How to Make a Killing info:
Director: John Patton Ford
Writer: John Patton Ford, Robert Hamer, and John Dighton
Starring: Glen Powell, Margaret Qualley, and Jessica Henwick
Intro
Hello and welcome to another week here at 1guysmindlessmoviereviews.com. I hope everyone is having a great start to May. Better weather, end of the school year, and we are getting really close to the summer movie season. Also, if you remember that I teased something new for 2026, I am getting close to announcing what that is. Maybe within a week or two, I will have some exciting news to share.
In the meantime, my wife and I watched a newer release this week. It was streaming already, for some reason, it didn’t last long in theaters. “How to Make a Killing” was released in February of this year, so it still qualifies as a new release in my book. But before I get too far, spoiler warning first. If you haven’t seen this yet and don’t want to know anything about it, go back to my homepage and see what other goodies I have to offer.
How to Make a Killing recap
“How to Make a Killing” starts off with a flashback of a young lady who is from a very wealthy family. She becomes pregnant and is told to leave the estate or not have the baby. She refuses, so she is ostracized from the family. Both she and the father end up passing away very early on, so Becket grows up in foster care and meets Julia along the way. Then we fast-forward to the present, where Becket (Powell) has a low-level job but seems happy with it.
All that changes when he runs into Julia (Qualley), and she mentions to him about being the heir to the Redfellow (his last name) fortune. At first, he’s not on board, but when he loses his job, he decides to take it seriously. He decides to start at the bottom of the family tree and goes after Taylor Redfellow (Raff Law) first. This first murder goes off extremely easily, and he is actually shocked at how well it went. He meets Taylor’s father, Warren (Bill Camp), at the funeral and strikes up a conversation that leads to a job and closer access to the family.
The next kill isn’t as easy, but he still sets it up perfectly as he has grown close to both Noah (Zach Woods) and his girlfriend Ruth (Henwick). Once Noah is gone, he and Ruth grow closer and end up living together as a couple. As he starts to go higher up the tree, it brings us to Pastor Steven (Topher Grace) and his very short scene before he gets poisoned and dies.
The next part of “How to Make a Killing” flies by pretty quickly as he is able to knock them out one by one. But then he gets to a place where he is happy and has a great life. This makes him change his mind because he genuinely likes Warren. Unfortunately, fate took over, and Warren died of a heart attack anyway. That would leave only Whitelaw (Ed Harris) left. He blows off his engagement party with Ruth to visit his grandfather.
When Whitelaw tries to kill him, he fights back and ends up the final Redfellow anyway. But once again, fate steps in, and he is arrested for the murder of Julia’s husband. It seems like she had set him up all in hopes of getting his fortune. In a slightly twisted ending, she gets him out of prison, and they go home together after Ruth leaves him.
My thoughts on How to Make a Killing
Director John Patton Ford really took us for a ride on this one. We know he is in prison to start the film, and we are led to believe it’s for killing his family. By the end, we do learn that it’s for a murder we didn’t even know about, so that was fun. Once again, Powell scores another leading role as he continues to be absolutely everywhere. Honestly, Qualley isn’t far behind at this point either, with everything she’s been in lately.
“How to Make a Killing” was a fun story, but the execution wasn’t smooth along the way. There was a ton of setup (which I’m aware was needed), but it then took away from too much later. I really enjoyed how he stumbled upon the first murder almost by accident and then was very careful at planning the next two. He did his research, and we got to see him work his magic to make them look like accidents.
Then, they sped through the next few like wildfire without hardly any backstory or introduction to the characters themselves. I would have liked to see a little bit more of his family… and definitely more of Grace’s Pastor Steven. What’s another 15 minutes added to a movie? It was under two anyway. What I did like was that he sort of turned over a new leaf and was content with where he was, then fate changed it all with the death of poor Warren.
The characters we did see were fun onscreen, and I would have loved to see some family gathering at some point with them all being together. That could have been some great scenes. But, alas, Becket killed them all too fast. Powell, Qualley, and Henwick were all very good together (well, two of them technically weren’t onscreen at the same time).
Overall, this is a fun movie with a slight twist at the end that made it surprising. But, parts of it also felt rushed (murder scenes) while other parts lingered on too long (prison scene with the priest). In the end, it’s decent enough for a decent grade, and I give it a 7 out of 10.
Watch or wait?
Sometimes you don’t have a choice in life. This is one of those times. You can’t watch it in theaters anymore, so you are reduced to checking out via rental on streaming right now. Perhaps if you wait a little longer, it will appear on your service of choice, and you can watch it at no additional cost.
Alright, that’s it for me this week. But now it’s your turn… have you seen “How to Make a Killing” yet? If so, what are your thoughts? Did you enjoy as much as I did, but wished they spent a little more time on character development? Let me know in the comments, and I will be back with another mindless movie review of some sort next week.
