TIFF: Eating the Rich with "Knives Out"

by Chris Feil

When Rian Johnson announced a star-studded murder mystery in the vein of Agatha Christie, you didn’t think it would just be a straightforward genre exercise, did you? As he has shown in films such as Looper (and to an extent Star Wars: The Last Jedi in its brilliant eschewing of franchise dogma), Johnson delights in subverting our expectations of genre ever so slightly. Knives Out film is no exception, not only turning the ensemble comedy into a rollicking eat-the-rich satire, but also taking the standard whodunit plotting and repositioning it with exciting reinvention. Even if your tastes consider the book mold stodginess of Christie to remain delicious, Johnson’s modern narrative take should satisfy even purists.

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Yes No Maybe So: Knives Out

by Ben Miller

Director Rian Johnson can do what he wants these days.  After helming a Star Wars movie, directors have the cache to explore different realms of entertainment.  Johnson decided to go with Knives Out, an original story inspired by Agatha Christie murder mysteries.  Let’s break it down with our Yes, No, Maybe So™ system...

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TIFF: "Kings" and "I, Tonya"

TIFF wraps up Sunday and since we'd like the last few pieces to be positive let's get some negativity out of the way. Here are two films which yours truly did not respond well to. One is certain to be trashed by critics and the other, though trashy, is being widely praised. But they're both bad.

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Review: "Logan Lucky"

by Chris Feil

Steven Soderbergh’s cinematic return begins with an apt statement that reflects the experience of his most entertaining films: Channing Tatum’s Jimmy Logan tinkers away at his truck as he tells his daughter Sadie a fantastical tale about the John Denver tune on the radio. When she asks what makes the song so special to him, his matter-of-fact response is that sometimes you just “like the song because of the song.” For all of Soderbergh’s conceptual refinement and polemical subtlety buried within his most mainstream features, sometime you can’t just help love the song.

Logan Lucky is another one of those films for the director, and another of his spectacular ensembles. Tatum is one of three protective Logan siblings along with Adam Driver’s amputee Clyde and Riley Keough’s no-bullshit hairdresser Mellie.  In order to stay a part of his daughter’s life after losing his construction job, Jimmy hatches a plan to rob a NASCAR motorway of its subterranean cash stash. For added muscle the Logans recruit the mischievous Bang brothers, led by current convict and hard-boiled egg enthusiast Joe, played by an inspired and loose Daniel Craig.

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YNMS: "Logan Lucky"

Chris here. Tucked away in late summer is Steven Soderbergh's Soderbergh's official return from cinematic retirement Logan Lucky. Why is this return so quiet with little fanfare? Well, probably because we always knew that retirement wasn't going to last long anyway - and maybe if Soderbergh is back, he'll stay low-key.

However, from the looks of the first trailer, Logan Lucky will be anything but a low-key romp. Soderbergh is back to the ensemble heist capers he turned into big hits with the Ocean's films, this time even more broadly idiosyncratic and silly. This film's heist seeks to pull one over on NASCAR, with the lovable thieves a set of goofy oddballs that sound more at home in the land of Coens than Soderbergh. Take a look at the first trailer, and we'll discuss the Yes No Maybe So after the jump...

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