Cast: Glen Powell, Margaret Qualley, Ed Harris, Jessica Henwick, Bill Camp, Zach Woods, Topher Grace
Genre: Comedy , Thriller
Director: John Patton Ford
In Irish Cinemas: 11th March 2026
There’s something deliciously wicked about a film that leans fully into its own moral rot, and How to Make a Killing does so with a grin that’s equal parts charming and sinister. The premise alone is pure pitch-black comedy. Becket Redfellow, played with roguish swagger by Glen Powell, was cast out of his obscenely wealthy clan the moment he arrived in the world. Yet thanks to an inconvenient tangle of inheritance and tax law, the family never quite managed to remove him from the line of succession. Decades later, that technicality presents him with one final opportunity: if every other Redfellow happens to die before he does, the fortune becomes his.
The film frames Becket’s story as a confessional, delivered to a priest in the hours before his scheduled execution. From that death-row vantage point, he retraces the steps that led him there, an increasingly bloody trail involving opportunistic schemes, inconvenient relatives, and the competing influences of two women who represent entirely different futures for him. One is his childhood confidante turned decadent co-conspirator, played with icy relish by Margaret Qualley. The other is a more grounded romantic interest, brought to life with gentle sincerity by Jessica Henwick, whose presence hints at a life Becket might have chosen if he were wired differently.
There’s a particular pleasure in watching a black comedy that refuses to soften its cynicism, and the film’s satire is aimed squarely at the grotesque excess of the ultra-wealthy. In an age where staggering fortunes coexist with widening inequality, the film’s gleeful dismantling of aristocratic privilege lands with a sting. Becket’s murderous climb toward the family fortune is hardly framed as noble—but the film understands the audience might find the spectacle oddly satisfying. Each carefully orchestrated “accident” carries a whiff of social revenge, turning the Redfellow dynasty into a parade of grotesque caricatures ripe for the chopping block.
Structurally, opening with Becket already awaiting execution might seem like an odd gamble. After all, revealing his ultimate fate risks draining the story of suspense. Yet the film places enormous trust in Powell’s screen presence, and that gamble largely pays off. His narration, equal parts smug confession and mischievous storytelling, becomes the engine that drives the film forward. Powell imbues Becket with the breezy confidence of someone who knows he’s the cleverest man in the room, even when the evidence suggests otherwise. It’s an infectious performance that pulls the audience into his warped perspective.
Despite knowing how the tale ends, the film slyly manipulates our loyalties. Becket is, on paper, indefensible, yet Powell’s charm makes it difficult not to root for him at least a little. The screenplay keeps things lively with sudden reversals and narrative feints as Becket recounts the twists that led to his imprisonment. Just when it seems the story has settled into a rhythm, another revelation arrives to complicate the picture.
The women orbiting Becket provide the film’s moral tug-of-war. Qualley relishes her role as a languid socialite with dangerous instincts, playing her character with the smoky allure of a classic noir temptress. There’s a hint of old Hollywood femme fatale energy about her, as if a character from Double Indemnity had wandered into a modern satire of the idle rich like Saltburn. Henwick, by contrast, represents a quieter, more sincere alternative, someone who embodies the possibility of a contented life beyond obscene wealth. Crucially, she avoids turning that option into a dull or overly sentimental one, giving the role warmth without slipping into cliché.
The film’s DNA clearly traces back to the mordant British classic Kind Hearts and Coronets, which also followed a man who eliminated relatives to climb the aristocratic ladder. Here, however, the story is transplanted into the gaudy ecosystem of modern billionaire culture. The result is a brisk, biting satire that delights in skewering privilege while maintaining a playful sense of mischief.
It’s not entirely flawless. The pacing stumbles slightly in the latter stretch, and the film occasionally threatens to run out of steam before the finish line. But even when the momentum dips, the combination of sharp writing, a game ensemble cast, and Powell’s charismatic turn keeps things entertaining.
Dark, cheeky, and just a little bit wicked, How to Make a Killing may not reinvent the black comedy, but it certainly understands the pleasures of the form. And sometimes, watching the rich eat each other is exactly the kind of cinematic therapy the moment calls for.
Overall: 6.5/10
Movie Reviewer
