A murder at a country manor kicks off the Agatha Christie play “The Mousetrap,” and a murder backstage after a London performance of said play kicks off the comedy whodunit “See How They Run.” It stars Sam Rockwell as a veteran and indolent police detective who is reluctantly paired with an overeager constable played by Saoirse Ronan.
Some background: “The Mousetrap” ran continuously from its London premiere in 1952 until 2020, a detail that tends to baffle many (why this play?) though I’m partial to its enduring appeal. The pandemic temporarily got in the way of things (as it did for every theater production) but the play reopened in 2021 and it is a marvel of longevity few anticipated. Consider this clause in its contract: No film adaptations are permitted until six months after the show has closed on the West End. Seeing as it’s never closed (COVID excepting), no movie has been made.
But who could have foreseen a decadeslong run? Certainly not the (mostly) fictional characters herein. What if there had been a movie in the works?
“See How They Run” begins on the night of the show’s 100th performance — we’re still in the early '50s — and Hollywood has come calling in the form of Adrien Brody’s crass movie director, who is unimpressed by the story as it transpires on stage. He has something splashier in mind and envisions “The Mousetrap’s” climax as one filled with car chases, guns and explosions. The joke is that his disdain for hoary mystery cliches isn’t all that different from his preference for tacky action cliches instead. Americans!
Nobody likes the guy — not the amusingly dramatic screenwriter played by David Oyelowo, nor the buttoned-up but compromised producer played by Reece Shearsmith. No one associated with the play seems particularly fond of him either.
That is why, when the director turns up dead, there’s no shortage of suspects. Inspector Stoppard (Rockwell) and Constable Stalker (Ronan) are on the case — if only Stoppard can keep himself awake (or out of the pub) and an enthusiastic Stalker can keep herself from jumping to the wrong conclusions.
Directed by Tom George from a screenplay by Mark Chappell, “See How They Run” is a throwback with a smirk. Or put more diplomatically: An old school whodunit reconceived as a farce. It’s self-referential (the characters end up snowed in at a country estate, just like in “The Mousetrap”) and simultaneously poking fun at the murder mystery form while also paying homage.
If only it were actually funny! Stoppard’s boss admonishes him to get his act together because the press is having a field day: “Fleet Street is all over this like hot jam on a Devonshire scone.” You need a speedy, don’t-look-back delivery to make that kind of line work, and that’s absent here. It’s emblematic of the film’s overall approach to comedy, which lacks pacing and animating energy. Ronan is fun — bright-eyed and smart and full of breathless enthusiasm — but the individual talents of the cast never gel into a cohesive idea of an ensemble.
Rockwell is especially ill-suited. British actors tend to have varying degrees of success playing Americans, but the reverse is rarely true. It’s not just about getting the accent right, but the nuances — of carriage and facial expressions and small interactions — that American actors often miss when playing a certain stripe of English character (Renee Zellweger probably came closest with the Bridget Jones films).
Murder mysteries fell out of fashion for a good long while, but there’s been a recent resurgence. These trends tend to be cyclical and I’m happy that there’s renewed interest. But the examples of late — from “Knives Out” to “The Afterparty” to “Only Murders in the Building” — are doing it with a wink. As if playing it straight would be too ... what? Embarrassing?
I’m not saying whodunits should be humorless. Far from it! But it’s as if all the reliable tropes, the twists and turns, are seen as passe and best mitigated with self-aware comedy skewering it all.
I’m not opposed to a jokey approach, so much as wondering why it’s become the default. Because it’s not the willingness to wink that makes whodunits so satisfying, but their careful architecture.
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'SEE HOW THEY RUN'
2 stars (out of 4)
MPAA rating: PG-13 (for some violence/bloody images and a sexual reference)
Running time: 1:38
How to watch: In theaters Friday
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