GLASS ONION is the sequel to KNIVES OUT, the funny and multilayered murder/mystery from filmmaker Rian Johnson. It's the best kind of sequel, too, because you don't need to see KNIVES OUT to enjoy the new movie.
Both films center on Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), a detective who tackles unusual cases. In GLASS ONION, Blanc arrives uninvited to a murder/mystery party thrown by billionaire Miles Bron (Edward Norton), along with a wide array of Bron's eccentric friends. Blanc suspects that someone is using the game as cover to plot an actual murder, and the plot quickly moves forward from there.
We talked to Daniel Craig and co-stars Madelyn Cline, and Jessica Henwick, along with writer/director Rian Johnson, ahead of the movie's limited theatrical opening.
"My love of the genre is similar to Rian Johnson's," says Daniel Craig. "They were event movies that brought in all these stars, there was a kind of magic attached to them. It's not something that you want to recreate in these movies, but we wanted to get the tone. Rian then puts on a very modern slant, and writes about what's going on today — which Agatha Christie did back in her day, she wrote about "the times," she didn't write about the past, she wrote about exactly what was going on — so in that sense they're very traditional in a way."
And while it's always fun to try to solve the mystery in a movie like this, that shouldn't be any audience's chief task. Let Benoit Blanc do that work! Craig says that, sure, you can "do a little work, since there's a mystery and you've got to think about the mystery, but it's not important — if you don't figure out the mystery, it doesn't matter." It's much more important to be along for the ride. "We think they're funny! That's the idea, that you can take your family and have a giggle."
Watch our full interview with the cast and filmmaker of GLASS ONION: A KNIVES OUT MYSTERY below:
GLASS ONION opens on November 23.
All images courtesy of Netflix.