Minder on the Orient Express

This was the Christmas Day special of Minder which was shown by ITV. About the same time the BBC broadcast the festive feature length special of Only Fools and Horses.

In the latter, the Trotters went to Amsterdam. Here Terry and Arthur go to Europe on the Orient Express.

Minder on the Orient Express is very much like a feature film. Like those sitcoms in the 1970s that spawned a movie. I actually did wonder if there were initial plans to release this in the cinema.

Although Minder was always shot on film, this is upgraded to better film stock. You have aerial shots of the Orient Express going through London and the English countryside.

The story is Terry helps out a woman called Nikki getting mugged and he gets two tickets on the Orient Express. He plans to take his girlfriend but Arthur connives to invite himself. Arthur is evading the police who are trying to summons him as a witness.

Nikki is the daughter of the notorious London gangster Jack South who died some years ago. Many of the passengers on the train are associated somehow with Jack South.

All of them are after Nikki for some information relating to his criminal proceeds. Detective Sergeant Chisholm turns up on the train as an observer, helping out Interpol as they are after some of the criminal associates of Jack South.

It is very glossy with actors such as Honor Blackman, Adam Faith, Amanda Pays, Maurice Denham. However it is less gritty than the earlier episodes of Minder. It plays out like a farcical version of Murder on the Orient Express.

It loses focus along the way and the story never really gels or is even believable. Even at 90 minutes this feels like a flabby extravaganza. It does have some good lines.

In the ratings war. It was trounced by the boys from Peckham with the vastly superior To Hull and Back.