Knives Out (Johnson) 2019

A fresh take on the murder mystery, Knives Out brings an all-star cast together in one of the most dysfunctional family comedy dramas in years.

The centerpiece of the story is the death of famous murder mystery author Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) in his remote country estate while most of his family sleep in the house below. With his throat slit and blood all over the study where he is found, suicide it the most logical cause of death, however Daniel Craig's mysterious investigator Benoit Blanc is brought in by an anonymous party to investigate further, under the assumption that Thrombey was murdered.

We meet a colorful cast of characters including Thromby's daughter Linda (Jamie Lee Curtis), her husband Richard (Don Johnson) and their son Ransom (Chris Evans). Michael Shannon plays Thromby's son Walt who is in charge of the extensive publishing empire while Toni Collette is the wife of Thromby's other son, tagging along with the family even after her husbands death.

Director Rian Johnson does a masterful job early in the film of painting the picture that just about anyone in the family might have a reason to off their father/grandfather. Interviews in the lounge at Thromby's home provide an opportunity to cut from one family member to the next when they get asked the same questions by investigators.

The last key player in the story is Thromby's nurse Marta Cabrera (Ana de Armas), daughter of a woman who immigrated to the United States illegally and worries what will happen now that the man she was caring for has passed. Multiple family members insist they will continue to help her all while Blanc enlists Marta as the Watson to his Holmes.

I won't reveal the killer (or if there even is one) so you can see for yourself, but this one should keep you guessing right up to the end. 

Knives Out is available streaming now on Amazon Prime.

8 out of 10​​

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