I really wanted this to be good

Rating: 3/10 (29 February 2020)

I don't normally pay attention to oscar season but with such amazing movies like Parasite and JoJo Rabbit getting nominations I decided to check this one out. The first 30 minutes or so of this movie are very solid, and the set design is what really drew me in though. After that however, I kept waiting for it to be good and for it to get more suspenseful but it never did. I realized that it never got good because pretty much all information about the family was found out in the interviews. Then, it was revealed that the muderee actually killed himself halfway through the movie. I kept waiting for that to be a fakeout but it never was. The nurse character who thinks she killed him for some reason, the detective takes a liking to her, showing her evidence. (Even though she should still be treated as a suspect but I guess it is because of the puke whenever she lies thing). The detective's accent is very bad I could tell he was British the first time he talked. Micheal Scott does a better southern draw in The Office when they are playing that murder mystery game. I don't know why they didn't just make him french or British because that still would have fit with the character. The part that ruins it for me however is the culprit. He is the most obvious bad guy ever. He literally acts the most like a jerk and his name is literally Ransom. Where they even trying? A smarter writer would have made him a red herring. That's what I thought he was because the "You're Back Again Ransom" was so painfully obvious. When he was revealed to be the culprit I was hoping it was a fake out and when it wasn't I was so unsatisfied. Also, if he didn't hire the detective the cops would have assumed it was just a suicide so he foiled his own plot? It doesn't help also how the nurse is with him half of the movie and he is the only character with any character development. I do love the critique of the rich vs poor as a theme in a movie but it is so poorly done here. The only way we "know" that the rich family is bad and the poor nurse is good is because the detective keeps saying it. Come on, show don't tell. I don't know how this got nominated for an oscar because I agreed with a lot of the choices this year and this film is just messy. Toni Colette and Jamie Lee Curtis did what they could with this lazy script. I can't believe I'm saying this but the Netflix film "Murder Mystery" with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Anniston is more enjoyable and true to the murder mystery format. I would recommend watching that instead.