Sequels are a risk. When the original is a hit, it’s a hard act to follow. Which is why anything tagged part 2 or Season 2 is viewed with suspicion. The dubiety comes from experience. God, how happy we are that Sholay never had a post-script. Iconic fare only stands to lose some of its varnish by attempts to milk its success.
Sequels that do fare well are a cunning amalgamation of script innovation and staying ahead of audience expectations. Drishyam in Malayalam managed to do that. People who never saw the first were impressed enough with the second – and that perhaps is the secret of a good follow-up, book or film. That it can stand on its own. All that anticipation for the second season of The White Lotus did not go to waste. It was different, of course, but a worthy successor. And, halleluiah, the same has happened with Glass Onion.
Detective Benoit (Daniel Craig) is back! His southern accent is a bit different this time but that's a small nit-pick when it comes to the rest of the film. The mystery seethes differently from the first outing, Knives Out, which came out in 2019. And there's a nod to the pandemic in a mask-full start. Thankfully, very soon all masks are off.
In the best of mysteries, one desires to revisit the first half for clues they missed. Here that holds true; one wants to rewind and go back to the beginning before the film hits the halfway mark. What – who – when – how? These are valid questions that run through a viewer’s mind throughout the 2 hours and 19 minutes of it. Apart from the alert eye one has to keep on Daniel Craig’s wardrobe as Benoit.
There is suspense, there is a body count, there is opulence and there is idiocy – a mix that does not talk down to its audience. The script manages to keep us on our toes though we are aware throughout that this is escapist fare; really, nothing to take too seriously. Oh, but let’s. Look at the hackneyed central theme: the main villain (main, because there are others within whom villainy may reside in different degrees) may blow up the world, he is a first-class backstabber, he is so obviously the culprit that he cannot be one…
Taking all the tropes, taking stock characters who benefit from the victim being victim and culprit being culprit, taking the over-the-top grandeur, including too many glass objects that beg to be shattered, the film still surprises with precisely these ingredients. And you may well ask, pray what is Mona Lisa doing in the middle of all this. She is sort of part of the cast.
Kate Hudson, Edward Norton, Kathryn Hahn, Janelle Monae come to stay at a private island in Greece. Serena Williams, Ethan Hawke and Hugh Grant make surprise appearances. Grant especially, as Craig’s on-screen partner, ticks the gay box right there. Craig is just the way he is in Knives Out, all-knowing, explaining everything, including the ending. But he has the good grace to leave it to another actor to overpower the climax.
Glass Onion could make some yearn for the 70 mm screen again.
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