Rian Johnson is never one to hold anything back, especially when it comes to his own movies, and in one of his latest hot takes, Johnson sat down for an interview with The Atlantic to look at his new movie, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.
The film’s very long title came up, and Johnson offered his candid feelings about including ‘Knives Out‘, telling The Atlantic that he wanted to make the film feel a bit more isolated and less part of a shared universe but doesn’t deny the power of keeping the brand strong. “I’ve tried hard to make them self-contained. Honestly, I’m pissed off that we have A Knives Out Mystery in the title. You know? I want it to just be called Glass Onion,” says the filmmaker.
He adds, “I get it, and I want everyone who liked the first movie to know this is next in the series, but also, the whole appeal to me is it’s a new novel off the shelf every time. But there’s a gravity of a thousand suns toward serialized storytelling.”
With the shift to Netflix and the ever-cluttered pool of movies and series released weekly, Glass Onion needed an extra boost to get those original fans back in. 2019’s Knives Out was a big success for the filmmaker, bringing in over $300 million on a $40 million budget. And the latest entry isn’t off to a bad start, given its limited theatrical run and socially-pointed script. Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery made $15 million in its extremely limited cinematic run, becoming the best-performing theatrical release for Netflix.
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Now, the film is dominating social media and sitting pretty at the top spot on Netflix’s Top 10 list. Johnson may not love the title of the movie, but it’s safe to say that keeping Knives Out made Glass Onion a bit more popular.
You’re invited to put the pieces together. In the follow-up to Rian Johnson’s Knives Out, Detective Benoit Blanc travels to Greece to peel back the layers of a mystery involving a new cast of colorful suspects.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery stars Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Jessica Henwick, Madelyn Cline, Kate Hudson, and Dave Bautista.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is streaming now on Netflix.
