A dark day is coming for film-lovers. In these days of the plague, no one is making new movies. Features made before the pandemic are being released in drive-in theaters, and then to streaming, but eventually those will run out, and even our small screens will display nothing new. We will be consigned, for a spell, to re-watching the best of the films we have already seen. When that time comes, “Knives Out” will be on my list of films to re-watch.
Written and directed by Rian Johnson, the creator of "Brick," the film is a classic whodunit-style murder mystery. When famous mystery writer Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) is found with his throat slit, it looks like a suicide, and the local police are prepared to call it just that. Someone, however, has employed private investigator Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) to investigate the death. Blanc interviews each of Harlan's descendants, all of whom stand to inherit an impressive literary fortune, and each of whom turns out to have a motive for killing Harlan. The only person without a motive for murder is Harlan's nurse, Marta (Ana de Armas), and she just may prove to be the key to the whole case.
I will say no more, because it's simply too good for spoilers. “Knives Out” is a deliciously suspenseful and funny tale of murder, greed, and family dysfunction, helped along by a top-notch cast that includes Don Johnson, Toni Collette, Chris Evans, and Jamie Lee Curtis. If it sometimes seems just a bit too Agatha Christie, just a bit like a game of “Clue,” it's because this is a classic mystery in the old tradition, where all the necessary clues are presented along the way. An astute viewer could figure out the mystery, although I'll admit that I only predicted parts of it.
The cast chew the scenery with gusto, then spit out hilarious lines like watermelon seeds. I particularly enjoyed this exchange between Ransom the bratty grandson (Chris Evans) and Benoit Blanc, who talks in an admittedly-dodgy southern accent:
Ransom: You think I'm not going to fight to protect my own, our birthright, our ancestral home...
Blanc: [laughing] That is hooey! Harlan bought this place in the 80's from a Pakistani real estate millionaire... .
Ransom: Oh shut up! Shut up! Shut up with that Kentucky-fried, Foghorn Leghorn drawl!
The film is also a not-so-subtle political allegory, as it contrasts Marta, the hard-working daughter of immigrants, with Harlan's feckless heirs. They pretend to consider Marta “part of the family,” but they really think of her as the Help. Meanwhile, each of them thinks they are entitled by birth to the wealth Harlan created.
“Knives Out” did not get nearly as many award nominations as I think it deserves; it's too much fun to watch to be traditional awards-bait. No matter. It's streaming on Amazon now, and for my money it's one of the best films of 2019. Put on your deerstalker hat, light up your pipe, and click Play. The game's afoot!
4.5 stars out of 5
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