Michael Keaton is an actor who was somewhat of a comedian in the earliest years of his career. He did films like Mr. Mom, Johnny Dangerously, and Night Shift among others before getting the role of a lifetime as Bruce Wayne/Batman. He parlayed that into a long career in many more action films later on. Knox Goes Away isn’t quite an action film but it is another drama that he’s become used to at this point in his career.

John Knox (Michael Keaton) is a hitman who goes to a doctor’s appointment and finds out he has been diagnosed with dementia, and only has a matter of weeks to live, so he starts to get his life and affairs in order. When his son, Miles (James Marsden), comes back into his life after a long time this changes his plans. He decides to help his son and give himself one last chance at reconnecting with him after years of being estranged from each other. 

Keaton has had a bit of a renaissance lately with his villain turns in the Robocop remake, The Need For Speed, and his awards-worthy performances in Birdman and Spotlight. His performance in this film was a bit of a mixed bag. He gives a very nuanced performance. He is very subtle in a lot of what he is doing.  Considering he plays a hitman he doesn’t do a lot of action or many fight scenes. What he’s doing works for me though. This hitman has a series of boxes he has to check and he does just that in the end. The fact that he takes notes of things so he doesn’t forget Goes a long way to see what he’s trying to do. I liked this performance though. 

Keaton as a director has assembled a pretty good cast of supporting actors to fill out the rest of the cast. He probably called in some favors.  Ray McKinnon,  Al Pacino,  and Marcia Gay Harden all brought a sense of importance to their roles. With Keaton and Marsden being the main focus of the story the others worked well opposite them. They played key roles in the story. The chemistry between this cast was pretty good.  It seemed like they were pretty comfortable working together.

I’ve seen a lot of films about hitmen in my day. I haven’t quite seen one like this before though. Keaton tells this story with a lot of relevance to one’s aging and illness. He walks on eggshells with this subject matter. It doesn’t hit you over the head but it’s obvious that this debilitating disease has caused problems for him. As someone who is losing his memory, I could relate to this character. It’s not a fun experience to forget things you don’t want to forget. I have had to wrestle with that in recent years. It hasn’t been fun, to say the least. This character is well thought out in those regards.

Some subplots don’t get a lot of screen time but they aren’t the main focus of the film. The main focus is interesting and the main reason I cared about watching this film, and that’s Keaton’s journey throughout the movie. How he deals with his diagnosis and moves forward is what is the interesting part about this film and his character. These types of characters have been done before but none like this. The subtly is what makes him and it that much better.  I’m sure people will relate to it on various levels. I loved Keaton in this role and his direction.  Knox Goes Away won’t go away from me any time soon.

4 stars

Dan Skip Allen