Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery and all the images you see in this review are owned by Netflix
Directed by Rian Johnson
The thing about the Knives Out series is that you never seem to get what you wanted going into it, and yet it still manages to come around to being a great movie. The first one revealed its mystery fairly early on but managed to have enough twists and turns to keep you guessing until the end, and while its sequel was a bit messier with an oddly underwhelming denouement for its own mystery, it’s a well-made Whodunit that worked even better for me on a second viewing. Rian Johnson is definitely doing something interesting with these Benoit Blanc mysteries, but can this latest entry in the series be yet another masterful take on the classic genre, or have the gimmicks gotten staler than the corpses Blanc is sent to investigate? Let’s find out!!
In a sleepy rural town somewhere in upstate New York, a young priest has been transferred in after an altercation with a deacon and is now under the watchful eye of Monsignor Wicks (Josh Brolin); an ornery man with a childish sense of humor and a teenage view on the world. His fire and brimstone sermons are a hit with his core fan base which includes the local church lady Martha (Glenn Close), the town doctor (Jeremy Renner), a conspiracy writer (Andrew Scott), a disabled violinist looking for a cure (Cailee Spaeny), and a mother and son who don’t get along (Kerry Washington and Daryl McCormack), but to the newly arrived Father Jed (Josh O’Connor), they seem to be alienating these people rather than helping the community. Still, at least it leaves the suspect count low when the Monsignor dies during the Good Friday service and Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) is called in to investigate. All suspicions seem to land on poor Father Jed as he’s the only one who was not a fan of the Monsignor, and as evidence mounts against him, it’s up to Blanc to cut through the hysteria and histrionics to find the truth. Who is truly responsible for the death of Monsignor Wicks, and will the investigation uncover unsavory truths about him and this community? Can Blanc and Jed get along despite coming from such vastly different worlds, and what will this case reveal within both of them that neither wishes to face head on? Maybe the secret Jed wishes to hide is that he’s really good at playing Bad Cop when they start interviewing suspects.
For a series that could have easily been a Bond style franchise that hits the same notes over and over again, Johnson has been eager to take risks with each one of these Knives Out movies, with this being no exception. In this latest entry he has made his most inscrutable Whodunit to date, and like with Glass Onion, I might need a bit more time to marinate on it before I can fully appreciate what he’s going for here. I certainly think it comes off a bit better than Glass Onion’s first impressions, but Johnson’s ambitions with the genre can sometimes make it difficult to keep up, and I guess to some extent I’d prefer a more traditional yet exceptionally polished entry in the series rather than another deconstruction. Say what you will about the Branagh Peoriot series, especially the second one, there’s a certain value in knowing what lane you’re in from the outset and aren’t changing gears with every movie.
If you want a mystery film, there’s certainly one to be found here, but it’s almost on sufferance, which is obvious right away as Blanc doesn’t even show up until nearly an hour into the movie. There are clues to be found and twists and turns to reveal, but the broad strokes aren’t too hard to piece together early on; especially when the impossible crime in question has at least half a dozen very well-known solutions to anyone who’s watched a serialized mystery show. What this truly is, or at least what comes across as the true point of Johnson’s script, is a meditation on society filtered through a traditional religious lens, using the staples of a murder mystery as more of an agitating force than the thrust of the narrative. To that end, the religious commentary is rather well done and bolstered by a fantastic performance from Josh O’Connor as the hapless priest Jud. I don’t know what Johnson’s spiritual background is, but he does seem to be working through a bit here with Jud’s character and the trials he endures within this cynical world. There are scenes with him and Blanc simply conversing that are some of the most fascinating I’ve seen all year; making you forget that you were here to see a mystery with how well-crafted the dialogue and performances are. Despite declaring Jed to be the Watson to his Holmes, it’s actually the opposite as Blanc is the one standing off to the side and commenting on the protagonist’s actions which are what truly drives the plot and, in a certain sense, undercuts the entire mystery. This is Johnson’s other big idea, which is to sit down and interrogate the Whodunit genre from an ethical point of view. It’s an interesting angle, to say the least, but I think it overreaches a tad and ends up sucking a lot of oxygen out of the second half. After all, once the curtain has been pulled back, it’s hard to continue going through the motions, and he pulls this trick when there’s still quite a lot left to be uncovered. That said, a second viewing, one where I’m fully cognizant of this plot point coming up, may leave it with a better taste in my mouth, much in the same way the undercutting of the mystery in Glass Onion took a second viewing to appreciate.
What I think can be said without giving the film a second pass is that the film feels a bit clunky and broad, and while it’s not appreciably longer than the other two movies, the pacing does feel much more languid this time around. The lack of Blanc in the first hour may have been more forgivable if the story outside of him was spellbinding, but aside from the core three characters at the church played by Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, and Josh Brolin, the supporting case is not particularly compelling with several of the actors feeling wasted in little more than bit parts. We just don’t spend enough time with the key players for their stories and performances to feel meaningful outside a few key scenes and how they directly interact with Jed, and Johnson’s commentary about modern politics and religion leaves them feeling too much like caricatures for Jed and Blanc to react to rather than interact with. This is why I feel Johnson overreached a bit in trying to subvert the genre because he left several good tools on the table that would have bolstered the drama and made for a more compelling mystery. Blanc in the first one sat down and talked with almost every member of the family, which helped to flesh out those characters. IN here, he’s just tagging along and barely talks to anyone outside of Jed and the police chief. It almost feels like Johnson wanted to make a different movie and stuck Blanc in there as a way to make it more marketable, and while the movie he did make is fascinating to see, it does feel at odds with itself in ways that doesn’t feel intended.
Whether or not you like this movie is not going to depend on Benoit Blanc; which is weird to say for something that is ostensibly another of his sequels. More so than any of the other Knives Out movies, it will depend on the rest of the cast and the thematic elements at the heart of it, as the Whodunit and master detective are more of a framing device than an integral part of the story. Blanc does add a lot to Jed’s story, but this is about the preacher, the town, and the tension between them rather than another detective story. On its own terms, it’s a great little movie with some strong writing that’s spread a little too thin, but still has enough depth for it to stay in your mind long after it’s over. I suppose that makes it another success for the Knives Out franchise, but Johnson seems to be straining under the weight of his own creation, and I can’t even fathom where he will want to take the series next. If Blanc has to coach a little league team to win the regional championships, well, I would just have to assume that Johnson would find a way to make it work.
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