Kate Hudson has one thing to admit.
The star of fan favourites together with How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, Almost Famous and Bride Wars probably hasn’t been as enthusiastic about her movies as you have been. Or, no less than, she wasn’t as enthusiastic about them as she was enthusiastic about Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.
“I’ve only really had that a couple of times in my career, if I’m being honest,” Hudson informed news.com.au.
“There are movies that I’ve done where I can’t wait to play a couple of scenes or I’m excited to work with certain people, but rarely do I get that giddy feeling of, ‘Oh, I can’t wait to work with Rian [Johnson] and all of these people and play this part – and be in Greece!’
“This was going to be such a blast, and it really was. It exceeded my expectations. And the same thing happened when we saw the movie.”
Glass Onion can certainly encourage giddiness.
Writer and director Rian Johnson’s follow-up to the profitable Knives Out, Glass Onion is an immensely enjoyable sequel, transporting Daniel Craig’s gentleman detective Benoit Blanc to the glistening seductions of the Mediterranean.
Set on a non-public island in Greece, the thriller gathers a gaggle of mates with as many resentments as they’ve secrets and techniques, all visitors of a tech billionaire performed by Edward Norton. The glittering solid additionally contains Hudson, Kathryn Hahn, Dave Bautista, Janelle Monae, Leslie Odom Jr and Jessica Henwick.
It’s a pacy, compulsive homicide thriller, one with a intelligent plot, a ridiculously good construction and well-observed characters motivated by egocentric wishes, concern and an pressing must be related.
Netflix wager massive on Johnson, to the tune of $US469 million for the rights to 2 sequels, and if Glass Onion is something to go by, that’s a deal that may pay out.
While Craig’s star energy or the thought of cementing Knives Out as a franchise would’ve been alluring sufficient, what Netflix actually purchased was Johnson, and his prodigious mind and intense love for Agatha Christie.
Johnson initially felt the stress of the sequels – it actually was a lot cash – however as soon as he bought into the method of understanding new methods to shock audiences, the “nerve-racking” stress disappeared.
“I like to say these movies have to be rollercoaster rides, not crossword puzzles,” he informed news.com.au. “I always try to remember that first and foremost, it’s a movie that the audience is going to experience in a linear fashion.
“They’re not going to zoom back looking at a big map of all the clues. They’re going to be walking through a haunted house tunnel, and things jump out at them.
“So, trying to keep it on track and trying to keep the information doled out in a way where it’s always in the context of a story they’re actually engaged in.
“I want the audience to be having so much fun on the ride they forget they’re supposed to be solving something. And then at the end, it’s like a pleasant surprise when that comes back around.”
The authentic Knives Out earnt Johnson an Oscar nomination for authentic screenplay, in addition to the passion of top-notch gamers who desperately needed in on Glass Onion.
Hahn mentioned she was keen to do no matter it took to be concerned, particularly after she learn the script.
“I thought I was ahead of the script and, of course, I was not. At every turn of the page, I was like, ‘Oh, he’s going to pull it off again, I don’t know how but he’s going to pull it off again.’
“And I had that same feeling when I saw it for the first time, the same flutter and feeling of wonder. I don’t think I’ve had that feeling of excitement to make a movie in a long time.”
It’s Johnson’s potential to straddle the previous and the brand new that propels Knives Out and Glass Onion to nice heights. It’s the familiarity of a Christie-esque thriller with the twist of the up to date.
The filmmaker has by no means hidden his deep love for Christie’s work, repeatedly citing the icon’s writing because the inspiration for this entire enterprise. It’s what gave him the arrogance to maneuver from the cosy manor home to the brash non-public island, taking with him solely Craig’s Benoit Blanc.
“The one thing [Christie] did, book-to-book was she completely flipped it up,” he gushed. “You were getting a completely different deal with every new book, and that meant setting, characters and story.
“She was bringing in different genres, flipping the script and subverting your expectations.”
Johnson needed Glass Onion to be totally different to Knives Out in the identical means that The Mysterious Affair at Styles was totally different to Death on the Nile.
It’s additionally a declaration to audiences that every Knives Out film could be a brand new journey, assorted in tone and elegance. And identical to Hercule Poirot, Blanc could be an explorer in every of those new worlds.
Johnson described Blanc as being half-Jacques Tati and half-Cary Grant in To Catch a Thief, each seemingly bumbling and ultra-dashing. You can see it in Blanc’s bodily comedy and that blue-striped seersucker swimming outfit which remembers Monsieur Hulot’s sartorial selection when on holidays, and Grant’s debonair appeal.
This is a personality you wish to observe from film-to-film.
As Glass Onion was about to ramp up into manufacturing, Johnson began posting on social media about The Last of Sheila, a yacht-set whodunit with a screenplay by Anthony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim.
It’s simple to see the inspiration he drew from the movie, in addition to the Peter Ustinov-starring Evil Under the Sun and Death on the Nile.
“There’s something about the exotic, beautiful locale,” he mentioned. “It’s also great because you get a group of people who are in a place that’s foreign to them, and isolated, which is a great formula for a good murder mystery.”
It could be folly to doubt Johnson’s honest love for the style, it’s steeped in each body of those two movies.
It’s additionally in his casting of Sondheim and Angela Lansbury in cameo appearances – once they seem on display screen, it’s bittersweet. It was each their closing onscreen appearances – Sondheim died in November 2021 and Lansbury in October 2022.
Rian mentioned he didn’t wish to sound like a damaged report, however he actually couldn’t move up giving Christie all due credit score when requested if Glass Onion and Knives Out aren’t altering the shape, perhaps even just a bit bit.
“When you subvert the genre, you are imitating Christie in the most direct way,” he mentioned, nonetheless bowing all the way down to the grand dame of homicide mysteries.
It’s that unadulterated love of Christie and her works coupled together with his personal creativeness and filmmaking nous which makes Johnson the inheritor to her legacy.
Surely that’s value no less than $US469 million.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is streaming on Netflix from Friday, December 23 at 7pm AEDT
