The year is 1953, and Agatha Christie's "The Mousetrap" is celebrating its 100th performance with a bang: sleazy blacklisted Hollywood director Leo Koepernick (Adrien Brody) is here to make a film adaptation. But Koepernick, disliked by just about everybody involved with the play and making a fool of himself at the party, puts a spanner in the works when he ends up murdered backstage. Assigned to the case are the world weary cynical Inspector Stoppard (Sam Rockwell) and an eager, excitable and rather keen Constable Stalker (Saoirse Ronan). Together they have a struggle on their hands: not only must they contend with each other and their mismatched personalities, but also who solved this murder!
This is a delightful, droll and exceedingly British afternoon romp.Knowing and nudging without being smug or insincere about it, it comes across like a love letter to murder mysteries. Its use of "The Mousetrap" is both a creative setpiece and period detail; and adds to the meta-textual playfulness of it all. Opening with a film noir narration by a suitably sleazy and deliciously oily Adrien Brody talking about how he hates murder mysteries and "whodunnits", like all good ones it gives a clever viewer the killer in the first few minutes and then justifies why with it was indeed that person you thought little of.
The supporting cast are strong, from a campy David Oyelowo to a prickly Ruth Wilson and Reece Shearsmith, to an always welcome Tim Key as the chief of police and national treasure Shirley Henderson immediately elevating proceedings for a cameo as Agatha Christie.
Rockwell is always wonderful, and here plays his droll best, and is wonderfully counterbalanced by an all too eager and rather amusing Ronan. The transitions and audience-knowing interweaving of the plot and its mechanics never get grating, and make for a bouncy ride.
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