Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022)
3.5/4
One of the most exceptional movies that Netflix has put out in the last year is Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. This is a thrilling and funny successor to the 2019 murder mystery Knives Out that’s sure to entertain its audience as well as have them guessing to the very end.
Let’s start with Johnson’s screenplay, which is easily the star of the show and totally worthy of the Oscar nod it received. Heavily inspired by the classic works of Agatha Christie, Johnson’s script amazingly captures the spirit of the old Christie novels that are clearly the film’s inspiration and modifies it for today’s tech-savvy audience. Johnson does a great job with the twists and turns of this script by finding interesting ways to keep the viewer guessing about what’s really going on underneath the surface. The humour woven within is flat-out hilarious, and he also explores socialist themes in a very timely—and, again, humorous—way that’s worthy of praise.
Another thing that I like is the movie’s stacked cast. Everyone brings their A game, but the performances I like best came from actors Daniel Craig and Edward Norton. Craig makes his return as the southern-accented detective Benoit Blanc. He does a brilliant job with conveying Blanc’s best detective instincts as well as his human flaws. Norton also fantastically delivers a complex performance as billionaire Miles Bron. His character in particular is written as very unlikeable but Norton does a superb job in making the audience like him just as much as needed.
Nathan Johnson’s fantastic musical score adds an element of flair to the film—his beats are as catchy as any musical score I’ve heard all year. In addition, Steve Yedlin’s cinematography also provides some interesting shots that add to the mystery of it all.
There’s very little I dislike about this movie. The lack of explaining how the Mona Lisa, one of the most treasured artifacts in the world, got to a techno-billionaires private residence in the middle of an ocean was frustrating. This may just be me, but I have a very hard time believing that a panting that’s afforded as much security as that one is would just fall to the hands of a jerk billionaire, no matter how much money was offered.
Besides that little oversight, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is a worthy successor to the first movie and showcases fantastic performances and sharp writing with ease.