Knives Out

Well the mystery is already solved in the beginning but then there is another mystery and a twist. And vomiting! This is a modern mystery with comedy and it's a bit of a thriller. I was on the edge my seat hoping the main character didn't get caught for her role in the "murder." The rich family are duplicitous and manipulative scum bags but you don't hate them. You do dislike their behavior. At first I thought the beginning was an unreliable narrative when the family turns on the protagonist/murderer after the will reading. Did she get her claws into the old man or was she a very good caretaker he cherished? It's obvious as the story continues she's too honest and too kind to do something so heinous. ( Or is she? ) She even has a tell that wouldn't be acceptable during Texas hold 'em. It’s rare lately to watch fully fleshed out characters go toe to toe. I like the lead actress’s performance. She isn’t a trope of a weird pixie woman-child she’s just a good person dealing with a crazy situation. I also live for her character’s huge role and the “short” relationship with her very theatrical employer is endearing. Some people are complaining about "woke" politics... those people don't know what that means. This is a story of the have and have nots and the entitlement of trust fund babies. This is also the story of a neglectful famous father who likes to control everybody and everything even from beyond the grave. This story with an nearly all white cast is about class and lack thereof. Just because the protagonist is an immigrant or child of one doesn't make this movie overtly political. The film reflects our times in a very limited scope. The protagonist is a white immigrant as are many caretakers for the rich, insured elderly, or disabled with rich family. (Yes you can be Hispanic and white.) Rich people always look down on servants and the family in this flick doesn't let you down with their classist passive aggressive behavior. This is an excellent and well paced film with memorable characters and two great twists...I mean three great twists.

Knives out is a murder mystery which is what you would get if you cross an Agatha Christie novel with the game Clue, and a little bit of Sherlock Holmes mixed in. The main plot is that the patriarch of a wealthy New England family, named Harlan Thormby (played by Christopher Plummer), who is a famous mystery writer, dies on the night of his birthday party, in what all appearances, looks to be an open and shut suicide. The local police as well as a renowned private investigator named Benoit Blanc (played by Daniel Craig), who is hired under mysterious circumstances, are investigating the death looking into everyone who was in contact with Harlan, including his eccentric (to put it mildly) family. The movie was written and directed by Rian Johnson, in his first post-Star Wars movie. It has an ensemble cast of very well known actors and actresses including Jamie Lee Curtis, Don Johnson, Michael Shannon, Chris Evans, Toni Collette, Ana De Armas, and lesser know younger actors Katherine Langford and Jaeden Martell, all of whom seem to have a reason to have killed Harlan. It is a unique "whodunit" in that the audience knows most of what happened throughout the majority of the movie, but there are twists that happen that make it clear not all is what it seems, all building up to a classic third act reveal. While the entire cast does a great job, Craig and De Armas really shine in their roles, and definitely deserved their Golden Globe nominations for Best Actor and Best Actress. For those who get the 4k disc, the movie looks and sounds great in the UHD format. It does not have much if any, special effects, but there are a ton of wonderful New England scenery that looks great in 4k. The UHD disc also have all the extras included, of which, there are a ton. There is a making-of feature (broken up into 8 chapters that you can watch all at once, or one by one), which is nearly as long as the movie itself. Then there is a 42 minute Q&A with most of the cast members and Johnson, then several of the trailers and fictional ads for various elements of the Thromby empire. Overall, it is a wonderful movie that is well-written and acted. It is really not something that you can easily just have on in the background and give your partial attention to and still follow what is going on. But, if you are looking for a way to kill a couple of hours with a great, fairly unique story, this is definitely worth checking out.

I think the best thing going for this film is that it takes place in a modern time. Typically stories like these are antiquated and old-timey, and so I really appreciate the effort put into this mystery being in our current time. However, I really do think this film was overhyped and there's probably a lot of rational reason for that. For one, I don't think this type of mystery generally plays to the audience that it had in mind. Whodunits and mysteries of this sort are from the past, so generally your audience is going to be much older. You can see that in some of the casting in this film, however there are some newer players to the game in this one as well. It's a perfect mix of styles old & new, and it's layered storytelling at its finest. I really think a repeat viewing will be worth your time, as I really enjoyed watching both commentaries by Rian Johnson. I had just watched Murder on the Orient Express just before this, and I honestly got more jollies out of that one than I did in this. I think the main reason for that is they really don't make any one character likable in this movie other than Daniel Craig's detective. And honestly, that's because he's so absurdly silly in this weird way that it's just completely absorbing to watch him unravel the mystery. I can't say I was surprised by the ending, and felt that I had kind of put together the pieces by the end for them to be locked into place. There's a lot of attention to detail and the special features will make that abundantly clear, and for that I really appreciate this film. I think it's a great movie and a great mystery, but I do think it's overplayed as being sort of a ground breaking film, and in a way it is, but also there's other great whodunits and mysteries out there but usually don't take place in the modern era. I'm happy for Rian Johnson that he found a passion project like this one after flopping on Star Wars (I don't think he did, but it's the common sentiment). He's a great filmmaker and continues to display a great eye as a director. Following Brick with movies like this really make me think he should continue doing more modern day mysteries and resurrecting or maybe twisting the genre into a new, fun direction. But please, please, please make another movie with Daniel Craig's detective, which I do believe they are making a Knives Out 2. He is the sole reason to watch this movie, but everyone else is also phenomenal in their roles. Everyone has their time to shine!

Unsuspecting ending! Fabulous watch. My wife actually stayed awake for the entirety of the movie!

Written and directed by Rian Johnson, Knives Out is a fun and excellent whodunit for the modern age! With a great cast, excellent script, and plenty of twist and turns, a delightful mystery awaits with a fun detective in the mix. Harland Thrombey, a wealthy mystery novelist, has just committed suicide after celebrating his 85th birthday. Though police initially rule his death as such, the arrival of celebrated and famous PI Benoit Blanc create a further investigation. Blanc reveals to police detectives that he was hired by an anonymous person who left money at his hotel room to investigate Thrombey's suicide. A keen and astute PI, Blanc deduces that Thrombey had strained relations with his family members that came to a head the evening of his 85th birthday party and sets off a chain of events into discovering the truth. Knives Out offers a fantastic ensemble cast of characters who have motive and/or something to hide. Veteran actors such as Jamie Lee Curtis and Christopher Plummer, in one his final roles, shine alongside general newcomers such as Ana de Armas who captivates and connects with the audience as Harlan's intelligent and kind nurse. English actor Daniel Craig also shines as Benoit Blanc, a Louisiana PI, and captures the southern drawl accent well. The cinematography and editing with stunning visuals are also well done. The visuals of bright colors, the imposing Thrombey mansion, and the lighting that captures the darker moods add a lot to the story being told. The real technical aspect of Knives Out though is the editing style. Whether it's the flashbacks of the characters recollections or Blanc's explanations in the final reveal, the editing is the true highlight to make effective storytelling. Knives Out is a must watch and a film to add to your physical library!

Great all star ensemble cast! Great plot with lots of twists and turns! Fun to watch!

Politics usually ruins films, because they are often ham-fistedly forced in. And based on the early reviews, comments from the cast, and even what the director stated himself about what the film was about, this sounded like it would be WOKE garbage bashing conservatives. Don't get me wrong, this film does have that in it, but it naturally fits the film and isn't as one-sided as it could have (or even should have given the cast and director's intentions) been. I thought I would hate this film due to it's claimed anti-Trump and "pro-illegal immigrant" message. However, I was willing to give it a shot for many reasons. First, an excellent cast. I am not a fan of any of the casts politics or who they are in real life, but talent is talent and everyone in this film plays their role perfectly. Second, despite the directors politics, personal invulnerability, and bastardization of the Star Wars franchise, he is a good writer/director. I am a big fan of Brick, The Brothers Bloom, Looper, as well as Johnson's Breaking Bad episodes (Fly is probably the best episode of that series). Third, I am a big fan of the mystery/whodunit genre. Many of the greatest films, tv shows, characters, and books are set in that genre. Despite what the mainstream media, cast, and even director would have you think about the film, it is a well thought out whodunit, with a new and refreshing spin, and not a brain-dead story tacked onto a political message. The political dialogue is entirely delivered by characters who are all unlikable spoiled leeches. The family is supposed to represent Trump supporters, but even the WOKE SJW liberal family members are practically irredeemable greedy narcissists. Since both sides are presented as equally immoral, I fail to see how this is a stinging criticism of MAGA hat wearers. The likable characters (the dead father, the detective, and personal nurse) don't mention anything about politics, realize the family is entirely rotten, and seek to do the right thing. I saw them as stand-ins for those of us who realize that politics don't matter half as much as being a person of strong moral character. Additionally, despite all the family members being greedy lowlifes, even the Trump supporters are shown as being loving and accepting of Marta, the Hispanic personal nurse to their father. When illegal immigration is mentioned in the film, both sides are expressed accurately with one side saying it has nothing to do with race and everything to do with following the laws, and the other side hysterically claiming everyone who disagrees with them to be heartless racists. The only other uses of it, are in relation to it being a motivating factor making Marta's actions reasonable for her character and as leverage/blackmail. While all of the family members are exaggerated caricatures, none of them are presented as morons, actual racists, or even religious zealots (which is how conservatives are often portrayed in most of mainstream media).

The mystery plot which initially seemed a moot point turned out to be fairly unexpected and very interesting. Detective Blanc combined the best virtues of Poirot and Miss Marple, yet the character was not very likeable until the end of the movie. Too many of the characters were portrayed to be extreme personalities -- apparently in a heavy-handed effort to paint most Americans in bad light (greedy, lazy, useless, selfish and extremely ego-centric) and paint recent immigrants as extremely virtuous -- the result seems to be an unstated (but not very subtle) political implication 2 x 4 to whack the viewers over the head. Although it was clear that some effort was made to keep the pace of the movie moving along at a good clip, the editing resulted in the beginning of the movie being a bit confusing -- possibly attempting to put the viewer in the shoes of the police attempting to piece things together. Before too long, the viewer was made aware of most of the real activities so the viewer would think the "who dunnit" theme was a moot point -- but the plot twists at the end to surprise the viewer. The editing repeatedly confirmed most of the real activities to guide the viewer into firmly accepting the "moot" aspects of the initial death -- the repeated reminders were not needed -- another poor editing choice in my view. The plot ended up being quite interesting -- and there was a lot of attention to detail that was both good and bad. One of the details needed to explain how things were figured out seemed a waste of time sub-plot inserted for no reason, another detail was cleverly included. The entire movie is a mixed bag -- some good aspects, some bad aspects.