Murder On the Orient Express fascinated me. Throughout the course of the movie, two big questions are asked. Should ordinary people take the law into their own hands when the law lets them down? Can God forgive every kind of crime?
Twelve ordinary citizens take the life of a man who only escaped being hanged for kidnapping, murder, and other heinous crimes by coercing the DA and other people involved in the trial to hide evidence. Did the twelve people have the right to do this? Ultimately, the answer in real life is no. In a big surprise, the movie gives us the same answer. Mary Debenhem, the governess, tells Poirot that she asked God what she should do when she was hurting from little Daisy Armstrong's kidnapping and murder. She said He told her to "do what is right." She was certain that when Cassetti was dead, she would be happy again. Poirot asks her if she is, in fact, happy. She looks at him with glassy eyes for a moment before she protests in a whisper: "But I did what was right!" This shows that she most certainly is not happy.
Various characters throughout the movie protest that God won't forgive everyone who asks for forgiveness. "Violence against the children" cannot be forgiven, the Scandanavian nurse Greta Ohlsson tells Poirot. The twelve people deeply hurt by Cassetti refuse to forgive him. He was essentially responsible for the deaths of five people very close to their hearts - one of them a lovable little five year old girl. No, they refuse to forgive him. So they make a plan and do what they believe the law should have done years ago: They mercilessly execute him. But Poirot is a Catholic, and Catholics believe that God, in His mercy, will forgive anything if someone sincerely asks for His forgiveness. After a night of reflection and prayer, Poirot decides to let the twelve murderers go free. Why? The movie never answers that part of the question. But it seems to me that Poirot was showing the murderers what they refused to show Cassetti: A reflection of God's mercy.
Great post Hydra! I hadn't thought of Poirot's act in that light before. Of course we will never know what happened to those characters after they were let free, but I like how Christie contrasted Poirot's treatment of them with their treatment of Ratchett. Forgiveness is no easy thing, but to kill your enemy, even though he is a murderer himself?
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I know that it must've been a struggle for Poirot because in the books he is very against the act of murder.
I wish I could take credit for the "reflection of God's mercy" idea, but I only expanded on and polished something an older and wiser person told me!
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