Murder Mystery 2 Review: A Low-Stakes Sequel Coasting On Charm

It's difficult to spend too much effort on criticizing "Murder Mystery 2," a film that is relatively low-energy and low-stakes, and gets by on the charm of its two lead performers so much that to take it to task for its laborious mystery is to work too hard. If you squint at it, it's not hard to see some notable similarities between "Murder Mystery 2" and other recent and also vastly better films. Here is the second movie in just two weeks to have an extended setpiece in and around Paris' Arc de Triomphe. (This is a good deal less violent than the events of "John Wick: Chapter 4".) And here is the second relatively major film released by Netflix in just a few months' time to feature a murder mystery on a very rich person's private island, where an obvious sore thumb of a guest is tasked with figuring out what's occurred. But that is where the exploits of Benoit Blanc in "Glass Onion" and Nick and Audrey Spitz in "Murder Mystery 2" end their comparisons. It's fitting, though, because the surface level is where this film operates, along with those notable comparisons.

If there is anything to truly laud about "Murder Mystery 2", it's that this film — directed by Jeremy Garelick and written by James Vanderbilt — knows how and when to get out. Netflix subscribers are no doubt aware that once the end credits kick in, you're all but routed back to the main menu by force; in this case, that moment will occur just 79 minutes after "Murder Mystery 2" begins. The brevity of this film (which clocks in at just under 90 minutes including those pesky end credits) is extremely notable, especially in the setup of this follow-up to the 2019 comedy. Nick and Audrey (Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston, respectively) are still married and living in New York, and have failed to parlay the success they found as a married couple in solving the events of the first "Murder Mystery" into their own private-detective agency. When their old friend the Maharajah (Adeel Akhtar) invites them to his private island for his wedding to the lovely Frenchwoman Claudette (Melanie Laurent), they're hopeful for lightning to strike twice. And strike it does, as both a murder and a kidnapping occur in fairly swift succession, leading Nick and Audrey to both solve the crime and clear their names, having been framed for the misdeeds.

Adam Sandler has made a seemingly long line of comedies that double as a vacation of sorts for him and his pals, and just like its predecessor, "Murder Mystery 2" does the same thing. In fact, the short length of this film seems to have come at the expense of a much longer setup. (The two or so minutes leading to Nick and Audrey arriving on the private island include hurried exposition by an offscreen narrator as well as blink-and-you'll-miss-them cameos by Tony Goldwyn and Annie Mumolo.) And yet, as rushed as this film is to get going with its married heroes in the middle of another series of fatal events, the film is turgidly paced. As quick as the film is, it doesn't always move quite so fast in spite of Nick and Audrey desperately trying and failing to avoid being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

The saving grace of "Murder Mystery 2" is that Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler have a renewed sense of charm, bouncing agreeably off each other as a married couple struggling to revive the unique magic they found in their first adventure. The plot details regarding who their characters actually are in the real world — she's an ex-hairdresser, and he's an ex-cop, which you surely remember well — are largely beside the point. The basic idea of Aniston and Sandler having a mildly henpecked union, having high-volume arguments that are partially shrugged off as just being how New Yorkers talk, comes to life with their chemistry. Though their banter is far from Nick and Nora Charles in "The Thin Man," there are enough good chuckles between how Aniston and Sandler play off each other to make the shouting tolerable. (There is quite a lot of it.)

The mystery itself almost seems superfluous. Aside from Akhtar and fellow returning cast member John Kani, there's a slew of potential suspects from a famed ex-soccer player with a long line of paramours (Enrique Arce) to a spurned ex (Jodie Turner-Smith) and even a shrewd fellow negotiator played by Mark Strong who seems superhumanly capable of showing Nick up and proving his worth to Audrey. Yet for as much head-scratching is done regarding who may or may not have killed and kidnaped whom, the eventual reveal manages to both feel pretty obvious (at least in terms of which cast member or cast members may be involved) and not terribly interested in being super-logical. 

But again, it is hard to imagine watching a movie like "Murder Mystery 2" with the same eagle eye that you may bring to the stories of Benoit Blanc. Vanderbilt — whose career includes not just the first "Murder Mystery" but also the brilliant David Fincher film "Zodiac" — recently co-wrote "Scream VI," another film with a mystery at its core that doesn't make a great deal of sense if you stop and think about it for more than a few seconds. Here, at least, the reasons why the murder is less compelling are because so many Happy Madison productions are laid-back and breezy. And "Murder Mystery 2" very much is both of those things, rarely rising above the comic level of chuckle-worthy. (The exception is a cameo from Jillian Bell, which is both very clever and delightfully unexpected.) "Murder Mystery 2" fits in well with the typical Netflix offerings: it's the type of film that you could mentally check out of for a few minutes without missing a great deal, and it's over before you know it. Like its predecessor and so many other Netflix films, "Murder Mystery 2" is fine and perfectly content with being just that.

/Film Rating: 6 out of 10