Rian Johnson – all is forgiven!
Because this classy crime-murder-mystery shows he has ‘got it’ – after the divisiveness caused by his directorial turn with Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
‘Whodunnits’ – in the vein of Agatha Christie – are a real guilty pleasure of mine.
I love putting the pieces together to try and work out who the killer is.
However, there’s nothing more frustrating than the big reveal being someone too obscure with little to no clues as to them being the guilty one.
Or it being so bleeding obvious.
Is that the case with Knives Out? I’ll reveal all shortly.
The film focuses around the suspicious death of Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer), a multi-millionaire who built his fortune from writing mystery novels.
While Harlan oozes kindness and generosity, the same cannot be said about his family/potential suspects. To name a few, there’s the victim’s son Walt (Man of Steel’s Michael Shannon), who runs the family publishing company, the business-minded daughter Linda (Halloween’s Jamie Lee Curtis), her rat of a husband Richard (Miami Vice TV series star Don Johnson) and their spoiled son Ransom (Chris ‘Captain America’ Evans). Each member and more have their own incentives to kill.
The all-star line-up also includes those that are investigating the crime: two police detectives (Lakeith Stanfield and Noah Segan) – and one private detective (Daniel ‘007’ Craig) who was hired by an unknown client.
With so many cinematic legends thrown into the mix, it could have been easy for some to have been left in the ‘shadows’ – but that wasn’t the case at all. Each character feels just as important as the other. The casting is perfect, and the actors bounce off each other with ease. They looked like they were having fun filming Knives Out – and as a result I had immense fun watching it.
Director Johnson gets the tone of the movie spot on, paying homage to classic Agatha Christie – while giving it a modern spin.
I’ll admit that although I did not guess who the killer was, there are enough clues to work it out – and anyone going to see this will have a great time doing so.
ESP Rating: 4.5/5
Mikey Clarke
Cast: Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Ana De Armas, Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Shannon, Toni Collette, Don Johnson, Lakeith Stanfield, Katherine Langford, Jaeden Martell, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Noah Segan, Frank Oz & Christopher Plummer
Running Time: 2 Hrs 10 Mins
Director: Rian Johnson
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