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There’s a particular confidence required to open a movie where the protagonist essentially leans back and says, ‘Let me tell you how I got here.’ It suggests that what we’re about to witness will be so audacious that the inevitable endpoint won’t matter nearly as much as the ride.
It’s a plot device that’s been used to great effect throughout film history; just look at Citizen Kane or The
Usual Suspects.
But structuring a film in flashback is tricky business; either you distract the audience so that they forget they’re watching backstory, or every return to the present day needs to hit with humour or purpose. How to Make a Killing never really earns that confidence or purpose, making those jumps feel like someone slamming on the brakes every 15 minutes.
How to Make it Thrilling
Penned by Emily the Criminal writer/director John Patton Ford, the script originally landed on the industry Black List (a survey of most-liked but not-yet-produced screenplays) way back in 2014 when it was titled Rothchild.
Over the years the script has resurfaced—once upon a time Shia LaBeouf and Mel Gibson were circling the leads.
That troubled lineage is buried in the bones of How to Make a Killing. It has the smell of something that’s been sitting on a shelf for a decade. But that’s not the only dirty, not-so-secret part of its origin story.
How to Make a Killing is a modern-day rehashing of Ealing Studios’ razor-sharp classic British
comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949), starring the brilliant Sir Alec Guinness (you know him as
Obi-Wan.)
The story may be credited to Israel Rank: The Autobiography of a Criminal by Roy Horniman, but this has Ealing’s version written all over it. Where the 1949 original was wickedly dry and nimble, here, the satire lands like a dead weight.
Things do improve in the third act when Ed Harris spices things up, Ready or Not style. If only the entire movie were as unhinged.
What is How to Make a Killing about?
Born on the wrong side of a billion-dollar bloodline, Becket Redfellow (Powell) was disowned at
birth by his wealthy family and raised on bedtime stories of his stolen birthright.
His mother’s words instil the idea that the American Dream isn’t something he needs to earn but
reclaim—which he embraces by offing one inconvenient relative at a time.
To his credit, Glen Powell remains an undeniably compelling leading man, one with a touch of
old-school movie star charm about him. Since Twisters, his projects have been a little more
inconsistent. Here’s hoping the scripts match his upward trajectory moving forward.
As Becket’s childhood friend Julia Steinway, Margaret Qualley drifts in and out of scenes with such inconsistency that you might wonder if she’s even real. She interacts almost exclusively with Becket, appearing out of the blue in his office and his apartment.
Things might have gotten more interesting if Qualley had turned out to be Becket’s own seductive, money-hungry inner voice urging him towards vengeance.
For a story about orchestrated murder, How to Make a Killing rarely feels dangerous or even all
that much fun.
There’s a sharper film buried in here that goes all in on the nastiness of greed, trusts its audience, and really lets the comedy bite. It’s not a total disaster, but it’s less than lethal. | Two stars ★★
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