Agatha (DVD)

Agatha Christie is generally considered the Queen of Crime Fiction. Her novels, stories and plays bamboozle legions of murder aficionados with complex plotting and dazzling denouements. But no mystery she ever wrote surpassed the one she lived. This tantalizing tale posits what may have happened to the famed writer during her real-life 11-day disappearance in 1926. Dustin Hoffman plays a brash American journalist who tries his own hand at sleuthing when he sets out the find the missing novelist (Vanessa Redgrave), a shy, introspective woman whose marriage to a war hero (Timothy Dalton) has foundered. What really happened? The world doesn't know and Dame Agatha never told. But as suspensefully directed by Michael Apted (Coal Miner's Daughter, Gorky Park), Agatha offers a spellbinding solution.

Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Timothy Dalton, Helen Morse, Celia Gregory, Paul Brooks, Tony Britton, Alan Badel, Robert Longden, Sandra Voe, Vanessa Redgrave, David Hargreaves, Paul Brooke, Yvonne Gilan, Carolyn Pickles, Timothy West, Tim Seely, Christopher Fairbank, Liz Smith, Peter Arne, John Joyce, Irene Sutcliffe, Anne Francis, Hubert Rees, Pamela Austin

Director: Gavrik Losey, Jarvis Astaire

Rating: PG