So, did anyone else run to see how See How They Run ran?
I caught it this weekend, going in knowing nothing about it, and couldn’t have been more delighted. I’ve seen better movies this year, but this is probably the most genuine fun I’ve had in quite a while.
The basic premise is that a murder takes place during a 1953 stage production of Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap, which Sam Rockwell and Saoirsa Ronan are called in to investigate.
The film is quite lively and very funny, and reminds me more than a bit of Soderbergh’s Oceans films in terms of tone and style.
If that intrigues you, skip the trailer (which includes some good bits) and go check it out. But if you do watch it, it’s pretty representative of the whole.
Pretty great cast, and I’m certainly here for the “ensemble murder mystery” revival that seems to be going on lately, Gosford Park being probably my favorite movie of all-time. Definitely going on my list.
Oh yeah, Gosford Park and Knives Out were both on my mind when watching. All three have different fascinating takes on a similar source of inspiration.
I had somehow missed that this movie even existed until a few days ago! Cast looks great. I don’t know if I’ll catch it in theaters, but it’ll be a definite stream when it’s available.
I saw this last weekend with my daughter. I thought it was fun enough in places but it never quite got going. Saorise Ronan carries a lot of it and she’s fun to watch. I love Sam Rockwell but wanted more from him.
I rated it as I hope someone starts a thread about it but not I’m gonna start a thread about it. So thanks for starting a thread about it, anon!
Got around to watching this yesterday… and, sadly, didn’t like it as much as I had hoped.
The cast is good and Ronan’s performance is delightful, but I struggled to stay engaged with the movie throughout longer stretches of it. I totally understand the ‘meta’ aspect of it and saw the things that got set up/foreshadowed happen and pay off, but it simply didn’t do a lot for me. Maybe I’d need to be a bigger Christie/Whodunnit nerd to get more enjoyment out of this.
I would categorize this as “somewhat amusing.” The cast is very strong, with Ronan being the standout. And the production looks nice.
But it’s not going on anyone’s list of all-time whodunnits. I love Sam Rockwell, but a British accent is not a natural fit for him, and his role is a bit of a cliche at this point (you get the feeling they wanted Johnny Depp doing Jack Sparrow, but Sam Rockwell was what they could afford.)
The biggest stumbling block I had was with the tone. This is unabashedly a comedy, but it never quite makes up its mind what kind of comedy it wants to be. Dry, stylish Wes Anderson fable? Rollicking Clue-like Hollywood shtick? Given the lead character’s name is Inspector Stoppard (and the other lead’s name is Constable Stalker), I thought maybe it was going to be a very meta analysis of the mystery genre, and occasionally it kind of is. But the movie never settles into a tone, tries to be a little bit of each, and ends up as a bit of a mish-mash that wanders all over the place.
Two tiny examples of this uncertainty of focus: Richard Attenborough - yes, that Richard Attenborough - is a character in this movie. In real life, Attenborough was famously short for a leading man. In the movie, the actor playing Attenborough is quite tall, and doesn’t sound much like him. Is this incongruity meant as a joke, or is it just an oddity of casting? I have no idea. Likewise, some of the humor early on in the movie depends on us knowing that the play The Mousetrap is still running today. But the movie doesn’t actually bother to tell the audience that until the end, meaning if you’re not up on your British theater trivia, you’ll be saying “Oh, I see. Those bits at the start were meant to be funny!”
It’s all in good fun, though, and everyone seems to be having a fine time. It may do the trick if you’re in the mood for a featherweight diversion. Just don’t expect the next Knives Out.
The who in a Whodunnit is kind of important. And I do not think, that the solution to the mystery, the who, is interesting at all! If you do not have an interesting villain, you do not have a good finale.
