Is now a good time for a movie about an unrelenting group of assholes smugly looking down on everyone, the audience included? Inarguably, that certainly makes How to Make a Killing a movie fit for this moment in time. For much of its runtime, the latest Glen Powell vehicle oscillates between entertaining vignettes and a sense of aimlessness. Well, not aimlessness. Toothlessness is the affliction that ultimately proves to be the movie’s Achilles heel. The movie begins and ends on the same note, which is that the ultra-wealthy are parasites that feast on the world and spit the bits out as soon as the flavor dissipates.
How to Make a Killing is the story of Beckett Redfellow (Powell), way down the pecking order of inheritance for the Redfellow’s billions of dollars. Beckett’s mother was ostracized from the family when she turned up pregnant, and forced to live, gulp, a “regular” life. In a cruel twist, Beckett is quickly rendered parentless and ends up bouncing around foster homes until he’s old enough to strike out on his own. What the film tells us early on is that Beckett sits seventh in the inheritance hierarchy and decides he’s going to speed up the process by knocking off the people in front of him.
The premise gives the film an easy, episodic structure. Naturally, some of these episodes are more amusing than others. Writer-director John Patton Ford banks on viewers’ natural animosity toward billionaires to do the heavy lifting, because the script largely leaves the Redfellows as one-note characters. So the success of each episode boils down to how obnoxious the Redfellows can be and how creative their deaths can be. Your mileage, as they say, may vary. Zach Woods and Topher Grace deliver the film’s best scenes with their time in the spotlight. Woods plays Cousin Noah, a pompous artist who genuinely seems to hate everybody despite always surrounding himself with people. Grace plays Cousin Steven, a pastor who could’ve easily been the head of a rival church on The Righteous Gemstones.
The exception is Uncle Warren (Bill Camp). Beaten down by life and regret, Warren extends an olive branch to Beckett, offering him a finance job he is spectacularly unqualified for. Whatever pathos and emotional depth How to Make a Killing achieves is a direct result of Camp’s work. He’s worth singling out because the script often makes its points in broad ways, but Camp brings a subtlety that is desperately needed. Most of the satirical jabs the movie lands are superficial, so having someone deliver something a bit meatier stands out.
I’ve probably gone too far into this review without getting to the Glen Powell-ness of the movie, another headlining role meant to solidify his status as a go-to leading man. As with most of his performances, he’s an affable presence. There’s a brashness to Beckett that Powell works for audience sympathy until Ford eventually weaponizes it for a finger-in-the-eye finale that feels off-target. Powell’s charm is of the breezy variety, and at its best we get his work in Twisters, Top Gun: Maverick, and Hit Man. How To Make a Killing needs a performance with more edge, more menace to it. Even if it’s billionaires, we’re still watching people getting murdered for laughs. There should be more darkness, there should be some bite to the punchlines. There should be…more than what How to Make a Killing has to offer. Similar to his prior film, Emily the Criminal (just imagine Aubrey Plaza as the lead here, we’d be cooking with gas), Ford is tackling interesting themes, but it feels like punches are being pulled along the way. Both films have their moments, but mostly they are just good enough to make you wish they were better.
Where the movie really stumbles is with Julia (Margaret Qualley) and Ruth (Jessica Henwick). Ruth is the nominal love interest, but mostly she’s there to show Beckett that it is possible to love someone for non-monetary reasons. She has to say this because the character is toothpick thin and undercooked on the page and this is the kind of movie that spoon feeds the audience. Henwick hits a few nice notes, but the script hangs her out to dry more often than not. That’s small potatoes compared to what Qualley is settled with. Beckett meets Julia as a kid, and she reappears in his life as an adult. Julia proves to be a lackluster femme fatale and more of a plot device who shows up periodically to guide Beckett, and the film, to the next plot point. It’s a disappointing turn for Qualley, who has proven herself to be a versatile and game performer. It’s a shame the role isn’t stronger.
How to Make a Killing comes off as a movie that wants to be of the moment, but it doesn’t have the gumption to really get its hands dirty. It picks easy targets and makes its points gently. The ending hints at a cynicism that would’ve played better had it been a main component of the film instead of being used for a gotcha! punchline. It plays like a movie born on third base that has to strain to cross home plate.
