Rotten Tomatoes at 45 percent is a weird thing to look at because sometimes it tells you a movie is bad and sometimes it just tells you the wrong people voted or worst case they were sellouts, and How to Make a Killing is absolutely a case of the second thing or third thing, because the "critics" consensus on this one is just flat out wrong and I more with the audience side of this rating, 76% sounds about right for this movie. The concept alone should have people more curious than dismissive, you got Becket Redfellow played by Glen Powell, a guy who got cut out of his wealthy family fortune because his mother had him outside of marriage and his answer to that situation is to work his way through the entire Redfellow bloodline one by one until the inheritance has nowhere left to go but him. That is a dark and nasty idea for a movie and the thing is John Patton Ford commits to it do damn well since the start, dropping you straight into a death row confession with Becket talking to a priest before you even know the full landscape of what is about to unfold and that alone tells you right away that this is not your typical feel good story about a charming lead doing charming things. Powell has been riding this new wave of leading man energy for some time now and this role plays directly into what makes him work, the guy has this quality where you root for him even when everything he is doing should make you disgusted and A24 clearly gave him the space and the budget to let that quality run the whole show.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4357198/
- Platform: PRIME VIDEO
Margaret Qualley as Julia Steinway is the other end of this force making this thing move none stop, she plays Becket's childhood friend who shows up years later at his job and lights the match that starts everything and the relationship between these two is the best thing the movie has in it, is the one thing that keeps you entertain during the entire movie. Their history together comes through in every scene they share, the way they read each other, the way Julia knows exactly when Becket is about to lose his nerve and says exactly the right terrible thing to keep him moving forward and Qualley plays that with this specific kind of casual menace that is almost more unsettling than anything Becket actually does during the movie. Jessica Henwick brings some balance with warmth as Ruth, the school teacher who comes into his life and makes him think maybe there is a version of all this where he just stops and tries to be a regular person, and those scenes with her work because Henwick and Powell have real chemistry and because Ruth represents the one thing the whole Redfellow plan cannot take in consideration which is someone who actually sees him for who he is and not what he wants or what he is "owe". The one that shines within the supporting cast is the performance of Bill Camp as his uncle, because Camp brings this decency and quiet to a character surrounded by some of the most unpleasant people you will see on this movie and watching Becket really get alone, like this man creates a tension that the script actually earns during the build up because you can feel how complicated it gets when your plan runs into someone who does not fit the category you need them to fit.
Now there are very few perfect movies, and this is not one of them because the story starts losing some of its grip once the FBI enters the picture. The agents clearly recognize that multiple Redfellow heirs have died under suspicious circumstances, they know Becket stands to benefit from those deaths, and they even begin watching him, but the investigation rarely creates the kind of pressure that setup should produce. That does not completely break the movie, but it makes the middle section feel less convincing because Becket keeps moving through his plan while the FBI mostly hangs around waiting for the plot to need them again. The pacing gets uneven around the same point, with too many developments competing for attention and not all of them receiving enough room to breathe. Topher Grace helps wake the movie back up as Pastor Steven J. Redfellow, Becket’s megachurch cousin, playing him with exactly the kind of wild commitment the role needs. Steven is loud, theatrical and completely ridiculous, but Grace understands the joke and pushes it far enough that every scene with him feels unpredictable, one of them is the mansion scene with Whitelaw also brings back some real tension, especially once Becket realizes he has walked into something much more dangerous than a family dinner, with thhe uncomfortable atmosphere and Ed Harris gives the scene the kind of menace it needs. The problem is that by then the movie has already stretched the investigation around Becket about as far as it can go, so even though the sequence works on its own, part of your brain is still wondering why the FBI has not closed in on the most obvious beneficiary of this entire chain of deaths.
After watching the movie, I read that How to Make a Killing was loosely inspired by the 1949 British dark comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets. I had honestly never heard of that movie before, which is probably not surprising considering how old it is and how far outside my generation it is. Still, now that it is so easy to look this stuff up, I usually read about a movie after watching it to see where the idea came from and whether there was some extra meaning or reference I completely missed. That happens to me plenty, especially when a movie is connected to a book, because I am definitely not much of a reader. The basic connection is pretty obvious once you know about it since both stories follow a man who has been pushed aside by a rich family and decides to remove the relatives standing between him and the inheritance. This version turns that idea into a more modern American story about class, family money and the anger that comes from watching people inherit everything while you are left with nothing. The Redfellows are selfish, cold and completely disconnected from normal people, although some of them are definitely played bigger and more ridiculous than others. What makes Becket interesting is that he keeps finding ways to convince himself that what he is doing is fair, even when he is clearly becoming just as greedy and ruthless as the family he hates. I also kept thinking about Knives Out because both movies revolve around a wealthy family fighting over money while an outsider tries to find a way into that world, I bet many who watch the movie make such comparison. The big difference is that Becket is not investigating anyone or playing some harmless little trick, he is just trying to kill his way into a fortune, so this movie gets darker and meaner pretty quickly. It is also less interested in giving you a clean ending where the right person wins and everyone gets what they deserve because by the end, almost everyone has shown how ugly they can become once enough money and resentment are involved. Another interesting aspect of the movie is that the death row opening is not just there to grab your attention either. The entire movie is built around Becket explaining how he ended up there and that setup becomes more important as the story comes together. The movie has some messy parts, but I still think it is a little smarter than some of the early reviews gave it credit for.
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