Rian Johnson interview: Solving the mystery of 'Knives Out'
Photo courtesy of Alex Geranios
Writer-director Rian Johnson has been impressing audiences with his movies since 2005’s “Brick.” In that debut feature, he took the noir elements of a Dashiell Hammett detective story and put them inside a high school with remarkable results. His follow-up features “The Brothers Bloom” and “Looper” also dabbled in genre, and film fans couldn’t get enough of his work. But it was “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” that made everyone else sit up and take notice of Johnson’s talent. He was literally given the keys to the kingdom and created a “Star Wars” film that defied expectations and built something genuine for fans and newbies alike.
He has announced his return to “Star Wars” in a few years but in the meantime he’s come back to the genre world with the murder-mystery “Knives Out.” Inspired by Agatha Christie novels and TV’s “Columbo”, the movie centers on a bickering family and the ensuing mystery to find out which of the privileged clan killed off the family patriarch for the inheritance money. The film also follows the cinematic lead of Christie’s projects and boasts an all-star cast that includes Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Michael Shannon, Don Johnson and Jamie Lee Curtis.
Johnson recently traveled to San Francisco to promote “Knives Out”, and we discussed among other things, how to turn the murder mystery genre inside out and the best way to not talk about “Star Wars.” The following is a transcription of that conversation.
Q: I know you’re obviously traveling from city to city promoting this movie. Does that ever get tiring for you?
Rian Johnson: Not at all, I enjoy it. Having made movies before that people don’t want to talk about, I will always appreciate movies that people want to talk about. It also gives me an opportunity to refine my answers.
Q: How do you handle it when you make the movies that people don’t want to talk about?
Johnson: “The Brothers Bloom” is a very personal movie for me. It was my second movie, I put a lot into it and it was exactly that, a lot of people didn’t show up for it. Over time people have discovered it but I felt like you have to make movies for yourself in a certain way.
Q: I know the idea for this film has been with you for a while but did you always imagine it at this scale with an all-star cast?
Johnson: I’ve always wanted to make a whodunit and the initial idea was very conceptual. I wanted to make a whodunit with Hitchcock mechanics in the middle and then I started drilling down into the mechanics of what that would look like. Back then I could never imagine I could get a cast like this but recently I looked at it in terms of putting on a big show like “Death on the Nile” or “Murder on the Orient Express” when I was growing up. I looked at it as being big and having a lot of fun with it.
Q: Agatha Christie kind of fun.
Johnson: That’s it exactly!
Q: The marketing even sells the movie as a “Rian Johnson whodunit.” Was that your idea or the marketing department?
Johnson: Yeah, I even had it written as a whodunit on the original script page. I like telling people what to expect when they’re walking in.
Q: Since you had a big cast did you have certain actors in mind for specific roles?
Johnson: I never write with actors in mind. I’ve found that it’s a path to getting your heart broken because the actor will never be available. I just write the characters and hire great actors whether they’re movie stars or not.
Q: How do you juggle all of those personalities on set?
Johnson: It was so easy.
Q: Really?
Johnson: Yeah, it was weird. I was nervous coming into it but everyone showed up ready to have a good time. There was no movie star craziness, we were all hanging out in a house in the middle of Massachusetts. I think it would’ve been different if we had been making some kind of intense, interior drama with all of these people. This is a fun one, it’s a genre movie. I still had to work and dig in with the actors and the characters but in many way everyone knew what they were showing up to do.
Q: You’ve worked with Joseph Gordon-Levitt on all of your movies. Is there a reason he couldn’t join you for this one?
Johnson: It was his schedule. I was bummed but we got him in there as a voice. Did you catch that?
Q: No I didn’t.
Johnson: There’s a scene where the sister is watching a cop show on her iPad and the voice of the cop is Joe.
Q: I know you got him in as a voice on “The Last Jedi” but I didn’t know about this one.
Johnson: Yeah, there’s been a couple where I’ve had to resort to getting him in there as a voice. I can’t wait to work with him again for real.
Q: Do you have something in mind for the two of you to work on?
Johnson: Everything! I always try to work him on everything I do.
Q: Just to do a quick detour, I know the “Brick” Blu-Ray has been delayed for a while. Was that a rights issue or something else?
Johnson: For a while it was a rights thing. We kept bugging Universal to do it and I guess they felt it wasn’t in their financial interest to do it. Finally a swath of their titles got sold to Kino and they were going to put it out but we asked them to delay it because they were going to use the old transfer. So my cinematographer Steve Yedlin, my producer Ram Bergman and I stepped in and said we’ll pay for a new transfer. We would love to use this opportunity to make a new 4K transfer of the movie. Back when we first made the movie we didn’t know what we were doing but now we made this beautiful new transfer that looks like the original print of the movie.
Q: When you’ve directed TV episodes, do you find that job different than directing a movie?
Johnson: For me it’s different because I’ve written the movies I’ve made but when I’ve made TV, specifically “Breaking Bad,” I’m stepping into what other incredible writers have already written. For me, I feel like I’m just coming in and doing the fun part. On set it’s the same because you’re working with actors but with TV it’s different because I’m serving someone else’s material.
Q: How sick are you of hearing “Star Wars” questions at this point?
Johnson: (laughs) Oh no, I love talking about “Star Wars.”
Q: I apologize if that sounds mean-spirited but I’m guessing most journalists who come in here to talk to you are going to inevitably ask you about “Star Wars” and working on “The Last Jedi.” I’m just genuinely curious if that gets on your nerves after a while.
Johnson: (laughs) You don’t have to apologize at all. I’ve gotten very good at side-stepping questions I don’t want to talk about.
Q: Fair enough. I figured instead of asking you a “Star Wars” question I’d rather talk to you about not talking about it.
Johnson: I really like that approach and it’s a very clever way to talk about it. I have always been a “Star Wars” fan and I continue to love that franchise. There is a part of it with the internet where you sometimes have to watch what you say, and this is not malicious on your part, but whenever I say something about it any little bit can be taken out of context. I know that’s the nature of the beast but that’s the only math I have to do in my head when I can sense that someone is about to ask me a “Star Wars” question. I actually love talking about it in this way because it’s talking about the act of talking about it.
Q: In true “Columbo” fashion, just one more question…
Johnson: One more question!
Q: You’re going from city to city and getting a lot of the same questions. Is there one question you wish would go away?
Johnson: (laughs) This is going to sound awful but the exact same question you just asked.
Q: This is definitely a first and now I feel ridiculous.
Johnson: (laughs) This is so meta, I just turned the whole thing around.
Q: How often do you get that question?
Johnson: At least once every round of interviews. It’s a good question but I definitely get it a lot.
“Knives Out” is now playing in theaters nationwide.
