Knives Out

 This review was due a week ago. Apologies.

When I first read about this movie, I had fresh memories of having played Cluedo during Diwali (for the first time) and when I saw the murder mystery poster, I really thought it would be a good adaptation of the game to a movie (like the Witcher I hope (also need to watch a movie adaptation of And Then There Were None)). 

I was excited, which was further built up by Ishan Tuljapurkar who promised to watch it together when he would be next in Pune. Though he was, Force, Displacement and Cos Theta worked against this cinematic rendezvous. And the burden of initiative fell on another friend to convince me to expend effort to watch it.

Whereas the end was fun, a bit unexpected, a nice revelation of suspense and a few convoluted theories unravelling, the tangle only begin close to, or after the interval. Hence a massive build-up of an achingly slow start and mid, which was swallowed up in rapt attention (like the first lecture of the first contracts class) did not pay off in proportion. All was a considerable if not massive Om Phuss. Like an Anubulay answer, not even a Pathan. Towards the end it was more James Hadley Chase (without the sex) than Agatha Christie. I guess that is because I went with pre-expectation rather than with an open mind.

I am not saying that it was not fun. There were definitely a few well-timed comedic sequences, but when your mind is being built up slowly against a movie, even those seemed forced, like Andy's character after Michael leaves.

It was great to see Michael Shannon. I still love his acting in the blissful and heavily underrated Boardwalk Empire series. The cast of this movie is powerful but I often think that Bollywood movies are able to do more justice to ensemble casts than Hollywood ones. Yes, it was great to see Chris Evans also "have some fun".

Then there was Aditya Gadre whose tweet I saw praising Daniel Craig and his southern drawl. I respectfully disagreed. After watching him as an sophisticated Englishman, his attempts at the accent were tiring on the ear. Yes, this shows he is not typecast, but that opportunity was long lost when he accepted the Anglo-Saxon role.

This movie is not a must-watch. If you do, don't spend much.

Also Cinepolis Westend seats suck.

Rating: 2 Beards/5

Special thanks to Nikita Bhakare for suggestion and company. And for helping finish the popcorn :P