The Usual Suspects

This is a film that i believe would be better on a rewatch now that i understand things that were going on during the film. people always talk about how great of a plot twist this movie had and i was surprised because i though it was that keaton was keyser söze but it turned out that the plot twist was verbal kint being him. If you look at it through an outside lens you might argue that it is quite obvious, he’s the narrator of the story, he knows many details that maybe he shouldn’t have and just the way he recalls the story of söze and the hungarians sells it for me.  I didn’t like the big lack of character development in the film, but you can argue that they are all meant to die so what’s the point. The pacing was incredible, and it really helped keep the tension high from the beginning to the end. Even with all the dialogue and flashbacks, it never felt slow or boring. Each scene feels like it’s moving the story forward or setting up something that comes back later. I also liked how the film doesn’t hold your hand, it expects you to keep up, which makes the twist hit even harder once you realize what’s really going on and makes you be very focused throughout to try to piece and understand what’s going on.  One thing that stood out to me was how well the film uses misdirection. It gives you just enough information to keep you guessing, and because you’re seeing everything from Verbal’s perspective, it’s easy to fall into the trap, within the confines and possibilities that verbal is not being completely honest  The way the film blends real events with possibly fabricated ones adds to that uncertainty, and by the time the credits roll, you’re questioning everything you just watched. That level of manipulation from the storytelling side was something I found really clever. Overall, while this isn’t in my top 25 favorites, I can definitely appreciate the craft behind it. The performances, especially from Kevin Spacey, were strong, and the pacing kept me engaged the whole way through. I think it’s one of those movies that benefits from a second watch now that I know how it ends specifically because of scenes like the place where supposedly verbal is seeing Keaton die and other scenes of that nature that you don’t necessarily understand on first watch,  and for that, I’d give it 4.5 stars.