needles. Enjoy four feature-film adaptations of Miss Marple's greatest mysteries in one collectible 2-pack. It's hours of great whodunnits for all ages.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12272 in DVD
• Brand: A&E
• Released on: 2001-09-25
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Box set, DVD, Full Screen, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, Spanish
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 400 minutes

Amazon.com
One of Agatha Christie's most popular characters, the beloved Miss Marple, is brought to life in these classic BBC and A&E Home Video mysteries. Included in the boxed set are 4:50 from Paddington, Sleeping Murder, The Mirror Cracked from Side to Side, and A Caribbean Mystery. The delightful Joan Hickson is always entertaining as the prim and proper Miss Marple, complete with her elderly woman charm and perpetually clicking knitting needles.

In 4:50 from Paddington, Miss Marple's good friend Elspeth McGillicuddy witnesses a man strangle a woman on a passing train, and it's up to Miss Marple to uncover the mystery. In Sleeping Murder, the Reeds move into their dream house, where Mrs. Reed is plagued by the vision of a body in the hall. In turn they call upon Miss Marple to help them uncover this strange phenomenon. When the American movie star Marina Gregg in The Mirror Cracked from Side to Side is almost murdered while filming her new picture, she's fortunate to have the help of Miss Marple to sniff out the evil culprit. A Caribbean Mystery has Miss Marple, who's in need of rest and relaxation, deciding to holiday in the West Indies. Her holiday soon turns into a working vacation when it's time for her to gather the usual suspects. This boxed set is a must-have for the video libraries of all whodunit enthusiasts and Miss Marple admirers. --Samantha Allen Storey

Customer Reviews

Comments on edits made to stories
Much to my annoyance I found out that at least two of the stories in this set have been edited. For those trying to make a decision whether or not to buy these disks, I have outlined the cuts below:

Sleeping Murder - intact: no cuts.
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side - appears to be intact.

4.50 from Paddington - edited: 5 mins 11 secs
Scenes edited are:
* Miss Marple and Mrs McGillicuddy directly after the latter arrives at Miss Marple's where she talks about how the people on the railway wouldn't believe a word she said about what she saw on the train(30 secs)
* Miss Marple collects the mail after it has been dropped off by the postman (13 secs)
* A continuation of the conversation between Lucy Eylesbarrow and Emma Crackenthorpe as they walk down the hall after the former arrives there where they discuss the imminent arrival of the rest of the family and the peculiarities of the family will / Emma introduces Lucy to Mrs Kidder (the cook) / Dr Quimper leaving and chatting to Emma / Mrs Kidder leaving for the day and Lucy asking if she minds if she does a bit of tidying up / Lucy cleaning the kitchen (3 mins 10 sec)
* Dr Qumper walking with Inspector Slack away from the barn watched by the two boys / Slack talking to Quimper about the family (1 min 26 secs)

As you can see substantial edits here that actually affect what information we receive about the will, plus the removal of chunks of character development - grrr.

A Caribbean Mystery - edited: 3 mins 54 secs
Scenes edited are:
* Man setting up lantern on raft - a continuation of this scene where he jumps in boat and starts back / Miss Marple meeting Victoria / Tim greeting Miss Marple and discussing with her whether or not she would prefer an English-style meal for dinner, as Jason Rafiel enters (1 min 13 secs)
* Miss Marple unable to sleep (12 secs)
* Molly returning to dinner covered in blood after she finds Victoria and breaking down (1 min 3 secs)
* Greg Dyson the beach / Evelyn Hillingdon talking to Miss Marple (26 secs)
* Inspector Weston arriving at Victoria's funeral / singing at funeral (25 sec)
* Jason Rafiel watching Miss Marple approach and inviting her to tea, to which Miss Marple responds that she was coming to see him anyway (21 secs)
* Miss Marple folding linen as she packs to leave (4 secs)
* Inspector Weston with Miss Marple and Molly after the murderer is caught (10 secs)

The cuts here are not as severe except for the ones concerning Victoria (they establish Miss marples relationship with her) and the one with Molly returning to dinner where she finally cracks.

New Miss Marple DVD is a disappointment!
I'd been eagerly waiting for the DVD release of this wonderful series but am now very disappointed. This is the second set of A&E DVDs I've had to return recently because of poor quality. THE 4:50 FROM PADDINGTON DVD is the worst I've seen. It looks like an old and worn out video. It's dirty and the colors are washed out. No restoration work there! SLEEPING MURDER is better but not as good as it could be. Frankly, I didn't even bother to watch the other two shows, I returned the set. I've bought other A&E DVDs made from much older shows, like The Saint, from the sixties, and all 12 episodes are crisp and clear and the color is nice and bright. Also, why did they edit these shows? You lose important information that way, especially in mysteries.

It appears that A@E no longer cares about the quality of the products they sell. They should check them before they're made available to the public. Visually they lack the high standards that one expects from DVDs. Hopefully A&E will rectify this in future releases of this set.

Very entertaining collection deserves better transfer
I am a big Miss Marple fan, and it's nice to have these movies on DVD, but the picture quality is horrible. I can't believe A&E would put out such an inferior product, but then the episodes that are broadcast on their network are pretty lousy to begin with. Although some of the episodes look better than others, they ALL look like they are several generations removed from the original negative--which should NEVER happen with DVD. The resulting transfers look washed out, damaged and dirty, very dark and dingy (almost no contrast), and extremely grainy. The grain and contrast are so bad in one scene from "At Bertram's Hotel" that the characters' facial features just disappear into the grain--you can't make out eyes or noses! The fact that some reviewers on this site think this DVD looks all right helps explain how companies get by with such stunts. One would think that anyone with a DVD player would've played other movies before this one and could see the enormous quality difference between the Miss Marple set and practially anything else out there. This has by far the worst picture quality of any DVD I have ever seen. Not surprisingly, the Miss Marple set #2 has the same horrendous quality: dark, dirty, and enough grain to play connect the dots! A&E should be thoroughly ashamed! Please contact them at their website and let them know that you resent paying for this kind of crap. They apparently think nobody gives a flip--they obviously don't.