KNIVES OUT -- dir. Rian Johnson; Daniel Craig, Michael Shannon, Jamie Lee Curtis, Chris Evans, etc. etc.

what did rian johnson do

murdered star wars iirc

the faux-whimsical sort-of-precious tone used in Brothers Bloom and Brick don't quite work in their execution for me but I think Knives Out works better because the more twee bits are jettisoned

Brothers Bloom felt like he was trying to do some sort of fairy tale junk, like a Just So Stories about criminal brothers

I was actually hoping after they said his name was Benoit that he was going to do a ridiculous, Poirot-esque accent, but the colonel sanders was entertaining enough on its own.

mh otm re 'brick' -- i remember it being really irritating, actually? didn't see brothers bloom

it's been a while since I've seen Brick but wasn't it sort of like a budget Donnie Darkoish crime film set in studentland.. It was okay but very much of its time even then. He's improved as a filmmaker and writer since then, obvs

We don't talk enough about how great the ending for Looper was

Brick was edited on a macbook (iirc) and made for a teensy budget and I'd take it over anything else he's done tbh

I was actually hoping after they said his name was Benoit that he was going to do a ridiculous, Poirot-esque accent, but the colonel sanders was entertaining enough on its own.

― Jordan Pickford LOLverdrive (Neanderthal), Tuesday, December 3, 2019 2:53 PM (forty minutes ago)

I thought making him genteel and Southern in the rich suburban Boston milieu was a clever England-to-America transposition of Poirot being a Belgian fusspot.

Brb going back in time to smash that macbook

Xps

I love Brick intensely

yo this was great! the only other two I’ve seen were his Star Wars and Looper, neither of which made much of an impression

So Drew Daniel noticed something. (And I'm annoyed I completely missed this, since Johnson had already talked about Deathtrap in the run up to release.)

two Chris-es
in white sweaters
in mysteries,
both alike in dignity . . . pic.twitter.com/TAJ1HmpgsD

— DREW DANIEL (@DDDrewDaniel) December 4, 2019

Would've paid good money to watch Thanksgiving family crowds watch Chris Evans make out with Daniel Craig.

Brick was edited on a macbook (iirc) and made for a teensy budget and I'd take it over anything else he's done tbh

― Simon H., Tuesday, December 3, 2019 3:34 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

yes

I think they put Evans in that sweater to reduce some of the Captain American mass he was still carrying.

I have no particular investment in Rian Johnson as a director. I saw Brick and Looper, and they were fine. My interest in Knives Out was mostly because it looked fun, and it was!

xp

Didn't they already solve that in the first Captain America movie? Bring back skinny Steve Rogers!

I have no particular investment in Rian Johnson as a director. I saw Brick and Looper, and they were fine. My interest in Knives Out was mostly because it looked fun, and it was!

― jaymc, Wednesday, December 4, 2019 5:02 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

same - I saw Brick in 2006 and liked it and I guess missed everything else since, altho tbh I think I saw Brothers Bloom...didn't know he did that, totally forgettable.... anyway Knives Out is really good, and a great Thanksgiving movie to see with a big crowd. also appeals to almost everyone.

i don't understand how anyone can get mad about Looper or Brick.

in this economy? me neither

idk I think feeling irritated by things that try for a tone, and you dislike that tone or feel they didn’t pull it off, is actually fine?

many movies don’t reach for a specific tone or have directors that don’t try new-to-them things and that’s the largest segment of the theater. for all the dumbasses howling about directors who didn’t get final cut... well, most of those dudes were churning out product, but it just wasn’t quite short enough or punchy enough

I’d take a few Rian Johnson missed shots over having a movie theater of screens showing completely on the nose productions

you can feel irritated by a movie and still happy you went to it over Angry Birds 3

in his Atlantic interview, Johnson said the superheroes in sweaters similarity was entirely coincidental https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2019/12/rian-johnson/602884/

either way, very into the Chris-es in sweaters look.

Chris Evans in cozy sweaters is the tumblr i never knew i needed

I liked how for such a New England film, no one tried for a New England accent, not even Evans, the only cast member afaik actually from Massachusetts.

Have we talked about the final shot of the film yet? Cause it was fantastic.

That was actually something that I think they kind of messed up (in a minor way). The mug (that's what you're talking about, right?) is iirc the first shot in the movie, but almost at the end you see Marta standing on the balcony, and her fingers are very deliberately, carefully positioned over the three "my house, my rules" etc. lines. Setting it up for the punchline, of course, but it called enough attention to itself that when they do deliver the punchline it lost (imo) some of its punch . Too telegraphed. Still funny, though.

The mug was part of it, but I also really loved the wide shot after of her looking down at the family from the balcony.

That's not the last shot though? The coffee cup is.

I dunno, it’s possible I may have misremembered - movie was hell of a ride! But that shot is the one that sticks in my mind.

Really enjoyed it.
Laughed a lot.
Was reminded of Ready or Not which is also pretty much must see.
THough that might just be the upper middle class bit.;
Some great lines including the heritage of the house thing.
& a lot depending on earlier foreshadowing but won't go further into that until people have seen it.

the line about the house having been purchased in the 80s was hilarious in context of "our family's legacy"

oh yeah stuck around to see if there was a post credits scene. wasn't a visual one.
Did hear a dog bark right at the end of the credits though which I assume must be intentional.

xxxp it's a great shot!

this sucked c'mon

Oh man never thought about it that way

-daniel craig's southern accent was distractingly bad (ditto his creepily light blue irises)
-the MAGA/SJW jokes were super corny and forced
-wtf is up with that idiotic steampunk sword chair???
-twist ending was obvious from the moment daniel craig said he was hired by an unknown person
-hateable rich family were so much less funny + realistic than in succession

pfft

-the MAGA/SJW jokes were super corny and forced

Both of them?

-hateable rich family were so much less funny + realistic than in /succession/

Lol i know many real families far worse than the Thrombeys

the house has a bunch of references to the book series Harlan’s written, with a couple of bits of dialogue mentioning that! the chair’s pretty obviously one of them, and they also mention the hidden window entrance and it’s concealing door is another

I kind of enjoyed it mostly, but dozed off in the luxurious comfort of the Electric Cinema Portobello Road.

I did notice a lot of restless checking of phones throughout the film however.

the southern accent was bad not good but this movie was good not bad

is how i break it down to a certain extent

Dude he was doing community theater southern as a choice.

Nobody after Kevin Spacey on HoC does that shit as a legit attempt

spacey’s HOC accent was also trash

The southern accent was meant to be bad, they literally make jokes about it in the movie

spacey’s HOC accent was also trash

― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Thursday, December 5, 2019 7:20 PM bookmarkflaglink

That was my point