How Glass Onion uses masks to tell us about its characters
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery is the latest film in director Rian Johnson’s Agatha Christie inspired murder mystery series, and not only is this another delightful entry in the series but it also managed to do something that I haven’t seen in a movie yet to date.
Glass Onion takes place in May of 2020 at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown. Because of this choice, costume designer Jenny Eagan made the brilliant decision to not only incorporate masks in the costume design, but also utilize who is wearing them, what kind of mask they are wearing, and how the mask is being worn in order to communicate important details about each of the characters in this wild ensemble.
In the same way that a real person’s mask wearing habits during the Covid pandemic tell us a lot about them, the way the characters in Glass Onion wear (or don’t wear) masks provide a lot of insight into who they are.
There’s really only one scene in the movie where our characters are wearing masks. All of our characters are gathering together in Greece for a weekend retreat and murder mystery game, at the invitation of their mutual friend Miles Bron (played by Edward Norton). All the characters arrive one by one as the scene plays out, so let’s go ahead and break it down in order.
Benoit Blanc
Our charismatic protagonist, Benoit Blanc played by Daniel Craig, is wearing a fashionable mask that matches his outfit (of course) and fits his face well. This shows us that he has style, is detail oriented, and conscious.
Lionel Toussaint
The next to arrive is Lionel (played by Leslie Odom Jr.), the scientist of the group. Naturally, he knows that one of the best, and the most effective masks to wear is a KN95. Here he’s wearing a KN95 mask in the KN94 style, and he has it fitting tightly on his face. Since Glass Onion takes place in May 2020, this was before it was widely recommended in America to wear KN95s, so again he knows the science and the best mask to wear pretty early on in the pandemic.
It can be argued that Lionel’s beard is keeping the mask from having the tightest seal, and therefore showing us that even though he knows the science he chooses to ignore it when convenient. However, I also know many Covid cautious people would not have shaved their beard for the sake of a mask, especially so early on in the pandemic, so this could be interpreted either way.
Claire Debella
Claire (played by Kathryn Hahn) is wearing a mask that matches the rest of her beige attire, but it doesn’t fit right so she’s constantly pulling it up. Claire is a politician and is super aware of appearances and how she is supposed to come across, but can’t be bothered to come up with a sustainable solution to a problem. So, she keeps adjusting and pulling up her mask but doesn’t stop and take a few moments to adjust and make it fit correctly. This is especially funny because this mask does have adjustable straps so she COULD do it, she just chooses not to. I love this detail and think it’s great foreshadowing to how she handles Klear later on in the film.
Birdie Jay
Birdie (played by Kate Hudson), as the famous fashion designer and influencer, is naturally completely clueless about Covid and the severity of it, so her mask is purely for aesthetics. I love that this is literally just the infamous Lana del Rey mask.
Peg
Peg (Jessica Henwick), is Birdie’s assistant and as such she just follows Birdie and what she does. Peg doesn’t seem to be worried about Covid, probably because Birdie isn’t, since she’s not wearing a mask at the giant party earlier in the film. However, she is wearing one at the dock. Medical masks are a kind that you see everywhere and are commonly supplied to people that don’t have a mask on hand. I imagine that Birdie and Peg didn’t have masks on them and either at the airport or some other public place they were told to wear one and were given these. Birdie probably refused to wear it because she “already has one.”
Another interpretation is that Peg is seen as “disposable” by some of the other characters. She is also given a disposable red cup when the group is drinking later on which also ties into this theme.
Duke Cody and Whiskey
Duke (Dave Bautista) and Whiskey (Madelyn Cline) aren’t wearing masks because of course.
Andi Brand (spoilers ahead!)
When Andi (played by icon Janelle Monáe) first arrives, we see she isn’t wearing a mask, which upon first watch we might think this is telling us something about her character. However, once we find out that this is actually Andi’s twin sister Helen, we realize that this was likely Helen’s intentional choice to make sure the group could see her whole face and shock them. Because she is wearing a mask in two flashback scenes, and when she gets out of the car we do briefly see that she’s holding her mask in her hand.
However, while Helen’s not wearing a physical mask, she is still wearing a metaphorical one, as she is pretending to be her sister Andi.
I absolutely loved Glass Onion and I adore Jenny’s intentional costume design choices and using masks in such a creative way to provide an additional layer of storytelling.
For more Glass Onion analysis, I highly recommend you watch Rian Johnson breaking down this same arrival scene on YouTube. If you are looking for more film analysis, definitely read my previous blog breaking down the use of color motifs in Crimson Peak.
