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Glass Onion takes the well-worn detective genre and creates some genuinely surprising moments by "cheating" a little with what it shows the audience. This arti

Glass Onion takes the well-worn detective genre and creates some genuinely surprising moments by "cheating" a little with what it shows the audience. This article says it should have played it straight. I think that would have made for a more standard, boring movie. But whatever, that's just opinion. But I think it is silly to call it bad writing. Bad implies that the writer didn't have command of their craft. It is clearly all very deliberate and designed to create something surprising in a genre where that is very difficult. Like it or hate it, at least it tried something instead of just being another remake of Agatha Christie's "And Then There Was One".

sliken 4y ago
Dunno, I felt let down. Mysteries reward those paying close attention, everyone builds their pet theory on what happened "The butler did it!" and plays along being a detective. But instead the movie shows you what didn't happen, like grabbing a poisoned drink, and only later shows what really happened, being handed a poisoned drink. Seems just lazy and lame.
- cantaloupe 4y ago
  The original scene showed what did happen: the drink being handed rather than picked up. You can see it right before the 59’ mark. The drink being picked up was only shown in the later “memory” and was immediately pointed out to be a false memory.
brookst 4y ago
Well said. The author is basically complaining that their steak dinner was the worst pizza they’ve ever had.
- swivelmaster 4y ago
  Incredible analogy! I love it!
- ivan_gammel 4y ago
  Except that this was not a steak dinner, not even close. It was a microwave pizza with ananas served in “Italian” restaurant.
  - brookst 4y ago
    No, that was my point. The movie was very good for what it was, and the article’s complaints are almost all based on the author making incorrect assumptions about the movie’s intent and then complaining that the writing did not meet their incorrect assumptions. It’s fine to dislike the movie; about 7% of critics and moviegoers do, according to rotten tomatoes. But at least have the grace to understand it.
    - ivan_gammel 4y ago
      In some occasions 7% of critics do have correct assumptions, being able to see through the catchy hooks, and this is one of those cases. This movie is expected to continue the original story as a proper sequel, but it is something completely different — it simply does not match the expectations. It is very easy to understand this movie, because it is flat and unimaginative junk that does not leave any space for intellectual discussion, so trivial are the ideas, the plot and the dialogues in it. In the end, of course, it is a matter of taste, so let‘s not throw the words like „grace“ in this conversation — they are reserved for more important things.
      - brookst 4y ago
        I’m very sorry the movie made you that angry. I hope it’s one of those things you can see again in a few years and enjoy in a new light. I was like that with Steve Martin’s The Jerk: hated it, thought it was banal, came to appreciate it years later. You may or may not be right about the ideas in Glass Onion being trivial, but how blind must the author of this clickbait review have been to not even notice that literally Yo-Yo Ma, literally playing himself, literally sets up the movie’s structure and explains why it plays out the way it does, in one of the first scenes? You can think that’s dumb, but you can’t ignore it when writing a critique! This supposed revelation of “bad writing” is just clickbait from someone who didn’t understand the (yes, blatant! yes, arguably trivial!) structure the movie was exploring.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
bambax 4y ago
> creates some genuinely surprising moments by "cheating" a little I haven't seen the movie yet, but I know this much: you can't cheat. If you do, and you keep some fundamental fact hidden until the last minute, or if you use some kind of magic, or if the murderer was a complete outsider, or if the victim died by accident and nobody's guilty, or, God forbid! if it turns out the victim isn't actually dead, or it was all a dream... then the audience gets angry. Sometimes very angry. That may be what happened here. To paraphrase Walter Sobchak, this isn't 'Nam. There are rules to writing detective stories.
- drewcoo 4y ago
  > you can't cheat Sherlock Holmes always does. Poor Watson, encumbered by reality like the audience, can't see the clues that suddenly appear only to Holmes just in time to announce the "obvious" truth.
- smcl 4y ago
  I think you should maybe watch the movie before weighing in on whether or not it was "cheating", because it's a bit more subtle than is implied. It sounds like you've already formed your opinion though, which is a shame because it's maybe better to go into a fun movie like this with an open mind and no expectations. The only way I can see people getting angry at the film is if they go into it with a set of checkboxes they want to tick, or want to solve the crime along with (or ahead of!) the main character. But then at that point they're sort of setting themselves up to be angry.
  - bambax 4y ago
    I was careful to speak in general terms. I am absolutely not expressing an opinion about that movie at all. I saw and enjoyed the first installment of Knives Out. I don't have a beef with the filmmaker, or the series, or the actors, or the genre. I'm just saying that detective fiction in general should follow a certain formula and if you stray too far away from it, most of the time, it doesn't turn into a wonderful new recipe but simply fails. In general. Is it the case for this film in particular? I have no idea!
- 4y ago

sliken 4y ago

Dunno, I felt let down. Mysteries reward those paying close attention, everyone builds their pet theory on what happened "The butler did it!" and plays along being a detective. But instead the movie shows you what didn't happen, like grabbing a poisoned drink, and only later shows what really happened, being handed a poisoned drink. Seems just lazy and lame.

cantaloupe 4y ago
The original scene showed what did happen: the drink being handed rather than picked up. You can see it right before the 59’ mark. The drink being picked up was only shown in the later “memory” and was immediately pointed out to be a false memory.

brookst 4y ago

Well said. The author is basically complaining that their steak dinner was the worst pizza they’ve ever had.

swivelmaster 4y ago
Incredible analogy! I love it!
ivan_gammel 4y ago
Except that this was not a steak dinner, not even close. It was a microwave pizza with ananas served in “Italian” restaurant.
- brookst 4y ago
  No, that was my point. The movie was very good for what it was, and the article’s complaints are almost all based on the author making incorrect assumptions about the movie’s intent and then complaining that the writing did not meet their incorrect assumptions. It’s fine to dislike the movie; about 7% of critics and moviegoers do, according to rotten tomatoes. But at least have the grace to understand it.
  - ivan_gammel 4y ago
    In some occasions 7% of critics do have correct assumptions, being able to see through the catchy hooks, and this is one of those cases. This movie is expected to continue the original story as a proper sequel, but it is something completely different — it simply does not match the expectations. It is very easy to understand this movie, because it is flat and unimaginative junk that does not leave any space for intellectual discussion, so trivial are the ideas, the plot and the dialogues in it. In the end, of course, it is a matter of taste, so let‘s not throw the words like „grace“ in this conversation — they are reserved for more important things.
    - brookst 4y ago
      I’m very sorry the movie made you that angry. I hope it’s one of those things you can see again in a few years and enjoy in a new light. I was like that with Steve Martin’s The Jerk: hated it, thought it was banal, came to appreciate it years later. You may or may not be right about the ideas in Glass Onion being trivial, but how blind must the author of this clickbait review have been to not even notice that literally Yo-Yo Ma, literally playing himself, literally sets up the movie’s structure and explains why it plays out the way it does, in one of the first scenes? You can think that’s dumb, but you can’t ignore it when writing a critique! This supposed revelation of “bad writing” is just clickbait from someone who didn’t understand the (yes, blatant! yes, arguably trivial!) structure the movie was exploring.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

bambax 4y ago

> creates some genuinely surprising moments by "cheating" a little I haven't seen the movie yet, but I know this much: you can't cheat. If you do, and you keep some fundamental fact hidden until the last minute, or if you use some kind of magic, or if the murderer was a complete outsider, or if the victim died by accident and nobody's guilty, or, God forbid! if it turns out the victim isn't actually dead, or it was all a dream... then the audience gets angry. Sometimes very angry. That may be what happened here. To paraphrase Walter Sobchak, this isn't 'Nam. There are rules to writing detective stories.

drewcoo 4y ago
> you can't cheat Sherlock Holmes always does. Poor Watson, encumbered by reality like the audience, can't see the clues that suddenly appear only to Holmes just in time to announce the "obvious" truth.
smcl 4y ago
I think you should maybe watch the movie before weighing in on whether or not it was "cheating", because it's a bit more subtle than is implied. It sounds like you've already formed your opinion though, which is a shame because it's maybe better to go into a fun movie like this with an open mind and no expectations. The only way I can see people getting angry at the film is if they go into it with a set of checkboxes they want to tick, or want to solve the crime along with (or ahead of!) the main character. But then at that point they're sort of setting themselves up to be angry.
- bambax 4y ago
  I was careful to speak in general terms. I am absolutely not expressing an opinion about that movie at all. I saw and enjoyed the first installment of Knives Out. I don't have a beef with the filmmaker, or the series, or the actors, or the genre. I'm just saying that detective fiction in general should follow a certain formula and if you stray too far away from it, most of the time, it doesn't turn into a wonderful new recipe but simply fails. In general. Is it the case for this film in particular? I have no idea!
4y ago