There’s been a murder! Not literally of course, but there has been a rather lavish and dramatic murder that lies within the heart of this week’s film review - See How They Run. As you have probably guessed by now, this film is a murder mystery with an element of comedy too. The film takes inspiration from some classic murder mystery films, especially ones that revolve around the many stories of Agatha Christie, with one of her more well-known stories playing a prominent part within the narrative of this film. See How They Run is an original story but it contains a lot of borrowed elements from other murder mystery stories, so there’s no way of knowing how this film will play out which is a bonus.
As with all great murder mysteries you need a larger-than-life cast to fill in the sea of culprits. The film is based on the production of a well-known play which is currently playing in the West End. The play is so popular that an American filmmaker wants to turn it into a movie, that is until his death causes all of that to stop. The cast members and crew members of the production are played by an assortment of British talent that includes Ruth Wilson, Reece Shearsmith, Harris Dickinson, David Oyelowo as well as many more. The central protagonists are the detectives in charge of solving the case, Sam Rockwell’s laidback Inspector Stoppard and Saoirse Ronan’s eccentric Constable Stalker.
The chemistry between Inspector Stoppard and Constable Stalker is one of the comedic highlights of the film as Constable Stalker is brash and jumps to conclusions too often, whereas Inspector Stoppard is more reluctant and takes an old-school approach to solve the case. After a second murder, the story starts to spiral into a conspiracy theory with multiple people having multiple motives, unfortunately, you do start to get a little lost in the story as you attempt to connect all the dots. The film feels very theatrical too which slightly diminishes the cinematic aspect of this film. Despite the fact, that this is releasing in cinema it feels like it might have worked better as a streaming release.
From the beginning, you are absorbed into this world of 1950s London, but sadly the film isn’t gripping enough and there are a lot of tongue-in-cheek jokes about murder mysteries scattered around the film, such as one character jokingly talking about how lazy it is for films to show flashbacks to progress a story forward during a flashback in this film! It does feel over-convoluted at times and the “play within the play” trope does make the film feel more chaotic than it should be but it is an entertaining film nevertheless.
★★☆☆☆
2/5
See How They Run doesn’t hold your attention for too long as the story twists and turns in many directions. You think you know where the story is going until another plot point is raised. With so many red herrings and not enough time with the characters, you do start to feel bored and you begin to wish the murderer kills someone else just to keep the pace going. Saying that the comedy is on point and Sam Rockwell and Saoirse Ronan are the biggest draws in an otherwise slow and overly-dramatic film.
Thanks for reading today’s blog!
Alex Murray, the Head of Eyesight Productions
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