We are a mere week away from October, which means spooky season is on our doorstep, and there are few better ways to invite it in than with a murder mystery. Perhaps the most famous storyteller in the game is none other than Agatha Christie herself, and with another adaptation of her work in theaters now thanks to Kenneth Branagh, it’s clear what movie Christie fans should see this season: A Haunting in Venice.
If you bought a ticket to Branagh’s A Haunting in Venice with the source material top of mind though, you might be surprised. The movie takes only light inspiration from Hallow’een Party, the novel it’s based on. Just *how* different is A Haunting in Venice from Hallow’een Party, you ask? Read on for the key variations and save yourself from drawing comparisons in your head mid-watch.
A note before we get started: There are SPOILERS for both ‘A Haunting in Venice’ and ‘Hallow’een Party’ below. Proceed with caution.
A Haunting in Venice moves the setting from England to Venice, Italy
The movie firmly sets itself in Venice (it’s in the title, after all!) and reminds viewers of it often with gothic palazzos, volto masks, and frequent Venetian rowing scenes amid a dramatic storm.
But Agatha Christie’s original does not take place in Italy at all. The book is set in Woodleigh Common, a small English village without any of the sheer theater of its movie counterpart. It’s the first of many distinctions between A Haunting in Venice and Hallow’een Party.
And the premise is wildly different
Let’s hear it straight from the sources. Here is the formal synopsis of Hallow’een Party:
“At a Hallowe’en party, Joyce–a hostile 13-year-old–boasts that she once witnessed a murder. When no-one believes her, she storms off home. But within hours her body is found, still in the house, drowned in an apple-bobbing tub. That night, Hercule Poirot is called in to find the ‘evil presence’. But first he must establish whether he is looking for a murderer or a double-murderer.”
While here is the synopsis for A Haunting in Venice, courtesy of Disney:
“A Haunting in Venice” is set in eerie, post-World War II Venice on All Hallows’ Eve and is a terrifying mystery featuring the return of the celebrated sleuth, Hercule Poirot. Now retired and living in self-imposed exile in the world’s most glamorous city, Poirot reluctantly attends a séance at a decaying, haunted palazzo. When one of the guests is murdered, the detective is thrust into a sinister world of shadows and secrets.”
That murdered “guest” in A Haunting in Venice is also changed from the 13-year-old in the original, which brings us to the fact that….
The victims are changed from kids to adults
Hercule Poirot may be called to solve a murder in both the book and the movie, but whose murder is not consistent…which is likely for the best given the murder victims in Hallow’een Party are children.
Hallow’een Party immediately veers down a dark narrative path by opening with the murder of 13-year-old Joyce Reynolds after she meets Christie’s famed murder mystery novelist Ariadne Oliver while preparing for a kids Halloween Party. The child brags to Ariadne that she once saw a murder herself, which seems like just talk until Joyce is later found dead.
This isn’t the only death, either. Joyce’s brother Leopold is also drowned later on in a brook. And there is another victim in Olga Seminoff, who is missing when the novel begins but whose body is discovered later on in a well.
Meanwhile in A Haunting in Venice, the victims are not children. The inciting incident that brings Poirot into the picture is not even a death at all, but Ariadne Oliver (Tina Fey) wanting his help outing a celebrated psychic medium (Michelle Yeoh) as a con during a séance she’s holding that evening. Only afterwards, the medium is brutally killed.
The medium’s name? Joyce Reynolds.
Most of the characters are different despite sharing names
The core things 13-year-old Joyce Reynolds of the book and séance Joyce Reynolds of the movie have in common are their names and their deaths. A Haunting in Venice borrowed names of original Hallow’een Party characters and sometimes fit them to new people entirely.
Another example is in housekeeper Olga Seminoff. In the book, Olga has been MIA for months and is later found dead, making her the true original murder victim. In the movie, Olga escapes death and is even present with the group during the séance.
That said, A Haunting in Venice borrows the book’s “previously unsolved death/disappearance becomes important” strategy with the new character Alicia Drake—the deceased daughter of the Halloween party host for whom they hold a séance—who seemingly died by suicide but was really murdered.
Ariadne Oliver and Hercule Poirot seem the same…until there’s a twist
Ariadne Oliver and Hercule Poirot are good friends in the book and remain each others’ confidants through the sleuthing process.
In the movie, Ariadne and Hercule’s relationship starts that way but quickly devolves. Poirot realizes Oliver has an ulterior motive and actually invited him to the séance not to discredit Joyce the medium but to use his inability to explain the mechanisms of the séance as plot fodder for her new novel. It sours their friendship and they part on bad terms.
And the movie features ghosts
Kenneth Branagh’s latest Agatha Christie adaptation leans further into horror than Murder on the Orient Express or Death on the Nile. In the movie, Poirot begins seeing things while trying to unearth the mystery, including children’s voices and the ghost of a little girl in a mirror. Ultimately, he deduces he is hallucinating after ingesting the same substance that Alicia overdosed on, which helps him solve the case. (None of this happens in the book.)
But one thing remains the same: the murderer herself
Ladies and gentlemen, behold the murderer, Rowena Drake:
In the book, Rowena’s motives are dark; She kills multiple times to cover an affair and ensure her placement in a will. (She also has an accomplice.)
In the movie, her motivations are quite different; Before the movie takes place, she purposely made her daughter Alicia sick to keep her close, resulting in an overdose. Rowena staged it to look like a death by suicide and then killed subsequent people to keep it all quiet.
Whether you went to the movies or picked up the book, the blood still ends up on Rowena’s hands, but the journey to get there is certainly worth comparing and contrasting. Be sure to check out A Haunting in Venice while it’s in theaters now.
GET TICKETS TO ‘A HAUNTING IN VENICE’ IN THEATERS HERE
Deputy Editor
Alexandra Whittaker is the deputy editor of Cosmopolitan magazine, where she helps manage the website and all of Cosmo‘s news and entertainment coverage. With more than a decade of journalism experience, Alexandra oversees multiple teams of stellar writers and editors. She crafts thoughtful editorial coverage plans from start to finish by ideating, assigning, and editing timely, search, and brand-building stories with an eye on strategy, growth, and audience development. She is a mentor with Girls Write Now and the American Society of Magazine Editors, and she is a proud Northwestern and Marquette alumna.
