"CATCH YOU FUCKERS AT A BAD TIME?"

Knox Goes Away

KNOX GOES AWAY is, somehow, the second movie I watched in a week where a professional killer is diagnosed with the fatal neurocognitive disorder Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. In THE KILLER’S GAME it quickly turns out to be a false alarm, but even setting that one aside there’s a small subgenre of killers trying to do one last job before their dementia stops them. I’ve also seen THE DYING OF THE LIGHT with Nicolas Cage and MEMORY with Liam Neeson, which is a remake of a Belgian film called THE ALZHEIMER CASE (or at least an adaptation of the same novel). I suppose all of these are a cousin to movies about killers with other fatal diseases – in 3 DAYS TO KILL, for example, Kevin Costner has an aggressive form of cancer, in SHADOWBOXER Helen Mirren has the cancer, in KATE Mary Elizabeth Winstead has been poisoned, etc.

This one has a little dark humor but it’s mostly grim and serious. Michael Keaton (AMERICAN ASSASSIN) directs and stars as John Knox, who has hidden his memory problems from people including his partner Muncie (Ray McKinnon, FOOTLOOSE). When a specialist (Paul Perri, MANHUNTER) tells him the news he starts saying he’s “going away” and “cashing out,” as he arranges to launder his assets and give them to his ex-wife Ruby (Marcia Gay Harden, SPACE COWBOYS), estranged son Miles (James Marsden, ACCIDENTAL LOVE) and favorite sex worker Annie (Joanna Kulig, COLD WAR).

There are two big complications, though: one, he gets confused during his last job, kills more people than expected and does a bad job of making it look like they killed each other. Two, Miles comes to him panicked because in a rage he killed a guy for statutorily raping his daughter. So Knox agrees to use his unique knowledge (and last days of lucidity) to cover up the crime. But Detective Emily Ikari (Suzy Nakamura, “Jenny’s Assistant,” DEEP IMPACT) is investigating the first mess, which will eventually lead her to the second one.

To me this one plays like an adaptation of a novel, but it’s actually a spec script by Gregory Poirier (DANGER ZONE III: STEEL HORSE WAR, DANGER ZONE 4: MAD GIRLS BAD GIRLS) that Keaton was attached to so long that he eventually came around to directing it. He’s one of those actors who’s always fascinating to watch, which is important for a movie like this where we watch his process without knowing at first what he’s up to. He’s moving around the murder weapon and bloody clothes, breaking into a security office and messing with the recordings from the night of the murder, fending off questions from cops, and meanwhile working with his old friend Xavier (Al Pacino, THE SON OF NO ONE) and others trying to exchange diamonds and paintings for money. But the whole time we know he’s losing it so we’re not sure he’s doing it right, and it seems like he doesn’t either.

Most people reading this probly know my dad had Alzheimer’s, making me sensitive to these kind of stories. I know I’m getting hardened to it because this was a pretty authentic depiction but I only got teary a little at the very end. I don’t have to worry about covering up crimes, but the sort of confusion Knox is dealing with is my greatest fear, really, and the way he gets confused about things and tries to hid it from people was very familiar from the early days of my dad’s disease. And what the doctor tells him about having strong emotions but not remembering the thoughts that caused them, I definitely saw my dad going through that, and it’s really upsetting.

There’s a scene where Knox goes to his old house and I think it was genuinely to talk to Ruby, but he seems to forget that, starts to act like he still lives there. He opens up the freezer looking for something, writes “beer” on the white board grocery list.

Ruby of course mistakes him for an intruder at first and almost shoots him. It’s a bittersweet encounter where she expresses love for him and clearly notices he’s acting strange, but maybe doesn’t catch the significance of him struggling to remember his granddaughter’s name (he didn’t know her anyway) and calling college “the big school.”

It’s an effective form of suspense, too. We get invested in him pulling this stuff off but he can always go into a place and forget why he’s there. He’s a hyper-competent mastermind but also extremely vulnerable. I was so worried about him.

It’s fair to say some of it is a little clunky. I don’t think it was necessary to make the pedophile also a neo-nazi, and some of Ikari’s hard boiled dialogue felt a little self conscious to me. But for the most part it’s a very classy, understated crime movie with a great performance from Keaton and an interesting dynamic between him and his son as they sort of warm to each other under these dark circumstances.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 28th, 2024 at 1:19 pm and is filed under Reviews, Crime, Thriller. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

14 Responses to “Knox Goes Away”

  1. Good review. I heard very mixed things about this but Michael Keaton is always worth watching. And his first directorial effort, “The Merry Gentleman”, is also a hitman movie, and also a Christmas movie! I remember that being a pretty low-key enjoyable movie about real-ish people, and this always sounded of the same ilk.

  2. Coincidentally, this is on sale on Amazon digital (in the states), and I picked it up this week. I’m looking forward to seeing this. I also picked up the PROTEGE on sale a minute ago and have that in the queue.

    Having expressed some grievances about BEETLEDEUCE, let me restore balance to the universe by saying that Keaton might just be my favorite actor (that is top of the dome, so, maybe I’m missing someone). I know his awesomeness is non-controversial, but it’s hard for me to describe just how great he is. There’s a pure Keaton energy that always manages to shine through in his characters and performances, and yet, this always elevates the proceedings, and I never find him distracting. He *is* performing and embodying characters and doing it exceedingly well without suppressing or diminishing his full Keatonessence. Somehow, he is always both himself and the character he is performing, and they meld seamelessly in a way that they both coexist in a kind of symbiosis. He doesn’t disappear into the character, it’s like the character gets assimilated into him. I cannot say this about any other actor, not De Niro (he disappears into the role), Pacino (he’s always a big mood), Dicaprio (great, but a little distracting), Grant (same as with Pacino), Stewart (same as with Pacino), Newman (same). Maybe Denzel, but I honestly don’t think Denzel has demonstrated the same range as Keaton — not necessarily that he couldn’t, but Denzel’s comedic potential is unproven as far as I know (unless maybe that Roman Esquire movie?? — I don’t know, I haven’t seen it).

    Anyway, you look at his Bruce Wayne, Ray Nicollette (sp?), Beetlejuice, Adrian Toomes, Mr. Mom, BIRDMAN, SPOTLIGHT guy. This dude’s got range. I have not seen CLEAN AND SOBER, but I’m sure he’s good in that, too.

    I’m sure there is someone out there who finds his energy offputting. I am sorry for their loss, truly.

  3. I’m pretty sure “Michael Keaton is awesome” is one of the few universally accepted truths we have as a species. I love that he went away for like ten years, then quietly came back, no big comeback role, just started appearing in movies again, and he was just so obviously the same ol’ Michael Keaton that it was like he never left. We just got on with having Michael Keaton in movies again. There was no need for a comeback because he had nothing to come back from.

  4. Totally. He’s that dude.

  5. Strong agreement with the love for Keaton, although I haven’t seen this one yet. That his guest role on that one episode of 30 Rock happened during the quiet phase of his career only makes me love him more.

    Skani, if you’re a completist and you haven’t watched Dopesick yet, I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

  6. Cool, I will check that out! I have to work up the steam to watch a straight drama, but I have known to make it happen — I liked SPOTLIGHT, even in all its conventional Oscar-bait-iness. The FOUNDER is another one I keep saying I’ll watch. I would not call myself a completist, but I do enjoy Keaton in whatever, so, I will check out DOPESICK.

  7. Ooooh, I thought he was GREAT in “The Founder”. That movie is clearly pretending to be a warts-and-all portrait of Ray Kroc that nonetheless hopes to sell you burgers. But Keaton plays him as a parasitic agent of the Capitalist Apocalypse, and he’s powered entirely by this squirrely jackass energy that you can’t look away from. I was hoping the Oscars would have recognized his work in that, and maybe then he wouldn’t have had to squeeze himself into the Batsuit that last embarrassing time.

  8. When engaging in conversations about the awesomeness of Michael Keaton, I have to say the turning point for me was a thriller he did ages ago called PACIFIC HEIGHTS with Matthew Modine and Melanie Griffith. He scared the shit out of me there, and since then he’s been a fascinating actor for me. Which is why I consider BEETLEJUICE one of his greatest creations. You laugh at his absurd, over-sexed antics, but underneath all that lies a genuine psychopath willing to fuck shit up real good.

  9. Yes, PACIFIC HEIGHTS is another great one.

  10. Sounds similar to his role in Dopesick. Watching him unknowingly become addicted is fuckin heartbreaking, but he still has that wily keaton energy. And yes, Pacific Heights is pretty great.

  11. Ed Harris has always been my “never seen him do bad work in anything” guy, but now that I think about it Keaton is probably right up there. I started watching this (it’s on Max in the US) but it didn’t fit my mood, so I walked away. I’ll come back to it.

  12. I hope Ed Harris and Michael Keaton play brothers in something someday. Or some sort of partnership that’s lasted for decades. Cops? Lovers? Cops who are lovers? Consider me on board for all of these ideas.

  13. burningambulance

    October 2nd, 2024 at 8:22 pm

    Wow. Just finished watching this and holy hell. I’m a professional writer, so losing my mind is pretty much my greatest fear in life, and this ran over me like a truck. The action was good, the caper/mystery stuff was good, and this might be my favorite Al Pacino performance since HEAT. Definitely the first time I can remember him playing a recognizably human being this century. But the emotional content of it was INTENSE. Really glad I came back to it.

  14. Definitely second the Ed Harris love (and its non-controversial-ness). Believe it or not, I had never seen THE ROCK until a few months ago, and, honestly, I didn’t love it, but Ed Harris was great. I also re-watched TRUMAN SHOW a few months ago, and he was great in that. I also caught THE FIRM a month ago for the first time in probably 30 years, and he has some really fun scenes in that. Great in TOP GUN: MAVERICK. Fun in CREEPSHOW. I’ve heard he’s good in that other Romero joint. Liked him in the first season of WESTWORLD (I dropped the ball with that show after a season). Something of his that I plan to revisit is ENEMY AT THE GATES, which is from the golden age of me and cinemas, where I would watch anything and everythign at the dollar movie and then spend my spending money on anything and everything when it was on sale at BEST BUY during its release week. I liked it then, which means there’s about 45% chance I’ll like it now (more likely than not it will be more mediocre than I remembered, but better odds than a lottery ticket).

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