The cast is an ensemble of British and American actors playing send-ups of well-known fictional sleuths, including Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Charlie Chan, Nick and Nora Charles, and Sam Spade.
The story takes place in and around the isolated country home populated by eccentric multi-millionaire Lionel Twain (Truman Capote), his blind butler Jamessir Bensonmum (Alec Guinness), and a deaf-mute cook named Yetta (Nancy Walker).
"[6] Author Ron Haydock states that an early draft of Neil Simon's script featured Holmes and Watson actually solving the mystery, but their roles were reduced to a cameo appearance and finally deleted, as the lead actors felt they were being "upstaged".
[8] Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote that the film had one of Simon's "nicest, breeziest screenplays," with James Coco "very, very funny as the somewhat prissy take-off on Hercule Poirot" and David Niven and Maggie Smith "marvelous as Dick and Dora Charleston, though they haven't enough to do.
"[11] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the film three stars out of four and wrote that "after getting off to a shaky start, the picture quickly hits a speedball comedy pace it doesn't lose until the unsatisfactory unravelling of the mystery.
[14] Kathleen Carroll of the New York Daily News wrote that the characters are "the impish inventions of writer Neil Simon, who, in caricaturing this Round Table meeting of the world's greatest fictional detectives, displays his usual killer's instinct for sharp, savvy comedy.
His 'Murder by Death' is not without flaws, however: there are lapses in taste, and some of his gags are just awful; the production has a routine Movie-of-the-Week look to it; and poor Truman Capote is an unfortunate choice for Twain, looking more pained than menacing—as if the whole experience had been about as pleasurable as sitting in a dentist's chair.
"[15] Dale Stevens of The Cincinnati Post said that "there is a deliciously old-fashioned feeling about the movie 'Murder By Death,' from the moment the first old car falters its way through fog and mist and a voice that belongs to Humphrey Bogart comes out of Peter Falk.
"[16] Stanley Eichelbaum of the San Francisco Examiner said that "there's so much enjoyable nonsense in "Murder By Death," which opens today at the Cinema 21, I suppose it doesn't matter that Neil Simon's spoof of Hollywood and British detective mysteries is a thin, somewhat labored invention.
"[18] Giles M. Fowler of The Kansas City Times wrote that "somewhere about midway, the movie sags a bit as the emphasis shifts from broad character to even broader action.
"[19] Corbin Patrick of The Indianapolis Star wrote that "Simon, hitherto known chiefly for Broadway comedy hits including 'Plaza Suite' and 'The Odd Couple,' makes highly amusing fun of all the cliches of detective fiction in his script for this film.
"[20] Susan Stark of the Detroit Free Press said that "the idea behind 'Murder by Death,' Neil Simon's first comedy written expressly for the screen, is to bring together the legendary sleuths for the purpose of having them collaborate on a murder case.
Most often, when an all-star cast is assembled to put the spoof on a famous set of characters, the writers and directors seem to think comic results will be automatic and don't bother to give the biggies anything solidly funny to say or do.
Director Robert Moore, who previously directed several of Neil Simon's Broadway hits, makes his film debut here and keeps everything rolling nicely.
"[23] Barbara Thomas of The Atlanta Journal remarked that "the movie often doesn't make much sense and the trick on the identity of the real Lionel Twain ends on a murky note.
But it’s still a deplorably thin cargo of mirth in a 93-minute entertainment from the pen of the erstwhile merry fellow who gave the world Barefoot in the Park and The Odd Couple.
"[26] Arthur Thirkell of the Daily Mirror in the UK called the film "a clever, fun-filled parody of five well-known fictional detectives Charlie Chan, The Thin Man, Miss Marple, Sam Spade and Hercule Poirot.
The result is a movie that will tickle the fancy of Agatha Christie and Dashiell Hammett fans and get chuckles from those usually cynically disposed towards corny, contrived sleuthing in fog-shrouded mansions.
The risk eminently worth running, for this is a prime piece of malice aforethought that debunks the genre and, like its title, turns expectations back to front in that arrogant that detective-story authors do to reader-addicts.
An amazing performer in authorship, is playwright Neil Simon, who has brought enough laughter into the world in recent years to deserve some special award.
Silly though they may sound, he makes the following angles hilariously funny: eerie old Gothic house, murder on the stroke of 12, screams in the night, a sinister butler, black-gloved hands groping around corners, guests trapped with no way out, gathering of famous detectives modelled on the best fictional master-minds, and a series of red-herring solutions to the mind-boggling whodunit mystery.
"[31] Colin Bennett of The Age wrote that "by the end, after automatic daggers and shrinking rooms, scorpions and poisoned wine, and unmasked plastic corpses, the whodunit revelations have grown hopelessly tortuous.
For once, Neil Simon is writing his jokes without point or social observation, simply for the sake of easy laughter, comic pastiche at the expense of detective authors who cheat their readers.