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

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

ah okay.

the real problem with actors putting on accents isn't so much the accuracy of them or not it's that unless they're great at it, the act of doing the accent tends to get in the way of their thought processes - some proportion of their brain is occupied with forming the sounds correctly, so they end up as less sharp versions of themselves and don't wring the sort of nuance out of their lines as they would otherwise. i thought this was true of craig here and made him less essential - i can pretty easily imagine a number of other actors who could have owned this role at least as well.

i did have a great time though. just the right combination of smart and stupid for me. even if i did accidentally buy tickets for an audio description screening lol. (MEG GASPS)

the real problem with actors putting on accents isn't so much the accuracy of them or not it's that unless they're great at it, the act of doing the accent tends to get in the way of their thought processes

This is otm. Speaking bas someone who has done them....if you can't pull it off seamlessly, better not to do it.

There have been one or two movies I've seen where a close but unconvincing accent has turned out to be a plot point. eXistenZ, maybe?

Dude he was doing community theater southern as a choice.

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

― master of nuggets (Neanderthal), Friday, 6 December 2019 00:16 (one hour ago) link

ah i see, acting badly on purpose, what a bold and advanced move

Have you seen movies before doggie

Most actors don’t act in movies so acting badly on purpose is a lot more fun

“combo of smart and stupid” — otm

loved this.

Loved Daniel Craig's ridiculous accent. That character would have been way less interesting without it. That whole donut within a donut speech would not have worked without that accent.

ah i see, acting badly on purpose, what a bold and advanced move

please somebody restrain flopson from seeing any previous mega-cast country-house murder-mystery screen comedies made from the 1930s to the 1980s, or stage ones ever, lest he utterly implode with disgust

One plus one plus two plus one

there's a bit where Craig says 'I suspect... foul play' which sounds like a direct echo of a line spoken by Edward Woodward in The Wicker Man. Made me wonder if it was deliberate or just very very uncanny

Did like that chair. Positively garish.
Harlan must love GoT.

May need another look at the film.had just assumed that the decoration had been some kind of family legacy until hearing it had very short family history. Was it supposed to say nouveau riche at all?

I saw that Joseph Gordon Levitt was credited as a random detective, and assumed he was one of the ones at the medical office or something - it turns out that he's the narrator in the show that Marta's sister's watching on her laptop.