Knives Out

Image credit: Wikipedia

I love talking about movies as much as anyone, all different shapes, sizes, and genres, but one of my most favourite to talk about and analyse is the murder mystery. Spawned from gothic literature, and having a successful, ever-shifting career in cinema thanks to people like Hitchcock and Bogart, the murder mystery is one of the most enjoyable, unwavering, and versatile subgenres in cinema. Yesterday I took myself off to see Rian Johnson’s new addition to the already overflowing reservoir of murder mysteries that cinema boasts: Knives Out.

The film is a classic return to the Agatha Christie style whodunit murder mystery centring on crime novelist Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) who is found with his throat slit the morning after his 85^th birthday. Leading the investigation is celebrity private detective, Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), who is hired anonymously to uncover foul play. But Blanc proves to have his work cut out for him as he discovers that every one of Harlan’s own family has a motive for murder.

This is a most agreeable film. Dripping with red herrings, misread clues, and layer upon layer of sidesteps and backtracks, Knives Out takes the traditional steps of the murder mystery and twists them around to create a truly exciting and fun dark comedy. A rather cynical social commentary on the moral state of humanity, the film’s central entertainment comes from its cast of erratic, eccentric, and morally flimsy characters (not to mention the weird and glorious cast itself). There is a great sense of emotional and moral payoff at the end when the truth is revealed, making for a very satisfying movie experience.

Image credit: National Review

The script is very clever and fun, following an exhilarating Sherlock Holmes/Agatha Christie style path, while simultaneously bringing the genre into the modern age. Everything is done perfectly; the red herrings, the misread clues, even the narrative ‘shotgun’, which gets very satisfactorily fired in the third act. One can truly feel the cast and crew’s enjoyment and appreciation of the genre oozing from all directions, which in turn makes the audience enjoy it too!

I would certainly recommend Knives Out.

Director: Rian Johnson, 2019

Cast: Ana de Armas, Christopher Plummer, Jamie Lee Curis, Don Johnson, Michael Shannon, Toni Collette, LaKeith Stanfield, Daniel Craig, Katherine Langford, Jaeden Martell, Riki Lindhome, Edi Patterson, Chris Evans, and Frank Oz