Roush Review: Go on a Great Escape With ‘Miss Fisher’

The only tears you’re likely to leak are of laughter in Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears, Acorn TV’s feature-length comeback for the glamorous Australian snoop, back on the scene after a five-year absence. Because no matter how high the body count, pistol-packing fashion-plate lady detective Phryne “Frannie” Fisher (Essie Davis) is still a Jazz Age delight. (The first three seasons are streaming exclusively on Acorn.)

Miss Fisher is a mistress of all trades — in one scene, she’s a daring aviatrix; in another a master fencer, to name just a few tricks up her stylish sleeves.

Related

Sundance Now, Acorn TV & More Streaming Services Available for Free Right Now

And she’s not above making an irreverent spectacle of herself from the opening scene, when she manages to elude the entire police force of British-occupied Palestine in a rollicking street chase. Or as the incorrigible flirt, who leaves behind a trail of broken hearts, later remembers this adventure, “I was dancing with the undesirables, and I found several of them to be quite desirable.”

When the action shifts from 1929 Palestine to a London estate where an Agatha Christie-like murder ensues, it’s not long before a London copper laments, “Wherever you go, trouble follows.” Her fans would expect nothing less, and this madcap escapade of cheerfully preposterous and absurdly colorful escapism will not disappoint.

(Credit: Acorn TV)

Before it’s over, the desert beckons again, and Miss Fisher finds herself embroiled in a mystery involving giant emeralds, the massacre of a Bedouin tribe and an ancient curse linked to Alexander the Great. Does any of this ruffle her cool composure? Surely you jest — although that’s really her department. Little wonder Detective Inspector Jack Robinson (Nathan Page), who follows her all the way from Down Under, is so smitten.

Who wouldn’t be?

Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears, Movie Premiere, Monday, March 23, Acorn TV