Knox Goes Away (aka A Killer's Memory) - Review

Rating: 4 out of 5

MICHAEL Keaton's second film as director is a smart hitman thriller that deserves to linger long in the memory, even if it may ultimately be a hard one to find.

Having debuted at the Toronto Film Festival, the movie enjoyed a limited theatrical release (I don't think it even got one in the UK) before ending up on streaming, where it changed its name from the appealing Knox Goes Away to the far more mundane, A Killer's Memory.

But those who check it out will be in for a great surprise. This is a dark, twisting, emotionally complex thriller, anchored by a typically nuanced performance from Keaton himself, and populated by brilliant supporting characters (Al Pacino as a comrade in arms, Marcia Gay Harden as an ex).

It's also slickly directed without anything approaching overkill. Keaton treats his viewers as grown-ups, refusing to spoon-feed them, and enabling them to put in the work that, ultimately, yields such satisfying rewards.

The story finds Keaton playing a contract killer named John Knox, who is diagnosed early on with Creutzfeldt-Jacob, a dementia-style neurodegenerative disorder, for which there is no cure, and which spreads rapidly. His doctor gives him weeks, rather than months, before his mind is completely gone.

Racing against this clock, Knox attempts to put his affairs in order and clean up the mess from a recent job gone wrong, only to suddenly be faced with the re-emergence of his estranged son (James Marsden), who turns up at his doorstep to reveal that he has killed a man and needs help with the clean-up. The victim in question was a 32-year-old predator, who had groomed and seduced his 16-year-old daughter, leaving her pregnant.

Knox attempts to do what is asked but must also wrestle with a rapidly diminishing mental capacity, as well as a dogged police detective (Suzy Nakamura), who relishes getting one over her male colleagues and the criminals she pursues.

If the idea of yet another hitman-in-peril thriller sounds overly familiar, then don't let that put you off. Done right (a la Richard Linklater's Hitman, or David Fincher's The Killer), this remains a genre that offers plenty of potential for invention and creativity.

Add to that another first-class performance from Keaton (to rival his work in the likes of Spotlight, Worth and Birdman), and you have the perfect ingredients for a really complex and emotionally engaging drama, given additional boost from Gregory Poirier's taut, yet often amusing script.

Memory, of course, plays a huge part in proceedings - with Keaton's faltering one becoming its own kind of weapon in many ways. Is he using what is happening to his advantage? Or is it making him unusually error-prone? Certainly, Keaton invests his central character with an intelligence that makes the loss of his mental capacity all the more tragic, while adding greater doubt around the characters that circle around him.

Can anyone be trusted not to betray him, for example? Pacino's wily friend certainly hints as much, continually reminding him that he is also a criminal.

It's a device that ensures the audience remains on their toes throughout, while also offering room to explore notions of time, legacy and responsibility. Keaton certainly wears the look of a haunted man, who realises that his own time is rapidly coming to an end - but not in a way that he has any control over.

If some of the supporting plays don't feel quite as fleshed out, individually, then this is probably also a deliberate choice from Keaton, as filmmaker, allowing things to unfold a lot from Knox's confused perspective. We're with him, figuring things out on this one. But that doesn't mean the director doesn't allow his cast room to perform.

Nakamura, in particular, makes a strong impression as the detective on his trail and, arguably, walks off with most of the movie's best lines, while Pacino gets to indulge some eccentricities in his character that make the scenes between him and Keaton highly enjoyable. 

Keaton's direction also keeps things tightly knit, so that his 'reveals' feel as clever as intended. It means that Knox Goes Away works on many levels, while offering undoubted rewards. It's a sly, ingenious movie in many ways, vaguely comparable with the high-class likes of The Killer and Memento for the way in which it keeps viewers invested until the very end, while inviting repeat viewings to see things coming together from a different perspective.

For Keaton, this has to rate as another high (both in front of and behind the camera) in a career that is already full of them.