The Usual Suspects by Christopher McQuarrie

he Usual Suspects by Christopher McQuarrie

The Usual Suspects (Bryan Singer, 1995) was written by Christopher

McQuarrie and shot on a low budget $6 million (estimated) for such a

successful film grossing over $51 million worldwide.

The storyline is a crime mystery thriller the genre has a set of

conventions, they create a high level of anticipation, uncertainty,

mystery and nerve-wracking tension. They also help the audience

understand the film more easily and know what to expect from it. It

also helps make sure that the audience will enjoy the violence,

suspense and mystery the film contains having seen similar films in

the past. The manipulation of the audience through plot twists and

misinformation creates confusion and even more suspense.

The Usual Suspects was aimed at a mature audience of both genders but

aimed mostly towards men due to the high amount of violence in it.

The mostly unknown cast (at the time) was headed by Gabriel Byrne,

Chaz Pullminterri and Kevin Spacey. The unusual cast helps to add to

the air of mystery of the film.

Verbal (Spacey) a crippled conman mostly tells the story in flashbacks

and third person narration as Kujan (Pullminterri) interrogates him.

Verbal the antihero being pulled through a series of events that seem

beyond his control. Kujan the hard-nosed detective, trying to get to

the bottom of the events. Both are very typical characters to the

conventions of the genre and help the audience to understand what is

going on in the film and what to expect from it. The other main

character is Keaton (Bryne) an ex-corrupt cop trying to go straight

drawn between the new life he is tryi...

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...ke Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs) help build up

the suspense and mystery the audience wants. Although it would be

difficult to apply a cause-and-effect model to the film (due to the

unreliability of Verbals testimony), it by and large conforms to it.

The initial meeting leading to the jobs the group go on and then the

anticlimactic resolution that Verbal is probably Keyser Soze. From

the way Kujan finds out just to late to do anything about what he

knows to the clichéd characters and the lack of answers until right at

the end of the film the conventions are what the audience expects from

a film of this genre and all add to the enjoyment and they also

reinforce our recognition of the genre. They also help us understand

that things will not always be as they seem and we wont know the story

proper until the very end.