How to Make a Killing ★★★

In his directorial debut Emily the Criminal, director John Patton Ford offered a cynical and dark noir updated for the modern day. In his sophomore feature, How to Make a Killing, he again tackles familiar noir tropes, while also drawing inspiration from the classic British crime comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets. Becket Redfellow (Glen Powell) is a potential heir to the considerable Redfellow family fortune, but only if everyone older than him in the family dies. His mother, Mary (Nell Williams), was not disinherited but effectively kicked out of the family for becoming pregnant out of wedlock, leaving her to raise Becket all alone in small-town New Jersey. It is not the elegant, upscale lifestyle a Redfellow family member would be used to, but they make do. Mary sees to it that Becket enjoys the social life he would have enjoyed if he grew up in the lavish Redfellow family mansion. As a boy, he tells anyone who will listen that he will one day inherit the Redfellow family fortune and while few pay heed, his crush Julia Steinway (Margaret Qualley) takes notice.

How to Make a Killing opens with Becket in prison, four hours away from execution. He is speaking with a priest and not so much confessing, but rather laying out why his story is “tragic.” This framing device is not uncommon in noir, nor is the ensuing heavy reliance on narration as Becket details everything that led up to his current predicament. How to Make a Killing starts off a bit slow, struggling to breathe under the weight of the narration and to find a rhythm in examining the quirky, off-beat nature of Becket, the black comedy of its murderous exploits, and its social satire. However, as he had with Emily the Criminal, Ford finds that rhythm in time. As the years go by, Becket finds himself working in a New York City clothing store and in walks Julia. With one simple conversation, he is back under her spell. With one simple line about calling her when he is done killing everyone in the way of him and the inheritance, an idea is planted.

Becket soon sets out to begin killing those in his way. It can be a bit goofy and quirky, playing nicely to Powell’s comedic and charming strengths; however, it is rarely laugh-out-loud funny. One thing that Ford excels in driving home is that this is a story of cost. Becket had to work hard in his life to get anywhere and his mother had to work hard as a single parent to see him have any kind of prosperous life. They idealized the wealth and excess of the Redfellow family, convinced – even in his final confession – that “money buys happiness.” But, Ford’s film makes it clear that this is not the full picture. As Becket begins to kill his family members, unexpected doors open. By simply introducing himself to his uncle Warren (Bill Camp), he lands a lucrative job on Wall Street. Bumping into his artist cousin Noah (Zach Woods) introduces him to Noah’s girlfriend Ruth (Jessica Henwick). He connects with Ruth right away and, as she will confess to him after Noah’s untimely murder, she was set to break up with him. Becket and Ruth start a heartwarming and deeply affecting romance. It is filled with movie magic and youthful passion. He is able to buy them a lavish lifestyle thanks to his job at Warren’s brokerage, but as Ruth will tell him, “I loved you when you had to take the bus to work in Newark.” It is not about the money for her. He is, with his growing bond with Warren and Ruth, rich in ways beyond wealth. Yet, he cannot stop.

At every turn, he has the femme fatale of Julia lurking, lingering in the background to remind him of the ultimate goal. With a sultry strut and a knowing gleam in her eye, Julia is always there to redirect him. Either it is with flashing her legs at him – and the framing of her, especially during an encounter in his office, makes it seem like her body is 90% leg – or, when he starts to waver and crave his life with Ruth more than bloodshed, by blackmail, Julia is there to keep him pinned into the corner that he fatalistically put himself in once he started this wicked endeavor. Qualley devours this role, oozing sex appeal and ranking favorably with the femme fatales of the classic noir era, while Ford’s development of the character is quite fascinating. 

In their days of childhood romance, Julia calls out Becket for wanting to “impress her.” During a power outage at a school recital, she gives him a quick kiss, pulling back when the lights are on. It is enough to create a lifelong obsession for Becket, while the power dynamics are always clear. He craves her attention, she craves his adoration. She loves him more than she will admit in public, but it is laid out there. Even once she gets married to another man, Julia loves to toy with him, hinting that he should ask her out anyway and then rejecting him when he does. How the character and storyline develop gains momentum and edge once Julia becomes a more frequent presence, no longer content to just puppeteer Becket from the shadows but now emerging to flash in front of his eyes just how much control she has over him and his future. The final act is great fun and delivers on the momentum How to Make a Killing has built, due to Julia’s role in the events.

How to Make a Killing finds laughs in how some of Becket’s family members meet their demise, especially in a montage once he turns his attention to his older family members. The scenes with Zach Woods have plenty of great comedic writing to them, while Woods nails the role of the wealthy wannabe starving artist Noah. Topher Grace’s grifting Christian pastor Steven Redfellow is, comparatively, a bit too much though Grace does sell the outlandish eccentricity of the character. Ford does a great job in building up the aura around Becket’s grandfather Whitelaw (Ed Harris). He has a foreboding presence, even if only seen as a shadow in a big armchair when first introduced. How to Make a Killing is naturally building up to a confrontation between Whitelaw and Becket, which has a bit of a Ready or Not bend to its action. While this confrontation is fun enough, it is the dialogue given to Harris in these scenes that stand out. There is a poetry and a melancholy to them, one that drives at the heart of How to Make a Killing’s central conflict about the soul destroying exercise of pursuing wealth. Harris is excellent, coming out of the shadows and living up to the billing of being the family’s domineering patriarch.

Making good use of the star power and screen presence of Glen Powell and Margaret Qualley, John Patton Ford’s How to Make a Killing is a lot of fun. A fittingly noir-tinged follow-up to Ford’s successful debut feature Emily the Criminal, it is a shrewd and smart anti-capitalist black comedy, even if familiar. How to Make a Killing struggles to find its footing initially and is always a bit tonally off, but it gains momentum with each passing minute and delivers on it with devious delight. With thematically rich characters etched in the classic tradition of noir, electric chemistry between Powell and Qualley as well as between Powell and Jessica Henwick, and plenty of heart to go along with its well-executed themes, How to Make a Killing delivers.