The knives are out again in Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, and this time, the box of knives is headed to an island. Although the shiny blades immediately catch the eye, it seems like a little more polishing was required.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery brings back the charming Benoit Blanc, played by Daniel Craig, and puts him in the middle of an eccentric bunch of rich people on a faraway island. The peculiar bunch of people are all connected to one common thread: the Glass Onion.
The lot includes Claire Debella (Kathryn Hahn), the governor of Connecticut who is running for the Senate, acclaimed scientist Lionel Toussaint (Leslie Odom Jr.), former supermodel turned fashion designer Birdy Jay (Kate Hudson), Twitch star Duke Cody (Dave Bautista), billionaire Miles Bron (Edward Norton), and Andi (Janelle Monae). Miles invites the “Disruptors” (as they call themselves) to an exotic beach to participate in a make-believe whodunit mystery. However, things blow up bigger with a couple of deaths and politics.
Glass Onion tries very hard to be layered like the onion but ends up becoming like a shallot, the layers are undoubtedly there but the spice of the onions missing. With the help of each character’s messy past, the film has enough layers to peel. Unfortunately, despite the layers, Glass Onion’s lack of depth led to the film becoming predictable. It doesn’t take an hour to guess the supposed big twist.
But with a cast line-up similar to Glass Onion, the script flaws can be easily forgiven. While Daniel Craig is undoubtedly the centre of the Mona Lisa painting in this movie, it’s the magnificent supporting showpieces that stole the show, especially the women.
Kate Hudson brings back the same energy of the early 2000s era when cheerleader movies were at their peak. Portrayed as a bimbo supermodel, Kate outshines everyone in most scenes, including Craig to some extent. Another actress who stole the show in the movie is Janelle Monae. She not only brought layers to the character she was playing but in the climax, she appeared to have a ball! Edward Norton impresses as the spoilt billionaire for all the strangest reasons.
Apart from the actors, the cinematography by Steve Yedlin — who has worked on Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Knives Out, and the upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania — captures the scenic island and the chaos with balance. It’s been a while since we’ve seen a glossy film on screen, and Glass Onion is a welcome return.
A special mention to Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery for including the pandemic and COVID-19 as characters in the establishment of the story, however, it seems like director Rian Johnson forgets about the pandemic when the final twist arrives, making the plot holes a tad evident.
The million-dollar question at this point is: Is Glass Onion better than Knives Out? My answer is no. The sequel stands out as a standalone film but isn’t as sharp as Knives Out. Nonetheless, don’t miss Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. It’s a fun film that doesn’t allow you to look at the time even once during its runtime.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery streams on Netflix starting December 23.
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