In a few days, a few theaters will have what we might call \u201cKnives Out 3\u201d from Rian Johnson.<\/p>\n
But \u201cWake Up Dead Man\u201d isn\u2019t titled as a \u201cKnives Out\u201d movie the way \u201cGlass Onion\u201d was. It may so in the ads, but on the title cards at the beginning and the end there\u2019s no mention of the original movie that started this series.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not surprised. The original \u201cKnives Out\u201d oozed charm and cleverness. The second, \u201cGlass Onion,\u201d had too many celebrities and not enough story. It was if someone said, Here\u2019s a huge budget, waste it as you wish.<\/p>\n
Now comes \u201cWake Up, Dead Man,\u201d which I see on Rotten Tomatoes almost every blogger has liked a lot. I wish I could count myself in that group. But despite Glenn Close giving an acting class, the movie feels like a long episode of \u201cGrantchester,\u201d the PBS imported English series in which a young priest goes around solving crimes. (And that show was almost non sectarian compared to this.)<\/p>\n
In this case, the priest is played by John O\u2019Connor as Father Jud Duplenticy, a former boxer who killed someone long ago. His last name feels like it\u2019s supposed to mean \u201cDuplicity,\u201d I think. After he clocks someone at his own church, Jud is sent to a small upstate New York village, assigned to one with few parishioners left and a cult like Monsignor named Wicks (Josh Brolin) who is so resentful he keeps confessing pleasuring himself to Jud..<\/p>\n
Immediately Jud realizes the Monsignor is dangerous and crazy but armed with a group of eccentrics in his midst. Monsignor has an ardent employee played by Glenn Close as if she were Mrs. Danvers from \u201cRebecca.\u201d You know she\u2019s up to no good immediately. There\u2019s also a cast of loosely connected churchgoers that includes Kerry Washington, Jeremy Renner, and Andrew Scott (so much better in this season\u2019s \u201cBlue Moon\u201d). Geoffrey Wright is the wise local bishop. Milas Kunis is the cute village sheriff, sort of filling the Ana de Armas role from the first film.<\/p>\n
After a murder occurs, Daniel Craig arrives on the scene as the trim and dandy private detective Benoit Blanc, speaking in his magnolia-dripping Southern accent. Unlike in the other films, little background about him is given. As we know Blanc has a reputation as a case solver extraordinaire. He\u2019s a famous mystery author. But little by little, in each movie, he\u2019s become less interesting. In \u201cWake Up,\u201d he\u2019s actually plays second fiddle to O\u2019Connor\u2019s Jud, and it\u2019s really weird.<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, the murder must be solved, and everyone is a suspect \u2014 sort of. But director-writer Rian Johnson has made a very talky film that relies on O\u2019Connor in almost every scene. He\u2019s also invested \u201cWake Up\u201d with a lot of Christian theology to the point where many in the audience may feel like they\u2019ve walked into a faith based film. There are a lot of deadly boring philosophical diatribes that could have been replaced with more interaction among the parishioners. (They barely seem to know each other.)<\/p>\n
Indeed, with O\u2019Connor giving dimply smiles and flirting with everyone, the movie feels like a set up for a series of \u201cFather Jud Mysteries\u201d rather than Benoit Blanc adventures. It\u2019s not until late in the film when Blanc suddenly takes the reins of the film in hand and sets out to identify the killer. If you\u2019ve waited, this is the payoff. But in almost every beat leading up that, Blanc is sidelined, mostly by Jud. <\/p>\n
Of course, there are some jokes\u2013 not a lot. The humor comes from a lot of wink wink. In this episode there are plenty of little Easter eggs and asides, references to Oprah\u2019s book club and \u201cStar Wars.\u201d Kunis, who is Jewish in real life, gets to say \u201coy vey\u201d at one point, ha ha. As they say these days, If you know, you know.<\/p>\n
Many of the stars have little do to but look mysterious. Their characters are rushed and underdeveloped. Kerry Washington could have so much more. She lights up the screen. Thomas Haden Church as a small role, so does Caelee Spaeny. Bridget Everett\u2019s Louise is a total non sequitir, only there to show that Jud is a sympathetic priest. A lot of the story is strapped to the back of Daryl McCormack, the least well known of the group.<\/p>\n
The joys of the first \u201cKnives Out\u201d may never be resurrected. The casting was perfect, and the characters were drawn sharply. Christopher Plummer\u2019s patriarch may not have been sympathetic but at least he was the central motivating reason for the film\u2019s plot. Brolin\u2019s Monsignor, however, is just awful. I kind of wished every suspect had killed him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWake Up, Dead Man\u201d will play in a very limited run for a week or so before heading to Netflix, where it belongs. I think the Netflix folks know that. They\u2019ve got bigger fish to fry with \u201cFrankenstein\u201d and \u201cJay Kelly.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a few days, a few theaters will have what we might call \u201cKnives Out 3\u201d from Rian…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":308915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[88,206],"class_list":{"0":"post-308914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-movies"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/308915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}