Knives Out: The Hole in the Doughnut Hole

If we must absolutely talk about the quality of Rian Johnson's films, we should probably first address the elephant in the room: yes, he did, in fact, direct one of the best, yet also most divisive, Star Wars movies and yes, said movie probably would have been better with a surer hand at the director's chair. The Last Jedi, despite being pretty great from a whole usurp-the-whole-system by way of arguing the validity of good and evil as being a matter of perspective argument, also lacked in basic entertainment value. The space battles were anemic and, yes, a large portion of the second act seemed to revolve around a bunch of alien llamas which, in turn, kind of made the movie something of a narrative mess. This, coupled with the fact that I've officially seen all of Johnson's movies (so you wouldn't have to), forces the most obvious conclusion: sci-fi and fantasy are NOT Rian Johnson's better genres (see also: Looper) and he'd probably be better off staying far away from them. Now, hard-boiled detective or noir-level mysteries? That's something we could probably all get behind the guy for. Case in point: Knives Out.

Yes, Knives Out is a great movie. The cast, even Katherine Langford, is perfect with enough nuance to make me both empathize with the characters for their flaws and hate them for their assorted pettiness, the plot, especially for a murder mystery, had enough twists to stay exciting without becoming tiring and the dialog stayed smart without being condescending. Tying all of these pros together are an outstanding turn by Daniel Craig as the closest thing to a Southern Hercule Poirot and Ana de Armas as a beyond reproach good person (something most mysteries have a hard time nailing because of the whole “Everyone Lies” motif). It not only kept me guessing but it kept me caring until the very end. Hey, Hollywood: THIS is how you make a mystery stick.

Unfortunately, mostly due to an at-times wordy script, the movie will, on occasion, dip into mundane segues that no one in any sane audience would care about on their best day. While Benoit Blanc (Craig) and his belief in Marta (de Armas) did serve as a backbone for a large portion of the narrative outside of the main plot, it also tended to veer towards obscure observations about existence for the sake of making Blanc even more eccentric than he needed to be to actually solve the case. I appreciate a cast of quirky and memorable characters, Johnson. You don't have to start making references to Gravity's Rainbow when it has NOTHING to do with the investigation.

As for watching it, do you binge watch TV shows like the Midsomer Murders or the Poirot Collection and wish American screenwriters had that kind of talent? This is a movie meant to bring you hope that, not only does that talent exists, but it desperately wants to get out. Would you rather just shut off your brain for a few hours? They were playing Frozen 2 in three other theaters and I'm sure there's musical Earworm Medication that exists somewhere without the need for a lobotomy. Choose that which makes your brain cry the least, I guess.

Rian Johnson (Brick) goes back to what he's excelled at in the past with Knives Out, a fun, at times completely insane, journey through greed and murder that somehow feels like a misplaced feel-good story when the smoke finally settles. With the death of legendary mystery writer Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) and the gathering of his assorted viper's nest of a family for his will reading, well-known consultant detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) arrives under mysterious circumstances to have one last look at the case before the police officially rule the entire thing a garden variety suicide. Michael Shannon will play crazy, Don Johnson will play kind of racist, Jamie Lee Curtis will play high strung, Toni Collette will play hipster and their collective disdain/begrudging tolerance of de Armas' Marta will come back to bite them in the most satisfying way ever. How many other movies can make you anticipate a will reading with a bunch of gold diggers and still be so immensely satisfied when the ultimate realization finally happens?

My score: 9/10. Post-Captain America Chris Evans is a national treasure and must be protected at all costs. Someone start a freaking petition already! 

Midsommar: Toxic Relationships and Freaky Death Cults, Oh My!

Most movies in general tend to follow the simplest rules possible when it comes to plotting, characters, villains and pacing and, sadly, horror movies are no different. Be honest, when was the last time you watched a movie under the Horror banner anywhere and didn't go in expecting the bare minimum? Stupid people are going to do something stupid and encounter something evil/crazy/homicidal that will promptly show them the error of their ways via gruesome and, usually, over-the-top ends which previously mentioned stupid people won't actually learn from because they'll likely be dead by the end of said lesson. While this particular series of events is the basic bones of the genre trope for obvious reasons (its cheap and easy to pull off and requires zero creative input) it also tends to drag the entire genre down into the gutter of predictable plots and people too stupid to recreate. Enter Ari Aster: a man of both cinematic vision and original thought in a genre that doesn't seem to require it.

Before you ask, no, Midsommar is not your typical, mass consumption horror movie with some silly and predictable moral about clean living or else. The characters have depth, the monsters are, at times, far more human than the surprisingly large cast of protagonists, the setting is both beautifully rendered and ominously creepy and the psychological deconstruction of Dani (Florence Pugh) might be the only evil thing I've ever rooted for in a movie ever. Throw in a beautiful score than compliments the steadily deteriorating psyche of its characters and an almost personal argument about toxic relationships and how they can lead to true destruction and you even have something not seen in a horror film since...well, since Aster's last movie Hereditary. Hey, the guy's keeping the quality up, at least!

Unfortunately, like most cinema that breaks the mold, this obviously isn't for everyone or even the seemingly niche audience horror movie tend to create. In order to create a sense of alienation between the audience and the film, nearly half the dialog is entirely in Swedish with, at best, dotted subtitles and, also due to the director wanting the audience to feel his characters' pain, the film features numerous sequences revolving around intense mental anguish that was hard to watch even for someone incapable of being offended like myself. It felt like a movie you should be ashamed of watching and it still managed to resonate as both a deeply personal argument about mundane subjects and how not facing them can lead to destructive decisions and consequences. It was a horror movie about humanity that had me actively rooting against people. How did they do that?

As for watching it, good luck with that decision. This isn't a typical slasher or haunted house movie with simplistic black and white arguments about virtues or sins and, honestly, that will likely inhibit most people from wanting to even give it a chance to prove its worth. Do you seek out a vague answer to a “happy” ending where maybe, just maybe, the bad guys might have a point and the good guys might be the problem? This will probably make you think too much about that. Just try to avoid the urge to bleach your brain afterwards. That doesn't end well.

Ari Aster (Hereditary) continues to find the horrific in the mundane with Midsommar, a “folk horror” story about how a toxic, one-sided relationship and the desperate, nearly psychotic, need for something more can lead to really bad things in the loosest terms of the word “bad”. Having lost her entire family in a murder-suicide and stuck in a loveless relationship with a distant, uncaring boyfriend, Dani (Pugh) decides to guilt her worthless boyfriend Christian into allowing her to tag along on his “guy's trip” to northern Sweden for Midsommar, a once-in-90-years festival centered around a cult-like group called the Hargas. What follows is a steadily more ominous series of events culminating in Dani finally standing up for herself in ways that are both uplifting and disturbing (much more on the disturbing side). I've seen worse movies about Swedish death cults (okay, I've actually seen zero).

My score: 8/10. I will never look at meat pies the same way again. Well, I've always looked at them as disgusting pastries that seem to lack the basic requirements for either terms in their names, but now I'll probably only see them as, well, THAT.