FULL SPOILER-FREE REVIEW @ talkingfilms.net/the-thursday-murder-club-review-stellar-cast-forgettable-mystery/ "The Thursday Murder Club is a formulaic and forgettable effort. It's not a disaster - the magnetic presence of the cast ensures it never sinks that low - but it also offers nothing we haven't already seen in second-tier television productions. For those like me who get excited about the murder-mystery genre, the experience feels like a wasted opportunity. The lighthearted humor isn't enough to make up for the lack of tension. For those looking for light, undemanding entertainment, it may serve as a decent diversion. But for anyone hoping for more than the bare minimum, it will struggle to rise above mediocrity." Rating: C-

I was quite sceptical about this, but I have to say that I did quite enjoy it - and it’s not often nowadays you go to a packed afternoon screening and hear people laugh out loud. There are more parodies here than you can shake a stick at, so original high drama it isn’t, but here is a solid collection of personalities assembled to try to solve a mystery in a posh care home. It’s baking-mad “Joyce” (why isn’t Celia Imrie a dame, too?) who used to be a nurse and who is drafted in by the fastidious “Elizabeth” (Dame Helen Mirren) to help her small group of amateur sleuths look into a cold case from a generation earlier. “Joyce” is soon an eager participant alongside “Ibrahim” (Sir Ben Kingsley) and elderly wide-boy “Ron” (Pierce Brosnan) in their investigation, but before they can even begin to tackle one of her truly ginormous lemon drizzle cakes, there is a much more fresh crime to look into - and one that could involve local property developer “Ventham” (David Tennant) who just happens to co-own their former castle with “Curran” (Geoff Bell). This latter man has had his finger in a few dodgy pies over the years, has a handsome ex-boxer son “Jason” (the perfectly manscaped Tom Ellis) and is determined that so long as his aunt is resident, they will be safe from the grave diggers and the bulldozers. Scene set, we now play through some scenarios that allow Dame Helen to reprise aspects of her “Tennison” and Queen Elizabeth II characterisations; Sir Ben to do the same - only without Sir Michael Caine, and for both Imrie and the underused Brosnan to put an enjoyable degree of exaggeration into their roles as the plot thickens and we begin to wonder just where “Elizabeth” got that very swanky XK8 retirement gift! To be honest, the plot itself is not the most original and as it develops it does rather rely on a bit too much serendipity without overwhelming our own grey cells - but I don’t think that really matters so much. This is an enjoyable crime romp from a collection of stars who look like they are having fun - think “Quartet” (2012) only with shovels and not Shostakovich; Sir Jonathan Pryce, Daniel Mays and budding detective - but a real one, this time, “Donna” (Naomi Ackie) keep the sense of mischief bubbling along quite entertainingly whilst cinematic licence is taken without just about every aspect of police work, forensic science and floristry. If you are a fan of character actors doing their thing in a stately home with plenty of clues, red herrings and Black Forest gâteau, then you can’t really go wrong here.