KNIVES OUT A REVIEW

UPDATE: Going to leave up the movie review-
We're done picking against the Purple Birds so Ravens/49ers are off our board. 
Texans at Cheaters- Over 45. 
Packers at Giants...don't know why but we like the home-dog Gints +6.5
Rams at Arizona- Over 47.
J..E...T...S  Jets Jets Jets. Gang Green on the prowl. -3.5 over  sad Cincy. 
San Diego at Denver. Chargers -2.5 in the snow. 

Survivor: Judge Faber rules for the Pack; Fake AM likes Seattle; Mr. Markus and Peter Sautter roll with the Panthers.  (OUCH- see ya, wouldn't want to be ya) 
Juan Gonzalez rolled with the Pack. Awaiting  And Lucy Lew lost last week with the Falcons.  and Dustin Tischler took the Rams.

MOVIE REVIEW 

This is a decent piece of writing. Not by Rumpole, but by a reader who left it in the comments section. We are intrigued, so we decided to put it on the front page: 

At The Cinema said...

At the Cinema

“We’ve been here before” my fellow cinema attendees seem to say as they settle into their 

reclining seats to view “Knives Out” Rian Johnson’s ensemble “who-dun-it”. 

Maybe we have, and then again, maybe we have not. 

Which disgruntled family member killed patriarch-writer Harlan Thrombery 

(Christopher Plummer) in his twisty-turney mansion at the end of his 85th Birthday party 

when he is discovered with his throat gashed open? One of his disgruntled and recently 

disinherited children? One of their dysfunctional children? Did the butler do it ??? 

Except in this story the butler is played by ingenue Ana de Armas, the coquettish nurse who, 

by the time the movie is over, is from every country in Central and South America. 

First the clumsy part- the introduction of “famed” private detective Benoit Blanc

 (Daniel Craig), Johnson’s Hercule Poitrot. Blanc appears instantaneously,

 inexplicably assisting a couple of inept local detectives, one of which is 

inexplicably identified as a state trooper. Why is a traffic ticket writer assigned to a death?

 It’s never explained, and it doesn’t matter. 

The real question in this movie is not who did it, but what Craig and Johnson are

 doing with us? Do they think we are buying Craig’s putative southern gentleman accent 

and are cringing, or is the joke on us? There is everything but Craig breaking the fourth 

wall ala Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cops and pausing to wink at us. 

Eventually the will is read (did you think you were going to escape that tired old ploy?) 

the family gasps, and then the movie takes off in earnest. “Cui Bono” we ask in our 

criminal cases and in our murder mysteries (who benefits?). 

Craig/Blanc stops pinging one note on the piano, and in the penultimate and ultimate

 scenes Craig- ala Poirot ala Ms. Marple ala Holmes explains all. Don’t bother trying- 

you won’t be able to do it and Johnson doesn’t give you chance. It’s all a wink and nod- 

you pay for your ducat and some Snocaps and he takes you for a two-hour ride

 (there’s even a mild car chase). But even when the killer is unmasked- then as the

 infomercial says-“wait there’s more!”. 

Because in the end is it about life and morality and catching a killer… or in the end is it 

about the money? And this is where Rian Johnson wants to take us. Not to Agatha Christie 

and Sir Arthur C Doyle, but to Akira Kurosawa and Ingmar Bergman.

 Johnson has his popular vox popoli hits behind him- Star Wars and the like. 

Now he’s writing and directing for something bigger. 

Johnson wants his Seven Samurai, and Knives Out is his first attempt. 

The question at the end of this two-hour romp is not who did it? 

Intelligent viewers will leave the theater pondering what Knives Out will do to the genre? 

As Seven Samurai begot the Magnificent Seven, what will Knives Out beget? 

In Cinema Veritas… and next time the popcorn is on me.