The 66th London Film Festival closed Sunday with a lively screening of Rian Johnson’s murder mystery sequel, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.
Johnson and the film’s A-list cast, including Benoit Blanc a.k.a Daniel Craig, were all in attendance and conducted a brief Q&A onstage following the premiere.
The screening opened, however, with an extended introduction from BFI CEO Ben Roberts, who paid tribute to outgoing BFI Festival director Tricia Tuttle who leaves the BFI after five years in charge of the London Film Festival and over a decade at the body overall.
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“I know I speak on behalf of all of us, you are just a fantastic colleague and a really amazing person,” Roberts said of Tuttle, who came onstage and was presented with a bouquet of flowers.
Throughout the screening, the London audience frequently broke out in applause at the film’s surprising cameos and shocking twists, which Johnson was keen to remind the festival audience to protect from people yet to see the film.
“We’re all cool, no spoilers,” he warned before the film started rolling.
During the Q&A, Johnson also had to prompt his actors not to spill any of the film’s twists as their answers were being recorded. Instead, they sidestepped specific plot points and discussed the film’s themes and the expanded scale of the Knives Out universe.
Unlike the first Knives Out film, which was wholly set in and around a New England mansion, Glass Onion is set in Greece and features a vast set of high-tech gadgets, expensive yachts, and a massive real-life piece of glass shaped like an onion.
“All of this started with my love of Agatha Christie and to do what she did with each one of her books, which is something totally different,” Johnson said.
“She wasn’t repeating herself every time. She was not only using new settings and characters but also new narratives, tones, and genres. So I want the audience to know moving forward that that’s what we’re gonna be doing with this.”
Later during the Q&A, Daniel Craig, who returns as the famed detective Benoit Blanc in the film, praised Johnson for creating the Knives Out universe and said he would gladly continue to work with the director.
“I’d work with him rest of my life,” Craig said.
The Q&A ended with Johnson heaping praise on Janelle Monáe, who plays a lead role in the film and is a crucial part of the film’s shocking twist.
“Without saying why, the degree of difficulty in this role, and the amount of work she put into every scene, I didn’t even appreciate until I put the whole movie together and watched it for the first time,” Johnson said of Monáe.
He added: “She’s just extraordinary.”
Glass Onion will be released globally on Netflix on December 23, following a theatrical release in select theaters from November 23-29.
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