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Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie review: Daniel Craig film is rip-roaringly good time

Name: Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery
Released: 2025-12-12T13:46:28+05:30

Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie review: Rian Johnson goes full gothic, combining it with a closed door murder, and the result is wonderful, keeping you glued to the screen all the way through.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Written by: Shubhra Gupta

4 min readDec 12, 2025 01:46 PM IST

Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery review

Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie review: The film stars Daniel Craig in the lead ole.

Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie review: Benoit Blanc is back, and this time it’s with a proper bang, after last outing’s disappointing thud. Fancy yachts and self-obsessed billionaires made for a very dull sleuthing turn indeed. For this third go round, Johnson goes full gothic, combining it with a closed door murder, and the result is wonderful: I was glued to the screen all the way through.

You wouldn’t really call Jud (Josh O’ Connor) a failed priest, but he’s done something in the past which he shouldn’t have , and now he has to atone for his sins by going off to a small parish in upstate New York run by the commanding monsignor Jefferson (Josh Brolin) who keeps his small flock tightly leashed, helped by the devout Martha (Glenn Close) who, like the others, seems to be in his thrall.

Also read | Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery trailer: Daniel Craig solves an ‘perfectly impossible crime’ as he invokes Scooby Doo in another whodunit

It wouldn’t be an Agatha Christie-inspired whodunit if it weren’t a murder most impossible. Jud’s arrival stirs up several hornets in several nests, setting into motion events which lead to the murder of a key character.

What makes this closed-door murder mystery such a cracker is in the way Johnson, also the writer on the film, draws parallels with the world outside this seemingly closed-knit community with its ever-widening cracks which Jud’s warm ministrations split wide open. It also touches, lightly, upon questions of faith and belief, elements which make the film richer.

Watch Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie trailer here:

The A-list ensemble is clearly having a blast. Andrew Scott, fresh off Ripley and All Of Us Strangers, plays the town’s best-selling author. Jeremy Renner is the dodgy doctor. Kerry Washington is the twisted-out-of-shape lawyer. Cailee Spaeny is the movement-impaired cellist. Daryl McCormack is a camera-wielding influencer who keeps turning up where he is surplus. They are all bound by some unlovely covenant: could it be that the braying-from-the-pulpit monsignor is standing in for the guy running the country, who wants total control over all he surveys?

A tiny bit of silliness creeps in, but that’s dispensed with quickly enough, without, thankfully, any of the stodginess that beset the previous edition of the franchise. The performances are all top-notch, with O’Connor turning in one of those beautifully-judged acts which makes you want to start believing again in the goodness of humans.

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Another dead body turns up, as does the lovely Mila Kunis as a dogged cop chasing down clues and red herrings, strewn here and there. And the end is a most satisfactory closing-of-the-loops in which past sins catch up with present sinners, and everyone has a rip-roaringly good time.

Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery
Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie cast: Daniel Craig, Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Mila Kunis, Josh Brolin, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott
Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie director: Rian Johnson
Wake Up Dead Man A Knives Out Mystery movie rating: 3.5 stars

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