The Kid Detective

Netflix has this filed under comedy. Netflix is wrong.

This is a dark drama with dark twists, and a good chunk of them you will not see coming. I mean that as the highest compliment I can pay a movie I sat down for expecting something light. It's haunting. Days later it was still sitting in my chest.

Netflix has this filed under comedy. Netflix is wrong.

Adam Brody drives the whole engine here. He's not just good, he's the reason the thing runs at all. Every scene works because he's holding it together, and his acting is flat-out stellar. I've watched him for years and I don't think I've seen him do anything close to this.

And then there's Kaitlyn Chalmers-Rizzato. Wicked newcomer. She does that thing the really good ones do where she can hand you an entire emotion with nothing but a look, no dialogue required. Keep an eye on her, because she's going to be good. I loved her in this.

Here's my honest caveat, and it's not a knock on the film: I wouldn't hand this to just anybody. If you're sitting down looking for the comedy the marketing promised you, you're going to feel like you got sold a bad ticket. This is for the people who want to be unsettled a little. Those people are going to love it as much as I did.

Would I watch it again? Maybe. Some of it is the kind of thing you only need once, and that's not a flaw either. It landed, it stuck, and I've thought about it more than movies I'd rate higher.

Go in knowing what it actually is, not what the streaming blurb says it is. Then let it get under your skin.