Listen up, kids. Rian Johnson and Daniel Craig REVIVED the murder mystery genre. The OG’s of that genre are Edgar Allen Poe and especially Agatha Christie, who built an entire career off of Whodunits. Now that the genre is back in fashion, See How They Run hopes to bring Christie’s genius back to the mainstream, by setting the story during her heyday and giving us a meta’ed version of one of her tales.
See How They Run is set up as a story within a story, when Christie’s The Mousetrap was playing in London’s West End in the 1950’s. At the party celebrating the 100th show, movie producer Leo Kopernick (Adrien Brody) is slowly becoming the fly in the ointment, pissing off everyone there while also pissing off the audience, whom he is narrating to. And as Agatha Christie novels have taught us, if you’re the jerk at the beginning, that means bye bye to you. Kopernick gets murdered and left on stage at the theatre. In strolls Inspector Stoppard (Sam Rockwell) and newby Constable Stalker (Saiorse Ronan) to question the various suspects over the following days, including producer John Woolf (Reece Shearsmith), casting agent Petula Spencer (Ruth Wilson), Mousetrap writer David Cocker-Norris (David Oyelowo), and real life London stage legend Richard Attenborough (Harris Dickinson).
See How They Run’s goal is to deconstruct an Agatha Christie story into its repeatable beats, as amusingly as possible. When movies opt for that type of storytelling, usually the smaller the detail the bigger the laugh, and the more obvious detail callouts play to silence. For example, when David Cocker-Norris talks about how stupid flashback storytelling is, then immediately See How They Run jumps back in time to a flashback, that’s funny sh*t. However, when a character pronounces “It’s the character we LEAST suspect” then jump cut to the chief of police eating a sandwich, that garners an eye roll. Fortunately more of See How They Run is the former, with all sorts of little amusing send ups of the Christie whodunit formula: don’t jump to conclusions, “loose” adaptations, art mimicking life, etc. Plus, to add some more layering, there’s an undercurrent conversation about how to adapt a Christie story into a play vs into a movie, with the play “boringly” taking place in one location, but the movie going for more explosions, effects, and crazier stuff to wow moviegoing audiences, but completely undermining the point of the story in the first place. What’s even funnier is Mark Chappell, the See How They Run screenwriter, is a TV guy, so I guess he’s an impartial party to the stage/movie debate? All these winks give See How They Run a silly energy that keeps the tone light and amusing.
Plus, the movie has an incredible cast of characters as befitting a great murder mystery. Sam Rockwell and Saoirse Ronan play the opposite ends of audience conduits, with the over eager Ronan playing off the malaised, over-this Rockwell perfectly. The running gag of Ronan trying to arrest the latest suspect when new information comes to light and Rockwell stopping her never gets old. The suspect list is also filled with willing, over the top participants. Adrien Brody has a blast smarming and abusing his Hollywood power in the worst way possible. Reese Shearsmith, Tim Key, and Harry Dickinson have fun out Britishing each other going for the most British character in See How They Run. And David Oyelowo and Ruth Wilson ham it up as artists pissed off at how they’re forced to compromise for others. Plus the third act has some surprise character entries befitting an Agatha Christie story. It’s clear from the start with the costumes and kooky accents everyone is having fun in See How They Run, which adds to the manic positive energy the movie is putting out in the world.
It’s good to have whodunits back in the mainstream. Nothing’s more fun than getting a bunch of acting talent, a great lead detective, and a twisty story eliciting a host of gasps from the audience. Or in See How They Run’s case, a bit of laughter as well. Also, the movie is probably a finalist for most British movie I’ve seen, but it loses with The Dig on Netflix, which is, so, hilariously, British you’ll have to see it for yourself to believe it.