Knives Out: Review by @Kush_Hayes
Ive been looking forward to Knives Out for about four months now. At least since I saw the trailer. Im pretty good about catching most of them early. So when I understood the premise, A “Whodunit?”, produced, written and directed by Rian Johnson, starring an ensemble cast that sounds exciting when you do the role call. And depending who you talk to, Rian Johnson is either very exciting, or revered because of Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Most everyone agrees that Looper is a fun and original premise. But then when we get to The Last Jedi, its very black or white. And a big term to come out of The Last Jedi was “Expectations Averted”. I should have taken that into consideration when seeing the trailer for Knives Out.
Going back to this ensemble cast, when youre blending the talents of Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Shannon, Toni Collete - just to name a few - its only natural to have expectations enhanced, or at least those curiosities raised. Just to throw more fuel on the fire, add the talents of Don Johnson, Chris Evans and Daniel Craig… It only makes sense that this movie is going to be on pace to steal attention from other films this Thanksgiving holiday weekend.
We start our movie with the death of Christopher Plummer who plays Harlan Thromby, best selling murder mystery author who has built quite a life for himself and his family. We meet his surviving offspring, their spouses and children as well as the house staff and all of their personalities thanks to a snappy montage of Lakeith Stanfield and eventually Daniel Craig asking them simple questions to lead us the audience through what has happened.
You witness our ensemble chew on all the scenery in this film to the point where they are hip-checking each other so they can steal the scene from one another. Great ebenflow between this cast making you wish for more time with certain characters. You wish you have more scenes between Toni Collette and Jamie Lee Curtis demonstrating just how much their characters hate each other.
I feel like theres a lot of good in this, but the writing isnt its strongest part of it. Its come to the point after these previous three movies going back to Looper, that Rian Johnson is a better director than he is a writer. Or at least is trying to produce material that isnt strong enough to exhibit. Or Maybe is too complicated to keep straight. Most of the time you are with Ana De Aramas in her confusion to what is going on and can she keep the story going forward.
I want to go deeper into the story, but I do not want to allude to any spoilers that might lead you to figuring the story out before its over. Once we do get to the bottom of the mystery, I have to say I was pretty annoyed. I think its the weight of the story holding this film back from being truly great and if I have to make a comparison to recent “whodunit?”s, Knives Out lacks the charm or pace of 2017s Murder on the Orient Express. To close, we make three right turns when we only need to make a left to get to our destination.
Three Blueberries out of Six
Rated PG-13 for thematic elements including brief violence, some strong language, sexual references, and drug material
Official Site
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
© 2019 TheBosNet Family All Rights Reserved
