Smartest movie of the year

I’ve never seen a single episode of Murder, She Wrote, or watched Murder on the Orient Express. Heck, I haven’t even played Cluedo in years. So, I guessed a whodunnit’ murder mystery would make for a nice change of pace.

Knives Out was one of my most anticipated movies of the year for two reasons. Rian Johnson’s first film to follow Star Wars: The Last Jedi – otherwise known as my favourite motion picture, ever – was always going to get me into the theatre. That’s even before the cast list is considered and this is one of the strongest line-ups you’ll ever draw for an original film.

Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Jaime Lee Curtis, Toni Colette, Don Johnson, Ana de Armas, Michael Shannon, to name but a few. On top of these stellar names, I’m then blindsided half-way through the movie by the appearance of Frank Oz! A stacked deck, this is.

Of course, an Avengers calibre ensemble cast featuring Captain America, James Bond, Laurie Strode and – well – Yoda, will always raise expectations for the movie. Fortunately, Johnson’s razor sharp screenplay is a match for the on-screen talent. This is one of the smartest movies I’ve seen.

With such a big cast of characters, and none of them wearing Iron Man suits or Norse-god attire, it would be easy to confuse individuals or simply forget about the existence of some. However, Johnson gives a showcase to each and every one of them, offering distinctive and entertaining features and quirks – a lot of quirks.

Contrary to my expectations for how the movie would be structured, we are also offered a lot of information about the family early on. I expected to be drip fed details about possible motives as the 130 minute feature unfolded. Instead, suspicions are raised right out of the gate and continue to ebb and flow at breakneck speeds throughout the entire film.

I’ll no doubt write an article about the finer details of the plot once the movie has been out for a while – this is a film where the least you know about it heading into the theatre the better.

But keep an eye out for the details when watching. There are some big pay offs for seemingly insignificant nuggets. That’s a credit to Johnson – I don’t think there is a single line of dialogue in this movie that doesn’t carry value and every frame is full.

And if we are going to talk about dialogue, Daniel Craig deserves plenty of acclaim for bringing to life Detective Benoit Blanc. He brilliantly boarders on caricature, as Craig delivers a faultless southern accent while he looks to piece together this “donut” of a mystery.

Craig and another one of the actors, who I won’t name in this review as it does potentially give away one of the more surprising elements of the movie, would be good value for Academy Award attention. For my money, this film should also occupy nominations for Best Director, Editing and Original Screenplay – perhaps even Best Original Score from Nathan Johnson, (yes, Rian’s cousin).

I cannot overstate how immersed I was in the storytelling. I love Knives Out. It’s one of the best movies of the year and an absolute riot.