During the pandemic-induced lockdowns everywhere, über-rich Miles Bron (Edward Norton) invites his "best friends" - meaning those most dependent from his money - to his onion-shaped mansion on his private island in Greece for a murder mystery game. His guests are Claire Debella (Kathryn Hahn), who's currently running for profit and needs Bron's campaign money, scientist Lionel (Leslie Odom jr), whose work is financed by Miles, model past her prime Birdie (Kate Hudson), in whose sweatpants business he has heavily invested, and men's rights blogger Duke (Dave Bautista), who desparately wants to get a slot on his planned TV channel. Other guests are Birdie's assistant Peg (Jessica Henwick), Duke's wife Whiskey (Madelyn Cline), who Miles has an affair with, Miles' ex-wife Andi (Janelle Monáe), who has lost everything in their divorce ... and Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), who has the reputation of being the world best private investigator. Soon enough though it turns out that Blanc hasn't actually been invited by Miles, and apparently somebody has played a trick on Miles when sending Blanc the invitation. And a mean trick it has been since Blanc solves the murder mystery before Miles has even launched it - but he warns Miles that somebody might want to murder him, which Miles totally plays down, but then Duke breaks down dead after he has drunk from Miles' glass, so it seems somebody wanted to murder Miles. And then the lights go out, everybody runs around like crazy, until Blanc bumps into Andi, from whom he expects vital information - but she's shot dead right before his very eyes. In a flashback, we learn that Andi hasn't actually been Andi at all but her twin sister Helen, who has hired Blanc after she has found her sister murdered after she has found proof that would make her the owner of Miles' company. Unfortunately she has informed all of Miles' friends present at the party of this, and that was her death sentence. Now Blanc has accepted the case only if she slipped into the role of Andi and searched the premises for that proof, which is nothing more than a diagram of a napkin. Also, Helen survived being shot thanks to a notebook in her breast pocket, and while Blanc entertains Miles and company with his theories about the case she manages to find the napkin - and suddenly everything points to Miles as the murderer of both Andi and Duke (who has been an almost-witness of the murder), but Miles is quick-witted enough to burn the napkin, the only proof, and this is really where Blanc's expertise ends. But he gives Helen the means to destroy Miles' mansion and the man once and for all and make his "friends" turn against him ...

Taken as a murder mystery, Glass Onion is far from perfect, it's over-long, overly constructed, it wastes way too much time on exposition, tries too hard to be topical and thus is bound not to age well, the characters a few times too often border caricature, and it's often too gimmicky for its own good. But that said, the film still is a fun watch, basically because its mainly forgettable story also carries many fun details, little alusions and jokes that are bound to make one giggle - and as a director Rian Johnson sure knows how to exploit these to full effect while remaining subtle enough about them at the same time. And in its best moments the film even offers some satire reminiscent of Graham Greene's novel Doctor Fischer of Geneva or The Bomb Party. So it is definitely not a good murder mystery, but way more fun than it has any right to be - but that said, the overly long exposition is a bit of a pain to sit through.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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