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'The Usual Suspects' is a 1995 American neo-noir film written by Christopher McQuarrie and directed by Bryan Singer. The film follows the interrogation of Roger "Verbal" Kint (Kevin Spacey), a small-time con man who is one of the only survivors of a massacre and massive fire that have just taken place on a ship docked at the Port of Los Angeles. He tells his interrogator, U.S. Customs Agent David Kujan (Chazz Palminteri), a convoluted story about events that lead him and four other high-profile criminals to the boat, and of a mysterious mob-boss known as "Keyser Söze" who commissioned their work. Using flashback and narration, Kint's story becomes increasingly complex as he tries to explain why he and his partners-in-crime were on the boat.
The film, shot on a $6 million budget, originally began as a title taken from a column in Spy magazine called "The Usual Suspects," after one of Claude Rains's most memorable lines in Casablanca. Singer thought that it would be a good title for a film, the poster for which he and McQuarrie had developed as the first visual idea.
The Usual Suspects was shown out of competition at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival, and then initially released in few theaters. It received favorable reviews, and was eventually given a wider release. McQuarrie won an Academy Award for the screenplay and Spacey won the Best Supporting Actor award for his performance.
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