SXSW Review: MOST LIKELY TO MURDER: A Noir Comedy For The Holidays

More so than a coming-home-for-holiday story, Dan Gregor’s riveting feature debut, Most Likely to Murder, is a story about an asshole. Specifically, it is a story about an asshole learning that he is an asshole. And that, by far, is why I loved it the most.

Intersecting with washed-up, midlife crisis stories, the coming-home-for-holiday narrative has developed a boring formula. It can work fantastically when it’s just the scene, like in Frances Ha or The Incredible Jessica James, but stretched to the whole movie, it can falter. Gregor breaks this frustrating mold by giving us an absurd situation and a completely unsympathetic “hero”.

Seamlessly embodied by Adam Pally, Billy could not be more pathetic. We open on his deadbeat, degrading job, cleaning the bathroom of a club in Las Vegas. As he goes through the various disgusting tasks of the night, we hear him in voiceover leaving a voicemail for his ex, Kara, whom he expects to meet soon at Thanksgiving. In typical movie asshole fashion, he crafts a hilariously inaccurate narrative of his life, making it sound like he literally runs the club he cleans up every night. But soon after Billy goes home for Thanksgiving, Gregor makes sure to let us know quite quickly that he’s not exactly worthy of our sympathy.

Washed Up

Through conversations with his only remaining friend and old classmates, it doesn’t take long before we see him through the latter’s eyes: the popular high school bully who’s yet to get over what a big deal he was like a decade ago. We gradually side more and more with Billy’s haters as he makes it clear that he has no real intention of changing. He pursues Kara (Rachel Bloom, excellent as always) relentlessly, only stopping after she screams at him to leave her alone. He continues to be insensitive to everyone around him, especially his childhood neighbor Lowell, who he suspects is a murderer.

Eventually, it becomes increasingly clear that Billy’s only real reason for hating Lowell is his inability to comprehend that the scrawny kid he used to pick on is now much more loved and successful than he ever was. Billy is shocked to learn that everyone adores Lowell. As a pharmacist, he’s taken care of what seems like the whole town. Everyone has a story about how Lowell helped either them or their family. But the worst blow to Billy’s ego comes when he learns that Kara might be with Lowell. It’s no secret to anyone but Billy that his obsession with proving Lowell a murderer is a direct result of his obsession with getting Kara back and, in turn, restoring his sense of past glory. There’s a slick scene where it almost seems like he’s about to get what he wants, but even that is taken away from him. And he deserves it.

Once an Asshole

This might make Most Likely to Murder come across as a frustrating film: why stick around with such a terrible person? For starters, Billy is thoroughly entertaining. Gregor mines his every mishap for laughs, while never dismissing the problematic implications of his actions. Everyone knows that Billy is an asshole, except Billy. More importantly, Billy actually begins to understand why everyone sees him that way as we get closer to the surprisingly touching end. His arc isn’t one of redemption so much as it is of reckoning. He learns the hard way, which he deserves.

Though the unhinged performances, particularly those of Pally, John Reynolds and Doug Mand, do much of the work here, Gregor and co-writer Mand breathe comic life into what could’ve easily been a forgettable New York suburban town. There’s familiarity and tension between Billy and every other character. His best friend’s sister seems to flirt with him, much to his confusion. He gets called out for his anti-Lowell behavior at the annual “Jews vs. Goys” football game. Reynolds’ Perkins pressures him to confirm or deny the rumor that Billy has a sex tape that involves Perkins’ wife. Beyond the humor, this wealth of details grounds us in the dysfunction of Billy’s hometown, making those around him feel that much more relatable just as he is spiraling downwards.

Most Likely To Murder: Conclusion

Most Likely to Murder may not reinvent the wheel of holiday films, but its subversion of the genre, especially its willingness to fully indict and satirize its own protagonist, gives us ample reason to invest interest in the future of Gregor’s filmography. The man knows his way around the humor inherent in small-town life as well as murder mysteries. Here’s wishing him a long and prosperous genre-bending career.

What’s your favorite kind of holiday film? 

Most Likely to Murder premiered at South by Southwest. It has not been announced when it will be released.