'Death on the Nile' review: Classy, captivating whodunit

Kenneth Branagh’s "Death on the Nile" arrives this week with its work cut out for it. It’s his second Agatha Christie adaptation, following 2017’s "Murder on the Orient Express," a muddled mystery that drew mixed reviews, many of which focused on the distractingly large mustache of Branagh's detective Hercule Poirot. Five years later, with pandemic-fatigued audiences having fallen out of the moviegoing habit, "Death on the Nile" might seem dead in the water.

Surprise — "Death on the Nile" is just about everything you might want in a movie. It’s a grand, old-fashioned Hollywood production with gorgeous stars, extravagant sets, an inventive screenplay (by "Orient Express" writer Michael Green, subtly tweaking Christie’s 1937 novel) and a welcome touch of melodrama. If you’ve been on the fence about returning to the cinema, "Death on the Nile" is the push you need.

From its opening sequence, an enthralling World War I battle that explains the origins of that mustache, "Death on the Nile" announces some very big ambitions. And it delivers: Equally impressive is the sudden shift to a love triangle forming in a London nightclub. Here, we meet handsome playboy Simon Doyle (Armie Hammer, whose scandal-tainted presence is either problematic or central-casting perfect) and his hotblooded fiancee, Jacqueline de Bellefort (Emma Mackey). Their dance floor routine is about as steamy as a PG-13 rating will allow, but Simon’s head is instantly turned by the arrival of a beautiful heiress, Linnet Ridgeway (Gal Gadot, lighting up the screen like Grace Kelly in "Rear Window").

Sure enough, Simon marries Linnet — and here the spoilers shall end, save for the mention of murder on the couple's honeymoon cruise along the Nile. Also on board the SS Karnak are Poirot (conveniently), a maid named Louise (Rose Leslie), the soul singer Salome (Sophie Okonedo, lip-syncing to the gospel of Sister Rosetta Tharpe) and a pair of old chums named Van Schuyler and Bowers (the British comedy team of Jennifer Saunders and Dawn French). Tom Bateman reprises his role as the carefree young Bouc, while Annette Bening nearly steals the show as his cynical mother, Euphemia.

Things that shouldn’t work here — notably the fake Egyptian sets — somehow do. "Death on the Nile" has that dreamy, better-than-real quality that’s been missing from the movies lately. It’s pure escapism, but with enough intelligence and depth to make us feel something when the story ends. At the screening I attended, the closing credits rolled to a sound I hadn’t heard at the movies for quite some time: applause.