Latest ‘Knives Out’ Film a Return to Form

Josh O’Conner (left) and Daniel Craig in “Wake Up Dead Man”. Photo courtesy of Milwaukee Film.

We can anticipate the outcome and still enjoy the formula. This is one of the charms of the Knives Out films, an open variation on the “locked room” device of classic detective novels where every character in a class-conscious cast is a murder suspect and the sleuth will gather them at the end to unravel the clues.

Director-writer Rian Johnson, who also has credits in the sci-fi movie world, relishes reinventing this crime formula at each outing, happily echoing various great mystery writers down to the British-inspired use of dress and language. He churns out his screenplays at the last minute to incorporate changing methods in social media, thus allowing references to modern technology in the sort of church settings we attribute to British dramas.

The first Knives Out was inventive fun, the second was far less entertaining, but now comes the strengthened third, daring more variations than originally established. It uses Easter and a church called Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude to set loose outrageous plot gimmicks and sneaky probing of Catholic (and contemporary) morality.

The Good Friday setting is ironically forecast in the title: Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery.

British actor Daniel Craig, now escaped from playing James Bond, returns as private detective Benoit Blanc, whose cultivated tone and dapper manner are here meant to seem more backseat-uncertain. The script toys with the possibility that our narrator, a boxer-turned-Catholic priest sucked into this mix of suspicious people, is one of those untrustworthy narrators of modern literature. Or is he really a sincere priest who senses the devil afoot in his church and is truly more concerned with comforting his flock than dealing with the suspicions and gossipy tongues he attracts in the stabbing of his authoritative monsignor superior?

The narrator priest is neatly enacted by Josh O’Connor, who in looks and range could easily be the new James Bond. The authoritative monsignor is played full-throated by Josh Brolin as a Trumpster playing on the fears and clannishness of a coterie of parishioners, while insulting the rest of the flock to quit in anger.

Strong casting parades all the suspects before us – including Kerry Washington as a rich but shrewish lawyer, Jeremy Renner as a weepy doctor, Daryl McCormack as a grasping politician, and Glenn Close, both hilarious and frightening as the church lady who pops up everywhere, shrieks at will and is in effect the Frau Blucher of the piece (that was actress Cloris Leachman’s name and character in Young Frankenstein, which I swear Close is emulating).

You need the strong cast to keep the plot twists from seeming too apparent – and also to evoke the right moments of chuckle and dread. It also helps how director Johnson anticipates every script lag with a spooky moment of church ritual, shadowy crypts, creepy woods and bodies in chemical vats. There is a local sheriff (Mila Kunis, forgoing her glamour rep) with little to do but become exasperated at Blanc’s sleuthing techniques.

Incidentally, I am not painting the monsignor in the Trump vein from out of left field. Johnson is deliberately playing up the division in Catholic ministry to indirectly reflect on our present circumstances. In fact, the subtext undertones are the movie’s best feature.

As of this writing, Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery has largely finished its short run in movie houses and available on Netflix.

Dominique Paul Noth served for decades as film and drama critic, later senior editor for features at the Milwaukee Journal. You’ll find his blog here and here. For his Dom’s Snippets, an unusual family history and memoir, go to domnoth.substack.com