For his crime thriller Knives Out, Star Wars 8 director Rian Johnson brings together a remarkable cast of stars around Daniel Craig as investigator Benoit Blanc in a murder case. In the style of the classic whodunit thriller, clues are given, false leads are set and in the end all the pieces of the puzzle are put together to form a surprising overall picture.
Knives Out comes up with a whole series of surprises and in the end the facts about the true circumstances of the Death of Patriarch Harlan Thrombley. If the resolution went too fast for you, we have them all for you twists and revelations summarized and explain to you what the end means.
At this point we speak one explicit spoiler warning out.
Knives Out: Who is Harlan Thrombley’s killer?
At the beginning of Knives Out, successful crime writer Harlan Thrombley (Christopher Plummer) with a slit throat found. Each of his money-hungry family members seems to have a motive. But there is no such simple answer to the question of the murderer, because Rian Johnson juggles numerous motives and events that ultimately intertwine.
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Daniel Craig in Knives Out
Of the first big twist awaits us after a third of the film, when the murder mystery already seems to have been solved. His nurse, the migrant Marta (Ana de Armas), accidentally gave him the wrong medicine, an overdose of morphine. With just minutes to live, Harlan hatches a plan to steer suspicion away from Marta, since she was the only pure-hearted person in his life and he doesn’t want to risk Marta’s illegal immigrant being deported.
He slits his own throat. From that moment, Knives Out evolves into a completely different direction into a thriller with a critical look at greed, the privilege of the over-rich and xenophobia. In the end, however, investigator Benoit can solve the real crime and presents us with the surprising twist: Harlan’s grandson Ransom Drysdale (Chris Evans) wanted to kill his grandfather.
So we learn that it was Ransom who had switched his grandfather’s medicine. So Marta had indeed given Harlan the right medicine that would not have killed him. Therefore, the simple answer to the question is “Who Murdered Harlan?“: Harlan committed suicide.
Knives Out: Chris Evans is the real killer
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Chris Evans in Knives Out
While Ransom’s plan to murder his grandfather doesn’t quite go as planned, as the story progresses he becomes a real killer. Because the housekeeper Fran (Edi Patterson) tries to blackmail Ransom with the toxicological report from Harlan.
Ransoms uses this in his plan to get out of this. He makes Marta believe that she is being blackmailed and hopes that Marta will turn himself in to the police. Ransom ends up giving Fran one lethal dose of morphine and sends Marta to her so that she can be held responsible for another murder.
But Marta and Benoit Blanc can outsmart Ransom. After Benoit in a typical crime thriller final monologue the solving the crime presented, they let Ransom think Fran survived.
He confesses to the crime and eventually even attacks Marta with a knife, which turns out to be a dummy turns out. In the end, the murderer Ransom is taken away in handcuffs by the police.
That means the end of Knives Out
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Knives Out
With Knives Out, Rian Johnson has not only created a declaration of love for the whodunit crime genre, but also a social criticism of the socio-political situation in the USAwhich spans the political spectrum in the microcosm of Harlan’s family.
But one thing connects them all: you Right to privilege and money. When this is taken from them by Harlan leaving all his fortune to Marta, they show their true and xenophobic colors. They become self-centered and manipulative monsters, while Marta is presented as the only pure-hearted person.
everyday racism plays a major role in Knives Out. Because although many family members generously refer to Marta as part of the family, none of them knows where she actually comes from (a funny running gag throughout the film). When the wealth of the family members is stolen, racist slogans are heard.
The final image of Knives Out is a cynical comment on the migration debate. we see Marta on the balcony of her new home, the house of Harlan. In her hand she holds Harlan’s coffee mug with the inscription “My house, my rules‘ while the self-absorbed family members from whom she has taken everything look up at her in horror.
How did you like the resolution in Knives Out?