Summary
Benoit Blanc, played by Daniel Craig, goes to a private island to investigate a murder yet to come.
Whilst I still think this film is good, it pales in comparison to the first, not hugely, but certainly to a noticeable degree.
The writing is still sharp and the comedy and commentary is still very much on point, I laughed quite a few times during the film and thought that it had a number of insightful points about modern society.
Moreover, the vistas and the locations are still incredible to look at, and the film does present itself as the child of an Agatha Christie book and the excesses of the modern age.
However, outside of the comedy and the beautiful scenery is where the cracks start to immerge, and the hollowness begins to reveal itself more and more. This hollowness can best be seen in the performances, which do greatly lag behind the first film in that the ensemble never really comes together as well as feeling like each actor is playing a cliché or archetype rather than a real person. It feels like a group of actors acting rather than real characters interacting. The weakest member of the cast is probably Jenelle Monae who struggles to emote and gives an incredibly hammy accent turn midway through the film that simply isn’t believable at all, but this is why often musicians don’t make good actors.
Lastly, the runtime is an issue. At the two and a half hour mark the film quickly starts to develop pacing issues in act one and these get worse as the film progresses, there are many needless asides, flashbacks and so forth which whilst interesting to a degree in flushing out the world these characters inhabit, never really need to be.
Overall, still good but in some ways a little disappointing.
3/5
Pros.
The location
The comedy
Craig
Cons
The pacing issues and unsatisfying nature of the ending
The acting is frequently poor
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Another Millennial Reviewer 