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Customer Reviews of The Pale Horse

British Films
Many British films deal with characterization and personal reasoning and thought. Pale Horse falls under this umbrella.
If you are looking for alot of action, like in American movies, you won't find it here. But it is unfair to call this movie boring just because the viewer is not familiar with the British way of expression. This is not the best dramatization of an Agatha Christie book, but it does deserve viewing.

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Most Americans should not review British productions
It is very unfortunate that fully 70% of the reviews for 'The Pale Horse' are negative as it is an excellent few hours of viewing. It is also a perfect example of why most Americans should not review British productions. They just don't see the subtle nature of the British approach to television production, mystery-suspense writing, or for that matter, life in general. Put bluntly, they just don't get it. We share a basic language with them, but unfortunately, not much else. Americans tend to be Brits on steroids and expect their TV and movies to be the same way. No surprise most simply don't like or appreciate programs like 'The Pale Horse'. It isn't what they want from their viewing experiences.

Most reviewers called this a "movie". It isn't. It's a made for British television mystery-drama. In the US, this would be seen on PBS Masterpiece Theater, A&E, or The Mystery Channel, not FOX, HBO, or other major networks. To compare it to programming of that nature is absurd.

Brit TV is not blessed with the huge, unlimited production budgets of American studios. The fact that their production values are often superior to American TV is remarkable when viewed in that light. They use what the have. Actors often wear their own clothes in current day programs. They don't build many fake, costly sets. Most drama is actual location work. Their idea of 'action' is not computer generated special effects, endless physical and verbal aggression, pointless violence, or a blur of mind numbing, rapid fire scene changes. If that is what your looking for, look elsewhere.

British mystery-suspense TV like that featured in 'The Pale Horse' is quiet, subtle, mentally challenging, and has infinetly more depth than equivalent American programs. It is, like the British themselves, charming, slower, and mellower. They don't hit you over the head so often that it no longer hurts. Things that go 'bang' on American programs, go 'bump' on British ones. They love character development, something we have no use for since our characters are either weakly written on purpose to be the butt of someone elses sharp tongue or are killed off by a violent car crash, a series of impossible explosions, a rash of random gunfire, or some other such 'fast action' violence before the opening credits are over and you've finished the second slice of pizza.

In short, either you love British TV or you don't. If you do, this is a very solid bit of British mystery-drama. If you don't, why are you reading this?

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Quiet and spooky
I am disappointed but not at all surprised that nearly all the customer reviews for The Pale Horse are poor. I am not astonished that many found this movie dull, because they are Americans and Americans are used to fast pace action movies and when they think mystery movie they of course think action, violence, etc. Some people were surprised that an Agatha Christie story would be this spooky and set in the 60s, although as they should know Christie wrote mysteries until her death in the 70s. Like Miss Marple, Christie was a people watcher, she studied not only people but the times they lived in and the crimes those times were likely to contain. And in the 60s Christie's stories did become darker and spookier.
Some reviewers complained of useless characters and misleading/useless dialog and confusing hard to follow scenes, well if they dislike that than they shouldn't complain only about this movie, because that is precisely the way Christie writes, she uses all of those elements to conceal the truth of the mystery until the very end. Christie also uses many one dimensional characters; this makes many think it is the fault of the actor/director/script writer that characters appear unusual/one sided and unbelievable.
I think this is a very good movie and perfect for someone who likes a quiet interesting mystery. I also recommend watching it multiple times, ten to on e you will notice something that you didn't the first time. This movie is somewhat special because it does not contain any of Christie's famous detectives.
For people that want superior character development and better explained motives, but still want a good mystery. I recommend Ross Macdonald's mystery novels.