Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery

 

Mystery fans know that when it comes to detective stories all the pieces matter -- except when they don't.

Extraneous information can be useful as deliberate misdirections and McGuffins, devices that just move the story forward but serve no purpose in solving the case or revealing the killer's identity. Astute viewers can often identify these devices straightaway or soon enough. To my mind, the fewer of these narrative cheats the better -- make everything count, I say. Unless they're handled expertly.

Writer / director Rian Johnson is a master of the telling detail and the deflection; he has the disciplined mind of a computer programmer -- all ones and zeroes, x's and o's triggering responses, reactions and reflection. Watching the swirling pieces fall into place is the joy of watching well-crafted movie mysteries.

In 2019's Knives Out, Johnson assembled a family of exasperatingly privileged whiners and their hirelings in the wake of the death of the patriarch (Christopher Plummer), which the viewer sees executed early in the film and knows it to be a suicide witnessed by the man's nurse (Ana de Armas). So, that death is a brilliant McGuffin used to uncover other nefarious deeds.

To assist the local police (Lakeith Stanfield) in the investigation, Johnson created the delicious, oak-barrel mystery writer Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), a Southern gentleman sleuth not unlike Christie's wood-soaked Hercule Poirot -- courtesy masking craftiness.

One of the reasons to take in Johnson's most-excellent second Knives Out feature, the Netflix-produced Glass Onion, is to see (and hear) Craig's Blanc do his delectable thing, bouncing off of and around a rogues' gallery of, well, exasperatingly privileged hangers-on (Kate Hudson, Dave Bautista, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr.) to a tech giant played by Edward Norton. (I'd forgotten how much I enjoy Norton's work and am reminded he was nominated for an Oscar and won the Golden Globe for his first feature film performance in 1996's Primal Fear.)

In this Swiss clock of a mystery, Johnson takes his story to a Greek island owned by Norton's Miles Bron, who promises a whodunit weekend where his guests must solve the mystery of his own murder. (Spoiler alert: That's the McGuffin.) Johnson has filled each frame of this visually saturated picture with pop culture references and sight gags, some diversionary (Kanye's portrait) and some meaningful (the Mona Lisa). Also at the party is Bron's aggrieved former partner Andi, played by Janelle Monáe, who may or may not be out for revenge.

The picture crackles with wit and intelligence and some howlingly funny set pieces and contrivances. Take a notepad and pencil and play along.