Saturday, May 23, 2020

Review of 'Knives Out'

At last a good film! Clever, taut (despite being over two hours long), well-plotted, nice to look at (especially the interiors of the house, and especially the study!), and thoroughly enjoyable. Unusual in that it's a who-dunnit where the audience knows the answer for most of the film, but there's still a mystery hanging over us. It's got lots of familiar house-mystery devices, but these are either subverted or just sent up. It's 'inspired by' rather than based on several Agatha Christie novels, which is just as well as she's mainly awful - whereas this is brilliant. Not at all surprised to find it's directed and written by the same guy who did the very clever and atmospheric Brick.

The acting is mainly great, though I was a little bit dubious about Daniel Craig as a southern-gentleman private detective.

Once again watched via informal distribution and VGA cable on our TV; informal distribution seems to be coming into its own as so much of the films available on Netflix and Amazon Prime seem to be crap.

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