Take a bow, Rian Johnson. Take a bow. I watched Knives Out a few weeks ago and it is such a splendid movie on all accounts, from acting to cinematography to set design to writing. It is undoubtedly one of my favorite movies that I’ve watched this year.
Let’s start off with the cinematography because that’s the first thing that caught my eye with this movie. Knives Out is not shot on film, but it’s on digital. The fun part is, even though it’s shot digitally, the footage is processed in a way to give it the look of being on film. That achieves all the fun imperfections of shooting on film, while also giving you the benefits of dealing with digital footage. Because of this, Knives Out is a truly unique visual experience, and from the first few scenes, especially the initial interviews, you can grasp the depths of its aesthetics.
This is all thanks to Steve Yedlin’s genius by the way. He’s worked closely with Johnson on multiple movies now, and he was the Director of Photography here. He released a comparison video in around 2016 where he juxtaposed film footage with processed digital footage to prove that you can achieve that “film” look without having to rely on film.
Okay, onto the cast. Every single name on the list of actors deserves a round of applause. Jamie Lee Curtis’ expressions, Michael Shannon’s perfect embodiment of the “smaller but slightly angry” brother, and bloody Chris Evan’s rendition of Ransom. Who would’ve thought Captain America would’ve been the murderer all along? (Actually a lot of people, on a second watch you can observe the hints were laid out in the beginning itself.) Everyone did a phenomenal job here, Toni Collete as the Cali guru stereotype, Plummer as the mystery author/head of the family that’s constantly looking over the family, and a big shoutout to Stanfield, i.e. Detective Elliot. He is the ‘realest’ character on screen, and as a result, the viewer tends to attach to him in the scenes he’s in.
But the spotlight must shine on the two leads: Ana De Armas and Daniel Craig. Both of them were brilliant. Watching Craig stumble around as the world’s greatest/worst detective, explaining his ‘donut’ theory and finally figuring it all out was an enthralling experience. At the same time, this was one of Ana de Armas’ first leads in a movie, and with such a star studded cast, it is impressive how well she held her own. Hats off to her as well.
Lastly, the writing. WOW. This movie spends the first act developing Benoit Blanc (Craig) as this amazing detective, while introducing the entire cast to us as “suspects”. It starts off perfectly as a ‘whodunit’ thriller, and it follows that until the truth is just revealed to us – Marta murdered Harlan. From the second act onwards, the genre has been flipped on its head, and the movie is now about Marta trying to escape from the detective’s investigation. We now root for her, and this expectation subversion is done so well in the movie. Until the climax, where the gang finally figures out it’s Ransom and the whodunit thriller is also resolved.
This movie is a masterpiece all around. It employs beautiful camera techniques (The switch from a static tripod to handheld when Marta steps out of the house post the will reading is exquisite), it achieves a vibrant and stunning visual look and it feeds the right clues at the right time to keep the viewer guessing, but also recognize the killer when the time is right. It was HUGH.
