See How They Run

by Julian Spivey

Director: Tom George
Starring: Sam Rockwell, Saoirse Ronan & Adrien Brody 
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 1 hour & 38 minutes

“See How They Run,” directed by Tom George from a Mark Chappell screenplay, is a fun little whodunnit that pokes fun at the genre of whodunnits. Ultimately, it’s the poking fun aspect that comes off more satisfying than the crime story itself.

The film opens in 1953 in London with the celebration of the 100th performance of Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap in the theater. American film director Leo Kopernick (a delightfully sleazy Adrien Brody), who’s also serving as the film’s narrator, is wanting to direct the film version of the popular play and feels he can make the story better too, which immediately sets him at odds with the playwright Mervyn Cocker-Norris (David Oyelowo). Kopernick gets into a slugfest with the play’s star Richard Attenborough (Harris Dickinson) after making a pass at his wife and co-star Sheila Sim (Pearl Chanda) at the after-party. The next thing you know Kopernick, who might be the film’s most interesting character, has shown up dead on the set of The Mousetrap, with his tongue cut out.

Luckily for us filmgoers, Kopernick will be seen in flashbacks, including one of the film’s best scenes where he’s describing the ridiculous changes he’d like to make to the play in its film version.
Constable Stalker (Saoirse Ronan) is the first authority on the scene, but most wait for the lead detective Inspector Stoppard (Sam Rockwell) before really getting into the whodunnits of it all.

Ronan is delightful, as is frequently the case, as Stalker, a wet-behind-the-ears constable with high aspirations of going up in the job, but her greenery shows multiple times throughout the story when she jumps too soon to conclusions.

Rockwell plays Stoppard as a drunken, disheveled and depressed detective (is there any other kind in these stories). Despite the cliché, I still found it to be a likable performance, probably because Rockwell is a likable performer.

When “See How They Run” is at its best is when it’s playfully punching at the cliches of the whodunnit genre, like the aforementioned scene with Kopernick making changes to the story for the film, which I can’t go into depth on for fear of spoiling.

The unfortunate part of “See How They Run” is the eventual realization of the who in the whodunnit is not all that interesting, but it is propped up a bit with all the poking fun of what’s going on, especially a perfect needle drop of Hank Williams’ “I Saw the Light” at the end.

“See How They Run” makes for a fun, breezy watch – even if its 98-minute runtime can still somewhat drag – mostly because of the performances by Rockwell, Ronan and Brody. I don’t see anyone needing a repeat viewing of the film, especially when there are recent absolute modern classics within the genre like “Knives Out” out there for the taking.