Knives Out

"This is a twisted web, and we are not finished untangling it, not yet."

Novelist Harlan Thrombey (Plummer) is dead.  Detective Lieutenant Elliot (Stanfield) and Trooper Wagner (Segan) believe he committed suicide, but the arrival of famed detective Benoit Blanc (Craig) puts their results into question.  Blanc, Elliot, and Wagner interrogate Thrombey's family and staff to see if their stories still hold up.

The night of his death, Thrombey celebrated his 85th birthday, surrounded by his family and staff.  His daughter, Linda Drysdale (Curtis) is a self-made entrepeneur, who is married to Richard (Johnson).  His son Walt Thrombey (Shannon), runs his father's publishing empire, and is married to Donna (Lindhome).  Self-help guru Joni Thrombey (Collette) is the widow of his other son.  His grandchildren are Linda's son playboy Ransom (Evans), Joni's daughter college student Meg (Langford), and Walt's snobby son Jacob (Martell).  The family have conflicting versions of their evening and their relationship to Harlan.  They are more concerned with what they stand to inherit from the estate.  The only person that is truly distressed by Harlan's passing is his nurse Marta Cabrera (de Armas).

Can Blanc discover the truth about Thrombey's death?


The film was written and directed by Rian Johnson.  He set out to make a murder mystery film in the vein of Agatha Christie.

The Good:
The story keeps you guessing from the beginning to the end.  The characters are interesting and the answer is not obvious from the beginning.  The house is like it's own character.

The Bad:
I don't know that there were any downsides to the film.

Other Comments:
-I thoroughly enjoyed this movie and look forward to watching it again.  It seems like a movie that gets better each time you watch it (there are new things to notice each time).
-The film was well received and it sounds like Johnson and Daniel Craig are interested in bringing the character of Benoit Blanc back for a sequel.  Netflix produced a sequel, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery in 2022 and will be producing a third film.

Knives Out (2019) 130 minutes
Rating: PG-13 for thematic elements including brief violence, some strong language, sexual references, and drug material.
Director: Rian Johnson
Starring: Daniel Craig as Benoit Blanc
Chris Evans as Hugh Ransom Drysdale
Ana de Armas as Marta Cabrera
Jamie Lee Curtis as Linda Drysdale
Michael Shannon as Walt Thrombey
Don Johnson as Richard Drysdale
Toni Collette as Joni Thrombey
Lakeith Stanfield as Detective Lieutenant Elliot
Katherine Langford as Meg Thrombey
Jaeden Martell as Jacob Thrombey
Frank Oz as Alan Stevens
Riki Lindhome as Donna Thrombey
Edi Patterson as Fran
K Callan as Great Nana Thrombey
Noah Segan as Trooper Wagner
Christopher Plummer as Harlan Thrombey