While there\u2019s still a battle ongoing with Paramount to take over Warner Bros.<\/a>, we\u2019re staring down the barrel of a future where Netflix controls essentially everything you watch besides Real Housewives. My attempt to find a silver lining in something so seemingly dystopian: at least sometimes they make something that\u2019s actually good. <\/p>\n Case in point is the release of Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery<\/a>, the third in the Knives Out franchise and one of the most entertaining movies I\u2019ve seen this year. It may clock in at over two-and-a-half hours, a heinous crime against humanity according to the Film Running-Time Tribunal that includes me and myself. But, allergic as I am to such an egregious thing, I was so rapt and tickled by it that I took my antihistamine and gleefully trudged along. <\/p>\n Daniel Craig is back doing his Foghorn Leghorn drag as detective Benoit Blanc, who doesn\u2019t just talk, but somehow also walks and dresses with a Southern drawl. That the Knives Out movies haven\u2019t exactly reinvented the wheel is part of the appeal: They\u2019re versions of an Agatha Christie-style whodunnit but with characters who use iPhones. The structure has a cozy familiarity, settling you in so you can pay closer attention to the characters\u2019 quirky curiosities and the kaleidoscope of clues.<\/p>\n In Wake Up Dead Man (titled infuriatingly without a proper comma), a murder (duh) happens in a church (ooooohhh). One of the church\u2019s priests and several of its congregants, who have a cult-like devotion to its monsigneur, are all suspects. Enter Craig\u2019s Benoit Blanc, twirling his mustache and solving the crime. (Sure, the character has more of a fuzzy beard than a mustache. But he definitely has mustache energy.)<\/p>\n Rather, enter Craig\u2019s Benoit Blanc\u2026eventually. The entire first act unfolds before Blanc arrives, with Josh O\u2019Connor\u2019s Father Jud Duplenticity<\/a> introducing the eccentric members of the church where he\u2019s just been assigned. <\/p>\n There\u2019s Josh Brolin\u2019s sacrilegiously brash Monsigneur Wicks, Glenn Close as his devout and devoted church assistant Martha, Andrew Scott as a doofy sci-fi author with writer\u2019s block, Jeremy Renner as a depressed alcoholic, Kerry Washington and Darryl McCormack\u2019s listless mother and adopted son, and Cailee Spaeny\u2019s wallowing, disabled concert cellist. <\/p>\n Apologies to James Bond, but this is O\u2019Connor\u2019s movie. It is a quintessential movie star performance\u2014even though we\u2019ll all be watching it on our TVs and our phones. He\u2019s magnetic, alternately desperate, earnest, and combustible, and so naturally, easily funny. <\/p>\n Glenn Close is giving my favorite performance of hers in over a decade. That\u2019s not a slight to her recent work; that\u2019s just how enjoyable she is in this. And look out for Bridgett Everett to arrive like a wrecking ball for a one-scene performance that will knock your socks off, and is essentially the heart of the movie. <\/p>\n The mystery of what to watch this weekend? That\u2019s one case that\u2019s closed. <\/p>\n George Clooney, Good Actor. Who Knew?<\/p>\n Speaking of Netflix offering up good things once in a while, I\u2019m a big fan of Jay Kelly<\/a>.<\/p>\n The movie\u2019s not for everybody<\/a>. It\u2019s very sentimental, at times almost aggressively corny, and absolutely emotionally manipulative. That means it is, in fact, very much for me. <\/p>\n George Clooney plays a movie star named Jay Kelly who is, well, George Clooney-level famous. He\u2019s going through an existential crisis, looking back at all he accomplished and wondering if it was worth all that it cost in his personal life to achieve it: fractured relationships with his family, no friends who aren\u2019t on his payroll, and a startling inability to decipher between performing as \u201cJay Kelly, Movie Star\u201d and living as Jay Kelly, himself.<\/p>\n There are great performances in the film; if Adam Sandler gets his first Oscar nod for this, I wouldn\u2019t be mad, and Billy Crudup stuns in a handful of scenes. But it only works because of Clooney. No other actor could be convincing as a fictional star of the magnitude that Jay Kelly is, and no actor could manage to elicit sympathy for the character\u2019s woe-is-me pity party. <\/p>\n Jay Kelly is a surprise for cinema lovers\u2014and not always a good one\u2014considering it was co-written and directed by Noah Baumbach, known for films like Marriage Story and The Squid and the Whale. <\/p>\n Typically, Baumbach\u2019s movies are so prickly they\u2019re basically cinematic cactuses. They\u2019re so bitter they might as well be the movie versions of a grapefruit. (I was so proud of myself for coming up with both of those comparisons that instead of just including one like a good writer\/sane person, I included both.) Jay Kelly, in contrast, is nakedly earnest. <\/p>\n It\u2019s not everyone\u2019s cup of tea. But I\u2019m sipping with gusto.<\/p>\n My Favorite TV Performance Right Now<\/p>\n Every year, it seems like there\u2019s a new comedy series that quietly premieres awkwardly in a middle-of-nowhere section of the typical TV season. I discover them, essentially, by accident, but they\u2019re typically a delight!<\/p>\n That\u2019s what happened with Stumble, the NBC sitcom that has aired a handful of episodes and is now the series I most look forward to watching each week. It\u2019s basically Abbott Elementary meets Bad News Bears, a mockumentary comedy about a small-town college gymnastics team with ambition to beat their elite, snobby rival at a major competition.<\/p>\n Jenn Lyon plays the coach, a no-nonsense, yet endearingly maternal Texas spitfire. Lyon is a reliable scene-stealer. Her guest turns on English Teacher should win Emmys, and she was the heart and soul of the nail-salon-mafia drama series Claws. (Seriously, everyone should watch Claws. Did you read that description?) It\u2019s a treat to see her in a leading role, and she totally sticks the landing. That\u2019s gymnastics speak, right? <\/p>\n There\u2019s No Greater Hell Than AI Mickey Mouse<\/p>\n I used ChatGPT for the first time last night, and I got into a fight with it within seven minutes. So suffice it to say that I don\u2019t feel fully equipped, and certainly not excited, to embrace this future of AI all the time, everywhere. <\/p>\n Disney\u2019s investing in Chat GPT-maker<\/a> Open AI and licensing its iconic characters for its use is a grim development in the once-complicated conversation of how much should or will Hollywood embrace AI. The answer now is, apparently: fully. <\/p>\n Disney, Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars: all those characters are up for grabs for whatever demented thing people want to make with them. Sure, the potential for making kids\u2019 birthday party invites or something is cute. But there\u2019s also opportunity for people to make their own movies using these characters, which seems not, like, great for the creative community. <\/p>\n That\u2019s not to mention what twisted things people will come up with to do with them that I don\u2019t dare even think of. Protect Lilo at all costs!<\/p>\n Sounds Like a Real Grinch of a Film Shoot You are not prepared for how wild the film shoot was for the Jim Carrey live-action How the Grinch Stole Christmas, as detailed in a great oral history on Vulture<\/a>. Torture coach? The CIA?? Seal Team 6???<\/p>\n More From The Daily Beast\u2019s Obsessed<\/p>\n Meet the new Netflix holiday movie hunk. He\u2019s French! Read more<\/a>.<\/p>\n The secrets behind the wildest children\u2019s movie of the year. Read more<\/a>.<\/p>\n June Squibb is 96 (!!!) and giving the best performance on Broadway. Read more<\/a>.<\/p>\n What to Watch This Week: <\/p>\n Oy to the World: Hallmark made a Hanukkah movie and, yes, that\u2019s really its title<\/a>. (Sun. on Hallmark)<\/p>\n Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery: A total delight<\/a> despite its endless running time. (Now on Netflix)<\/p>\n Resurrection: There\u2019s a 30-minute sequence in this that is the coolest thing of the year<\/a>. (Now in theaters)<\/p>\n What to Skip This Week: <\/p>\n![\"Josh](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/DVSNOJTXIJGY3MAMCCCIG72TZA.jpg\")
Josh Brolin, Daryl McCormack, Glenn Close, Cailee Spaeny, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, and Jeremy Renner John Wilson\/Netflix <\/p>\n![\"Kerry](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/L4NOXCARY5B5XJFWIUUJC2SRPU.jpg\")
Kerry Washington and Glenn Close Netflix <\/p>\n![\"George](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/UISURUTIVBFZLNWCUAVXLRXNWU.jpg\")
George Clooney Netflix <\/p>\n![\"Adam](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/7BA35QDECZGBFAV52FDY2HUPQ4.jpg\")
Adam Sandler and George Clooney Netflix <\/p>\n![\"Jenn](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/JRF3CO35BFDPFKMMDU2GYA2FLI.jpg\")
Jenn Lyon in ‘Stumble’ NBC\/Danielle Mathias\/NBC <\/p>\n![\"MIckey](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/TMDLGIHMXRFJHN2IPUQ64GDL5A.gif\")
Mickey Mouse Giphy <\/p>\n![\"Jim](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Z6NUUHFN5NBJNFPM4E7JC353TM.gif\")
Jim Carrey in ‘How the Grinch Stole Christmas’ Universal Pictures <\/p>\n