I have been a fan of Agatha Christie for about eight years now, reading her books and the adaptations based on her work. I just love her compelling stories, memorable characters and atmosphere you get when reading. The Pale Horse I was sceptical of, the book is wonderful and one of the best of her later works and I was worried it would be another Sittaford Mystery, Nemesis or At Bertram's Hotel. While not the best of the series, The Pale Horse is far better than I thought it would be, and I was actually expecting it to be worse than it was.
My only real quibble is the pace, the middle segment dragged a bit and had a couple of scenes that either didn't move the story forward as much as ought to have done or were a little too long. That said, the dialogue has its good spots, and the direction is solid on the whole with some interesting little things. The story is compelling mostly even with the changes, it is coherent with a very impressive, chilling atmosphere and intriguing final solution, while the production values are superb with beautiful photography and settings and the music just adds to the atmosphere the adaptation does have. The acting is very good, Julia McKenzie is a terrific Miss Marple and JJ Field also stands out as he manages to do something special with a role that could have been uninteresting or obvious, everything from the body language, voice, face and little things were very well done and contributed to a very good performance.
All in all, much better than I thought it would be. Is it a faithful adaptation? Things are changed certainly, but it is not a complete re-write, and very watchable on its own terms. 8/10 Bethany Cox