Emma Laird Archives – CULTURE MIX

Review: ’28 Years Later: The Bone Temple,’ starring Ralph Fiennes, Jack O’Connell, Alfie Williams, Erin Kellyman and Chi Lewis-Parry

January 16, 2026

by Carla Hay

Ralph Fiennes and Jack O’Connell in “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” (Photo courtesy of Columbia Pictures)

Directed by Nia DaCosta

Culture Representation: Taking place in England, in the year 2030, the horror film “28 Years Later” (the fourth film in the “28” horror series) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few Asians and black people) who are uninfected survivors and zombies in a post-apocalyptic world.

Culture Clash: A 12-year-boy is kidnapped by a serial killer cult that expects him to murder people, and the cult eventually encounters a mysterious doctor who has been trying to find a cure for the virus that caused the zombie apocalypse.

Culture Audience: “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners, the “28” zombie movie franchise, and horror movies that adeptly mix social commentary with terror scenes.

Chi Lewis-Parry and Ralph Fiennes in “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” (Photo by Miya Mizuno/Columbia Pictures)

“28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” is a rare sequel that is more innovative than its predecessor. Ralph Fiennes and Jack O’Connell give performances that make this unhinged movie an instant horror classic. There’s also some subversive comedy mixed in with all the bloody gore. The movie isn’t perfect though. People need to see 2025’s “28 Years Later” (which was filmed back-to-back with this sequel) to really understand everything in “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.”

Directed by Nia DaCosta and written by Alex Garland, “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” is the fourth movie in the zombie apocalypse franchise that began with 2002’s “28 Days Later” (directed by Danny Boyle and written by Garland); continued with 2007’s “28 Weeks Later”(directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, who co-wrote the screenplay with Rowan Joffé, E.L. Lavigne and Jesus Olmo); and jumped forward to the year 2030 for “28 Years Later,” directed by Boyle and written by Garland. The movie franchise follows a group of people living in the United Kingdom during a zombie apocalypse, which began in 2002, because of a virus (called the Rage Virus) that quickly spread through infected lab animals. The movies in the franchise are filmed on location in the United Kingdom.

In this zombie apocalypse, the people become zombies within minutes of being infected through bodily fluids. The zombies can run quickly and have superhuman strength. In “28 Years Later,” the British Isles are under strict quarantine, while continental Europe has the virus contained. This infected area has had no Internet service or phone service in the years since the outbreak. At the end of “28 Years Later,” (spoiler alert), a 12-year-old boy named Spike (played by Alfie Williams) has left his estranged widower father Jamie (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson) in the Scottish Highlands to live on his own in the Scottish mainland. Spike is then kidnapped by a small cult of murderers.

The cult leader is a deranged fanatic in his mid-30s named Sir Jimmy Crystal (played by O’Connell), who styles himself like deceased media personality/accused pedophile Jimmy Savile (wigs of messy platinum blonde hair, track suits, bad teeth), and he expects his followers (who are all adolescents and young adults) to do the same. “28 Years Later” ends on the cliffhanger of Spike being kidnapped by Sir Jimmy’s cult. “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” shows what happens when Spike is a captive of this cult.

Sir Jimmy’s cult is based in northeast England, where “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” takes place. All of Sir Jimmy’s followers have been given new names by him, with their first names being Jimmy or a variation of Jimmy. The followers call themselves the Fingers. They are also sometimes called the Jimmies.

In the beginning of “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple,” Jimmy’s followers are Jimmy Shite (played by Connor Newall), Jimmy Jones (played by Maura Bird), Jimmy Snake (played by Ghazi Al Ruffai), Jimmy Jimmy (played by Robert Rhodes), Jimmy Fox (played by Sam Locke), Jimmima (played by Emma Laird) and Jimmy Ink (played by Erin Kellyman). Sir Jimmy uses religion to preach to and control his cult. When Sir Jimmy was 8 years old, his minister father died during the first Rage Virus outbreak and told Sir Jimmy that this zombie apocalypse was part of the Judgment Day that’s taught in Judeo-Christian religions.

Jimmy has brainwashed his followers to believe that he is the son of Satan and forces his followers to commit barbaric acts of torture and murder on uninfected human survivors. The cult members also kill zombies, but they get more pleasure out of killing uninfected survivors. Spike has to go through a cult initiation process of torturing and murdering innocent people, in order to prevent the cult from killing Spike. Spike is terrified and reluctant to participate in the cult’s brutal crimes. Jimmy Ink shows empathy to Spike and is the only one in the cult who is most likely to become Spike’s friend.

Meanwhile, an eccentric loner named Dr. Ian Kelson (played by Fiennes) has been working for years to find a cure for the virus. Dr. Kelson is a physician who lives in a remote place that he calls the Bone Temple, because he has a collection of obelisk-shaped mounds comprised of human skulls, as well as upright beams made out of human bones. All of these bones are his monuments made in memoriam of people who died for various reasons. Dr. Kelson lives in an isolated area.

In “28 Years Later,” Spike and his mother Isla (played by Jodie Comer) met Dr. Kelson when they sought out alternative medical treatment for Isla’s cancer. Isla’s death is one of the most emotionally moving parts of “28 Years Later.” That’s why it’s important to know the context in which she died and how Spike and Dr. Kelson met when they encounter each other again in “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.”

Another character from “28 Years Later” who makes his return in “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” is a 6’9″-tall zombie whom Dr. Kelson has named Samson (played by Chi Lewis-Parry) because of the zombie’s height and long hair. This “alpha male” zombie was the most vicious one shown in “28 Years Later.” However, in “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple,” Dr. Kelson is able to slowly gain Samson’s trust and tame Samson with a drug mixture that includes morphine, so that Dr. Kelson can experiment on Samson to find a cure for the virus. An unlikely friendship bond develops between Samson and Dr. Kelson.

“28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” goes back and forth between showing what Sir Jimmy and his cult are doing and showing what Dr. Kelson and Samson are doing, until the worlds collide because of Spike. The movie has some hilarious quirks, such as showing that Dr. Kelson is a big fan of Duran Duran. In his cluttered home, he has Duran Duran’s 1982 “Rio” album on display. He plays Duran Duran vinyl records on a turntable. And he’s shown singing and dancing along to Duran Duran songs such as “Girls on Film,” “Rio” and “Ordinary World.” Dr. Kelson also dances with Samson, with Duran Duran music playing.

Dr. Kelson’s taste in music from the 1980s and 1990s is also shown in the movie’s most memorable scene, where Iron Maiden’s 1982 song “Number of the Beast” is playing. Sir Jimmy also has a thing for nostalgia. He talks fondly about the Teletubbies, the fictional creature stars of the 1998 to 2001 children’s TV show of the same name. People who saw “28 Years Later” might remember that Sir Jimmy was watching the “Teletubbies” TV show with his siblings when the zombie outbreak hit their community.

“28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” director DaCosta made the confident decision to change the department heads for several technical areas (such as production design, cinematography, music and editing) to people who did not work on “28 Years Later.” These changes give “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” a fresh approach, instead of falling into the sequel trap of re-using the same techniques in telling the continuation of the story. One of the movie’s technical highlights is composer Hildur Guðnadóttir’s foreboding score music, which is a superb complement to the well-known soundtrack songs.

Credit should also be given to Garland for crafting a screenplay that’s a departure from the usual compilation of “human versus zombie battles” that tend to be the format of most zombie films. In “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple,” the biggest villains aren’t the zombies but are humans. “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” also has an interesting way of incorporating religious beliefs (or non-beliefs) into the story. Dr. Kelson is an atheist, Sir Jimmy is a satanist, and things that are taught in Christianity are part of the plot.

Spike’s backstory is already shown in “28 Years Later,” so “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” doesn’t spend a lot of time rehashing it, although the movie does have some flashbacks or references to what happened in “28 Years Later.” What the movie does that’s most unexpected is show a few details about who Samson was before he became infected. It’s a hint of a possible storyline in a sequel.

“28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” drags a little bit in the middle of the movie that shows a Sir Jimmy and the Fingers doing a home invasion of a farm inhabited by six people: a man in his 20s named Tom (played by Louis Ashbourne Serkis); his pregnant partner Cathy (played by Mirren Mack); a middle-aged man named Jonno (played by Gordon Alexander); an elderly man named George (played by David Sterne); a man in his 30s named Matthew (played by Elliot Benn); and a middle-aged woman named Jane Ji (played by Lynne Anne Rodgers). All of these six inhabitants except one are kidnapped by Jimmy and his cult and taken to another location.

If “28 Years Later” was about Spike’s family problems during this zombie apocalypse, then “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” is about contrasting and ultimately conflicting lifestyles of two different “families”: Sir Jimmy and his cult versus Dr. Kelson and his new-found companion Samson. These two factions have different agendas (healing versus harming), and both want Spike on their side. It’s a battle of wits and psychological manipulation, more than physical strength.

Fiennes gives a masterful performance as Dr. Kelson, whose mysterious image from “28 Years Later” slowly reveals that he is actually a deeply complex person who cares about the future of humanity and had a family of own before the zombie apocalypse. (That story is hinted at in photos that he keeps on display in his home.) O’Connell is a scene stealer in his own right and makes Jimmy completely unpredictable, even when his intentions seem to be transparent. “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” has a widely reported cameo appearance from “28 Days Later” star Cillian Murphy, who is in the last 10 minutes of “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.” This appearance announces that Murphy’s Jim character is alive and well and should be a vital part of a sequel in this franchise, which now stands as one of the best zombie franchises in cinema history.

Columbia Pictures released “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” in U.S. cinemas on January 16, 2026.

Review: ‘Fackham Hall,’ starring Damian Lewis, Katherine Waterston, Thomasin McKenzie, Ben Radcliffe and Tom Felton

December 20, 2025

by Carla Hay

“Fackham Hall”

Directed by Jim O’Hanlon

Culture Representation: Taking place in 1931, in an unnamed city in England, the comedy film “Fackham Hall” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few black people and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: An artisocratic family is in danger of losing the family’s longtime manor, named Fackham Hall, unless one of their daughters gets married, to ensure that there will be a male heir in the family.

Culture Audience: “Fackham Hall” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and movies that mix slapstick comedy with racy jokes.

Ben Radcliffe and Thomasin McKenzie in “Fackham Hall” (Photo courtesy of Bleecker Street)

“Fackham Hall” is like “Downton Abbey” meets “The Naked Gun.” Some jokes get too repetitive, but it’s an overall entertaining blend of social satire and slightly naughty comedy with word puns and sight gags. The talented cast members commit to the absurdity.

Directed by Jim O’Hanlon, “Fackham Hall” was written by Jimmy Carr, Patrick Carr, Tim Inman, Andrew Dawson and Steve Dawson. With all these credited screenwriters, the “Fackham Hall” screenplay sometimes looks like it suffers from “too many cooks in the kitchen” syndrome. However, the jokes often land on their intended targets fairly well.

“Fackham Hall” takes place in 1931, during the Great Depression, in an unnamed city in England. The movie was actually filmed in and around Yorkshire, England. Fackham Hall is the manor of the aristocratic Davenport family, which has presided over Fackham Hall for the past 400 years.

The Davenports are beholden to an archaic tradition that will allow them to keep Fackham Hall owned by the family if the family has at least one living male heir: either a son or a son-in-law. A recurring joke in the movie is that the Davenports have a tendency to marry their first cousins in arranged marriages. (Underneath the plaque on Fackham Hall’s front gate are the words “Incestus ad Infinitum,” which is supposed to loosely translate in Latin to “Incest Forever.”)

In the beginning of “Fackham Hall,” patriarch Lord Humphrey Davenport (played by Damian Lewis) and his wife Lady Davenport (played by Katherine Waterston) are relieved that one of their two daughters is engaged to be married. The couple’s fickle younger daughter Poppy (played by Emma Laird) is engaged to her first cousin Archibald (played by Tom Felton), even though Archibald is a boorish dolt.

Lord Davenport and Lady Davenport think that their older daughter Rose (played by Thomasin McKenzie) is a disappointment. Rose (who is 23 years old) is independent-minded, unconventional (she sometimes wears men’s clothes and drives cars), and is in no rush to get married. As far as Rose’s parents are concerned, Rose is an “old maid.”

Or as Lady Davenport describes Rose: “a dried-up husk of a woman: barren, desiccated, a wizened old walnut of a spinster.” As Lady Davenport gives this withering description, the camera pans away to show that Rose is sitting right next to her in the room. “Fackham Hall” repeatedly pokes fun at “upper crust” society people who can be just as crude and uncouth as the “common people” who are considered “lower class.”

It’s explained early on in the movie that Lord Davenport and Lady Davenport had four adult sons, who all died in freak accidents. John died in the Hindenburg. Paul was struck by lightening. George died on the Titanic. Ringo died from auto-erotic asphyxiation. Beatles fans will immediately get the joke about the significance of these son’s names.

“Fackham Hall” shows glimpses into the contrast between the “upstairs” aristocrats and the “downstairs” servants. The servants are mostly underdeveloped characters in the movie. However, two of the longtime employees stand out by having the most screen time out of all of the servants: uptight chief of staff Mrs. McAllister (played by Anna Maxwell Martin) and slightly goofy butler Cyril (played by Tim McMullan).

The Davenports will soon get a new employee, who joins the butler staff unexpectedly. His name is Eric Noone (played by Ben Radcliffe), whose surname is pronounced No One. Eric (who is in his mid-to-late 20s) is first seen visiting the nun-operated children’s home (Norfolks Orphanage) where he grew up.

Eric has been summoned to the orphanage by Sister Jude (played by Karen Henthorn), who introduces Eric to a mysterious man whose name is later revealed to be Austin Blaine (played by Ian Bartholomew). Austin asks Eric to go to Fackham Hall to personally deliver a sealed letter to Lord Davenport. Eric thinks the Davenports are elitist snobs, so he says “Fuck ’em all,” which is used in the movie as a play on words for Fackham Hall.

While riding his bike at Fackham Hall, Eric accidentally gets hit by a car driven by Rose. Luckily, Eric isn’t hurt. Rose makes profuse apologies. And it’s attraction at first sight for Eric and Rose. Eric is distracted by the accident and meeting Rose. The letter is almost forgotten until a turning point in the story.

Eric needs a job. And it just so happens that the Davenports need an extra butler. And so, Eric is hired for this position. He has to share a small room with five other male servants. His first big task is serving during the engagement party for Poppy and Archibald.

The engagement party is one of the weaker aspects of the movie. The only purpose of this party is to introduce several “high society” characters who are somewhat meaningless in the overall plot. Archibald’s best man is Bert Chester (played by Adam Woodward), who brings his materialistic and wealthy American lover Fifi Valentine (played by Lily Knight) as his date. Fifi wants to buy Fackham Hall, but Lord Davenport admantly tells her that Fackham Hall is not for sale.

Other party guests with speaking roles are on the fringes of the main story and don’t do much but show up in scenes and make quipping jokes. These vague supporting characters include bachelorette identical twins Mary Bechdel and Constance Bechdel (both played by Erin Austen); Lord Davenport’s attorney Darvesh Khalid (played by Ramon Tikaram), who keeps telling his World War I combat stories; and JRR Tolkein (played by Jason Done), who is an unpublished author, long before he became famous for “The Lord of the Rings.”

Another member of the Davenport family who is in the movie is Great Aunt Bonaparte (played by Sue Johnston), a foul-mouthed elderly woman, doing the tired comedy stereotype of “old ladies who curse are automatically supposed to be funny.” Phyllis Davenport (played by Lizzie Hopley) is Lord Davenport’s sister and Archibald’s mother. She’s given even less to say in the movie than Great Aunt Bonaparte.

The “Fackham Hall” trailers already reveal that Lord Davenport dies at Fackham Hall. His body is found with a knife through his chest. What the trailers don’t reveal is that this death doesn’t happen until the last third of the movie. The person who shows up to lead the investigation is Inspector Robert Watt (played by Tom Goodman-Hill), who thinks he’s as brilliant as Sherlock Holmes, but Inspector Watt is really a clumsy and bungling cop who has a habit of dropping things and overlooking clues.

“Fackham Hall” co-writer Jimmy Carr (who is a famous stand-up comedian) has a small role as a priest or minister who misreads text during church services and then has to correct himself. This type of joke is amusing but over-used in the movie. The movie’s fart jokes are predictable and get tiresome very quickly.

McKenzie, Lewis and Waterston show the best comedic timing of all the “Fackham Hall” principal cast members. Some parts of the movie fly by quickly, while other parts drag. “Fackham Hall” is nothing more than escapist comedy that doesn’t get too dark with its satire. It’s flawed but funny enough for people inclined to like wacky comedy that leans into slapstick scenarios and intentionally silly jokes.

Bleecker Street released “Fackham Hall” in U.S. cinemas on December 5, 2025. The movie was released in the United Kingdom on December 12, 2025.

Review: ‘The Brutalist’ (2024), starring Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones and Guy Pearce

December 20, 2024

by Carla Hay

Adrien Brody and Guy Pearce in “The Brutalist” (Photo courtesy of A24)

“The Brutalist” (2024)

Directed by Brady Corbet

Some language in Hungarian with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in from 1947 to 1980, in the United States and partially in Europe, the dramatic film “The Brutalist” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few black people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A Hungarian architect immigrates to America and settles in Pennsylvania, where he becomes entangled with a wealthy family who employs him, and he battles an addiction to opium.

Culture Audience: “The Brutalist” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners, filmmaker Brady Corbet and epic dramas about the American Dream.

An unidentified actor, Joe Alwyn, Guy Pearce, Stacy Martin, Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones and Raffey Cassidy in “The Brutalist” (Photo courtesy of A24)

“The Brutalist” tells an epic story about the pros and cons of the American Dream from the perspective of a brilliant but opium-addicted Hungarian immigrant architect. The acting performances are top-notch but the sprawling nature of this 215-minute film has some noticeable flaws. One of the biggest problems with “The Brutalist” is that a major question that comes up near the end of the film is never answered.

Directed by Brady Corbet (who co-wrote “The Brutalist” screenplay with Mona Fastvold), “The Brutalist” had its world premiere at the 2024 Venice International Film Festival and also screened at the 2024 New York Film Festival. “The Brutalist” (which takes place from 1947 to 1980) is named after the Brutalist style of minimalist architecture that is the specialty of Hungarian Jewish architect László Tóth (played by Adrien Brody), who arrives in New York Harbor on a crowded ship with other immigrants who want to start a new life in the United States. During this trip, László tries opium for the first time. It’s the start of an addiction that lasts for decades in László’s life.

László, who was a celebrated architect in Hungary, has left behind his loyal and loving wife Erzsébet Tóth (played Felicity Jones) and their niece Zsófia, who is being raised by László and Erzsébet because Zsófia’s parents died during World War II. László was separated from his family during the Holocaust, so he doesn’t even know for sure if Erzsébet and Zsófia are still alive when he leaves for America. However, he relies on friends in Hungary to look for Erzsébet and Zsófia. If Erzsébet and Zsófia are still alive, László plans to earn enough money so Erzsébet and Zsófia can immigrate to the United States and live with him.

László settles in Philadelphia, where his cousin Atilla (played by Alessandro Nivola) lives with his much-younger American wife Audrey (played by Emma Laird), who is Catholic. Atilla hides his Jewish heritage by pretending to be a gentile with a furniture store/construction business called Miller and Sons, where László works closely with Atilla. László also lives with Atilla and Audrey when László first arrives in the United States. Audrey becomes the reason why the relationship between Atilla and László eventually changes.

Attila and László are hired by a spoiled, wealthy heir named Harry Van Buren (played by Joe Alwyn) to remodel a library in the Van Buren mansion. It’s here that László first shows his penchant for the minimalist Brutalist style that later give him acclaim in the United States. Harry’s domineering and manipulative father Harrison Lee Van Buren Sr. (played by Guy Pearce), who goes by the nickname Lee, initially berates László for the remodeling job but then later hires László to design and build a massive community center. The building complex (located in Doylestown, Pennsylvania) is supposed to be a namesake tribute to Harrison’s deceased mother Margaret Lee Van Buren, who had a rocky relationship with Lee.

Much of “The Brutalist” is about László’s work on this massive project while he battles his addiction to opium, particularly heroin. László’s closest friend during this time is his co-worker Gordon (played by Isaach de Bankolé), who is also addicted to opium. Erzsébet and a teenage Zsófia (played by Raffey Cassidy) eventually come to live with László, who becomes more dependent on the Van Buren family when Harrison gets journalist Erzsébet a job at a newspaper in New York City. Erzsébet uses a wheelchair because she got osteoporosis (a bone disease) while she experienced famine during the Holocaust. Other characters in the movie include Harry’s twin sister Maggie (played by Stacy Martin) and building contractor Leslie Woodrow (played by Jonathan Hyde), a longtime associate of the Van Buren family.

“The Brutalist” takes its time but often gets repetitive in showing the push-and-pull power dynamics between László and Harrison. The movie’s tone gets very dark, including showing cruel antisemitism and a shocking sexual assault. The total running time for “The Brutalist” might test the patience of some viewers, even with the movie’s built-in 15-minute intermission. However, “The Brutalist” is a master class in acting, with Brody, Peace and Jones leading the way in this impactful story that is about people fighting not just for their version of the American Dream but also for what they want their legacies to be.

A24 released “The Brutalist” in select U.S. cinemas on December 20, 2024, The movie will be released on digital and VOD on February 18, 2025.

Review: ‘A Haunting in Venice,’ starring Kenneth Branagh, Camille Cottin, Jamie Dornan, Tina Fey, Jude Hill, Kelly Reilly and Michelle Yeoh

September 9, 2023

by Carla Hay

“A Haunting in Venice”

Directed by Kenneth Branagh

Some language in Italian and Latin with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in 1947, in Venice, Italy, the horror film “A Haunting in Venice” (based on Agatha Christie’s novel “Hallowe’en Party”) features a nearly all-white cast of characters (with one Asian) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: Famous and super-intelligent Belgian detective Hercule Poirot comes out of retirement to solve the murder of someone who died a gruesome death during a Halloween party séance.

Culture Audience: “A Haunting in Venice” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of Agatha Christie novels, the movie’s headliners, and competently told murder mysteries with supernatural elements.

Rowan Robinson and Kelly Reilly in in “A Haunting in Venice” (Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios)

“A Haunting in Venice” is another efficient but not exceptional offering in director/star Kenneth Branagh’s star-studded series of murder mystery films based on Agatha Christie novels. This horror movie delivers enough intrigue to outweigh some motonony. The other Branagh-directed movies adapted from Christie novels were dramas with no supernatural elements to the stories. “A Haunting in Venice” is a ghost story that makes famed Belgian detective Hercule Poirot (played by Branagh) question his belief that ghosts don’t exist.

As the third film in a series of Hercule Poirot movies directed by Branagh, “A Haunting in Venice” is the one that is literally the darkest, not just in terms of the cinematography but also in its emotional tone. The previous two Branagh-directed Hercule Poirot movies—2017’s “Murder on the Orient Express” and 2022’s “Death on the Nile”—contrasted their glamorous locations with the ugly realities of murder among rich and beautiful people. In “A Haunting in Venice,” Detective Poirot and his group of potential suspects not only have to deal with the murder investigation but also the possibility that a ghost might be in their midst, in a gloomy palazzo that has lost a lot of its former attractiveness.

Michael Green adapted the screenplay for “A Haunting in Venice” from Christie’s 1969 novel “Hallowe’en Party.” The movie (which takes place in 1947 and was filmed on location in Venice, Italy) has some touches of comedic riffs between a few of the characters. But for the most part, it’s a pure horror story, with multiple scenes of possible spirits possessing and terrifying living human beings. The ever-logical and fact-finding Hercule remains deeply skeptical about the existence of ghosts, until he starts to wonder if he might be wrong.

In the beginning of “Haunting in Venice,” Hercule is enjoying his retirement asa resident of Venice, a city surrounded by water and where boats, not trains or buses, are the main form of group transportation. Hercule meets up with his sarcastic American friend Ariadne Oliver (played by Tina Fey), an author of mystery novels whose career has been fading because of her most recent books have flopped. It’s established early on that Ariadne is desperate for a comeback, even though she doesn’t really want to admit it to everyone.

The friendship between Ariadne and Hercule goes back to the 1930s. And it hasn’t been an entirely smooth relationship. Ariadne became a popular author because she based her main detective character on Hercule, without asking his permission. It’s caused some tension between Ariadne and Hercule.

Ariadne has a plan to make a comeback by writing a book with a new angle: Ariadne wants the main plot of her next book to be based on a real-life person who can leave Hercule confounded during a murder investigation. She has already decided that the person who can outwit Hercule is someone who has been making a living as a renowned psychic: Joyce Reynolds (played by Michelle Yeoh), who claims to have the ability to speak to the spirits of dead people.

Ariadne tells Hercule about a lavish nighttime Halloween party that retired British opera singer Rowena Drake (played by Kelly Reilly) is hosting for local orphaned children at Rowena’s palazzo, which used to be an orphanage where children were mistreated. The palazzo isn’t entirely run-down, but it’s not exactly in the best of shape. In fact, it has a reputation for possibly being haunted by children who died at this location.

Ariadne has been invited to this party and wants to bring Hercule as her guest. Ariadne is up front with Hercule in saying that she’s not going to the party because of the orphans. Ariadne wants to go to the party because Rowena will be having a séance where single mother Rowena hopes to contact the spirit of her young adult daughter Alicia Drake (played by Rowan Robinson, shown in flashbacks), who died one year ago, after falling from a balcony at the palazzo. The fall is widely believed to have been a suicide, since Alicia had been depressed and dealing with other mental health issues after a breakup from her fiancé.

Joyce has been hired to be the psychic who will lead the séance. Ariadne wants to use what happens at the séance as the basis for Ariadne’s next book. Hercule doesn’t believe in the afterlife. He thinks it’s utter nonsense to believe that ghosts exist. Ariadne is very superstitious and thinks ghosts can exist. Part of Ariadne’s agenda is to get Hercule to change his mind.

Needless to say, someone ends up being murdered at the party, and Hercule ends his retirement to investigate the murder. The death happens when this murder victim is thrown from a stairwell onto a statue that impales the person. As shown in the trailer for “A Haunting in Venice,” Hercule almost gets murdered himself, when someone tries to drown him by forcing his head underwater in a bucket meant for bobbing for apples. And viewers will not be surprised if more than one person ends up dead by the end of “A Haunting in Venice.”

Some viewers might ask themselves while watching the movie: “What kind of person throws a séance during a party for children?” It’s explained that Rowena has been distraught with grief, ever since the death of her only child, Alicia. Rowena’s relationship with Alicia is described as more like sisters rather than mother/daughter. She was also very protective of Alicia.

The children are in another part of the palazzo during the séance, but things start to get dangerous when a huge chandelier falls down in the middle of a room where some of the children are. Luckily, no one is hurt. The party for the orphans essentially ends, but the séance continues, with one child in attendance who is not an orphan: Leopold Ferrier (played by Jude Hill) is the precocious 10-year-old son of widower Dr. Leslie Ferrier (played by Jamie Dornan), who is the Drake family’s personal physician. (Dornan and Hill also played a father and a son in director Branagh’s autobiographical Oscar-winning 2021 film “Belfast.”)

Dr. Ferrier is also a World War II veteran who has post-traumatic stress disorder, which has damaged his career and negatively affected his relationship with his son. Leopold and his father are both British. Multiple times in the movie, it’s mentioned that Dr. Ferrier was very fond of Alicia. The implication is that he was in love with her, but he did not cross the line and kept a professional relationship that a doctor has to have with a patient.

Leopold is the only child who is allowed to be at the séance. Why? The movie shows that Leopold’s father has been so wrapped up in his own problems, Leopold often doesn’t have much adult supervision. Leopold is not afraid to tell adults how he thinks he knows more than they do. At one point he says to psychic Louisa: “I talk to ghosts all the time. They say you’re fake.” In other words, Ariadne isn’t the only one in this group with a sassy attitude.

Louisa is also a diva, but she’s much more of a control freak than Ariadne. It should come as no surprise that she clashes with Hercule, who thinks people who make money as psychics are really con artists. However, Louisa (who used to be a war nurse) and Hercule have something in common: They both experienced trauma by witnessing the horrors of war during World War I. Flashback scenes in “Death on the Nile” showed glimpses into Hercule’s war experiences.

It wouldn’t be a movie based on a Christie novel without several murder suspects. After the first murder happens, Hercule orders everyone to stay in the mansion until he solves the murder mystery. One of the people confined to the house is Olga Seminoff (played by Camille Cottin), the Drake family’s devoted housekeeper. Olga is a very religious widow who used to be a nun, but she left her nun life behind when she fell in love with her future husband. Olga, who often speaks in Latin, is very open about her feelings that the séance is religiously wrong, because it’s meant to conjure up the spirit of a dead person.

Other suspects include Joyce’s two assistants: Nicholas Holland (played by Ali Khan) and his sister Desdemona Holland (played by Emma Laird), who are two orphaned young adults from Eastern Europe. Nicholas and Desdemona don’t say a lot and often seem to fade into the background, but their personal history is eventually revealed. Hercule already thinks that Louisa is a fraud as a clairvoyant, so he suspects that Nicholas and Desdemona are at least guilty of being Louisa’s accomplices in a con game.

A surprise and unwelcome guest at this séance is Alicia’s former fiancé Maxime Gerard (played by Kyle Allen), a cocky American chef from New York City. Even before Alicia’s death, Rowena intensely disliked Maxime, because she felt that Maxime was a gold digger who was after the Drake family fortune. Rowena blames Maxime for breaking Alicia’s heart and indirectly causing Alicia’s death. Maxime, who claims his love for Alicia was real, announces during this gathering that he’s going to be rich because he’s got his own restaurant in New York City.

No one is immune to being a suspect, not even Vitale Portfoglio (played by Richard Scamarcio), a retired policeman who is now Hercule’s bodyguard. A police officer who becomes part of the investigation is Vincenzo Di Stefano (played by Fernando Piloni), who was also on the scene after Alicia died. Hercule becomes convinced that Alicia’s death is somehow related to the murder that happened during this party.

“A Haunting in Venice” has lot of the traditional “jump scares” found in movies where a séance takes place in a mansion with a reputation for being haunted. What’s more interesting is to see the psychological effect that these “ghost sightings” have on Hercule, who is the biggest ghost skeptic in the group. He starts to wonder if he’s hallucinating, which shakes his confidence about his mental capacity to logically solve the crimes that have occurred during this gathering.

Branagh has a comfortable handle on this beloved and quirky detective character, so watching “A Haunting in Venice” is interesting to see this new side to Hercule. Yeoh has a very commanding and impressive presence as Joyce, who thinks she’s the best psychic in the world. Reilly’s performance as the emotionally fragile Rowena remains compelling throughout the film.

Fey puts her comedic talent to good use in her performance as Ariadne, who isn’t as sour and annoying as this author character could have been, because of the way that Fey delivers the lines. Hill is a scene stealer as Leopold, while Allen’s depiction of Maxime and Dornan’s portrayal of Leslie show different versions of emotionally wounded men. The rest of the characters in the movie are fairly two-dimensional and don’t have much depth.

The cinematography of “A Haunting in Venice” (which takes place mostly at night) is bathed in a lot dark gold and brown for interior scenes and dark blue for the nighttime exterior scenes. Because most of the movie takes place inside a house, viewers won’t get to see much of Venice’s outdoor beauty, but when it’s shown, it looks gorgeous. The production design is top-notch. Branagh’s overall direction is quite stylish but occasionally stodgy.

As for the mystery itself, there comes a point in the movie where it might be easy for some viewers to figure out who’s guilty of the crimes. People who know enough about murder mystery stories know that the best ones have surprising elements, even when there are clues that point to the guilty party. Whether or not viewers solve the mystery before the movie ends, “A Haunting in Venice” remains an entertaining journey along the way and should satisfy people who are fans of Christie’s classic novels.

20th Century Studios will release “A Haunting in Venice” in U.S. cinemas on September 15, 2023.