WAKE UP DEAD MAN: A KNIVES OUT MYSTERY
This is how you do it.
After the thundering disappointment of 'The Thursday Murder Club,' Netflix has produced a second 'Knives Out' sequel and it's an absolute belter.
The third feature in Rian Johnson's murder mystery franchise, Daniel Craig's flamboyant Louisiana sleuth Benoit Blanc is back investigating the murder of a rogue Catholic priest in upstate New York.
Josh O'Connor plays Father Jud Duplenticy, a former boxer who is dispatched to Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude by Jeffrey Wright's Bishop Langstrom.
There he finds Josh Brolin's Monsignor Jefferson Wicks, a domineering prelate with a cult like following who uses his homilies as a bully pulpit to rail against the world and shame would-be parishioners.
Among his devoted followers are Glenn Close's Martha Delacroix, a devout churchgoer who helps run the parish and her lover, Thomas Haden Church's groundskeeper Sansom Holt.
Andrew Scott's successful sci-fi author Lee Ross, Kerry Washington's uptight lawyer Vera Draven, her adoptive son Daryl McCormack's failed politician turned social media influencer Cy Draven, Jeremy Renner's alcoholic local doctor Nat Sharp and Cailee Spaeney's wheelchair confined professional cellist Simone Viviane also make up the faithful.
While they lap up Monsignor Wickes' message of division and hate, Father Jud tries to win them over with a more accommodating and compassionate vision of Christianity.
However his efforts fall on deaf ears and he is treated by Monsignor Wickes as a cuckoo.
When Wickes is murdered during Mass after delivering a typical blood and thunder homily, the finger of suspicion is immediately pointed at Father Jud.
However with Benoit Blanc engaged by Mila Kunis' local police chief Geraldine Scott to help solve a murder that isn't as it seems, old parish secrets are resurrected that suggest the motives are anything but simple.
Written and directed by Johnson, 'Wake Up Dead Man' is wonderfully frothy.
It has a ridiculous plot and it knows it but its director, cast and crew simply enjoy the ride.
Craig, as ever, delivers a vivacious performance as the film's gay crime solving genius who respects Father Jud's ministry while declaring himself a heretic.
O'Connor is also superb as the young priest who finds himself being framed and begins to doubt his own sanity as he is ostracised by a community moulded by a demagogue.
Close has a whale of a time as Monsignor Wickes' most fervent follower, while Brolin relishes playing a charismatic but loathsome priest with more than a passing resemblance to Steve Bannon.
Scott, Washington, Haden Church, Spaeney, Kunis, Renner, McCormack and Wright all contribute to a murder mystery that recaptures the sheer joy of the first 'Knives Out' mystery while not quite eclipsing it.
There's no doubt it also outguns the first star studded 'Knives Out' sequel, 'The Glass Onion' and a lot of that is down to its nod and a wink performances.
This is best exemplified in a very amusing quip that Scott gets to deliver at the expense of Netflix.
As ridiculous as the film's plot is, Johnson somehow manages to also conjure up a smart tale that skewers the warped Christianity of the American religious right and their cult like devotion to those who cloak themselves in faith but preach hatred.
'Wake Up Dead Man's is a mischievous murder mystery for the second coming of MAGA.
But it also comes at a time when MAGA's followers are questioning the politicians they put their faith in.
However its genius lies on the way Johnson delivers the film's punches while distracting its audience with tongue and cheek frippery.
Kudos should also be given to cinematographer Steve Yedlin, costumer designer Jenny Eagan, production designer Rick Heinrichs and editor Bob Ducsay who deliver a handsome film that doesn't overstay its welcome despite a running time in excess of two hours.
Forget the poor imitators, Benoit Blanc and his 'Knives Out' mysteries remain a cut above the rest.
Johnson and Craig have pulled off another gem of a movie.
May they continue to delight us with at least one more star studded adventure
('Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery' was released on UK and Irish cinemas on November 26, 2025 and made available for streaming on Netflix on December 12, 2025)
THE LIFE OF CHUCK
It's easy to see why Mike Flanagan's 'The Life of Chuck' could divide audiences.
Adapted for the screen by its director from a Stephen King novella, it's a quirky, occasionally sombre story of life, love and death that thumbs its nose at Hollywood convention.
A three act story told in reverse, it won the People's Choice at the 2024 Toronto Film Festival but it still took an age to get a cinema release probably because those tasked with marketing it struggled with how to pitch it.
While it has a narrator courtesy of Nick Offerman, who introduces key characters in each section of the film, the movie is hard to pin down and label as belonging to a particular genre.
The first act of Flanagan's movie centres on Chiwetel Ejiofor's middle school teacher Marty Anderson and his ex-wife, Karen Gillan's nurse Felicia Gordon as the world heads towards oblivion.
The Internet has collapsed, huge chunks of California have fallen into the sea, wildfires have engulfed parts of America, other parts of the world have been submerged by floods and governments have toppled.
Sinkholes in the town have made Marty and Felicia's commutes to work more gruelling, time consuming and complex to navigate.
Amid all the chaos, posters, billboards, radio and TV ads appear and slogans are daubed on walls celebrating Tom Hiddleston's accountant Chuck Krantz, thanking him for 39 great years.
Felicia, Martin and other characters like Carl Lumbly's elderly mortician Sam Yarborough and Marty's neighbour, Matthew Lillard's Gus Wilfong struggle to find an explanation why the world is breaking down and they definitely don't know who Chuck is and why he is being celebrated.
When we do eventually see Chuck, it's in the film's middle act which focuses on Taylor Gordon's Juilliard drop out Taylor Franck encountering him while pounding a beat on her drum kit as she busks on a street corner.
Shocked to see Hiddleston's sharp suited businessman suddenly break into a dance on the street, the two of them gather a crowd of spectators which grows as he grabs an impromptu dance partner in the form of Annalise Basso's stranger Janice Holliday.
Janice, we discover, has recently ended a long term relationship and it's to Flanagan's credit that he avoids the obvious temptation to turn their magical dance into the spark that lights a Hollywood style chocolate box romance.
The final section of the film focuses on the forces that shaped Chuck's life during his childhood.
Orphaned after his parents are killed in a car crash, we see his seven year old self played by Cody Flanagan, 11 year old self played by Benjamin Pajak and 17 year old self played by Jacob Tremblay coming to terms with family loss, navigating first love and developing his passion for dance.
Raised by his paternal grandparents, Mia Sara's Sarah Krantz and Mark Hamill's accountant Albie, Chuck is aware of his grandfather's struggle with his parents' deaths and his subsequent dependency on alcohol.
While Albie struggles, Sarah instills in him his passion for dance which her husband discourages when she dies.
Eleven year old Chuck develops a crush on Trinity Bliss's older and taller fellow pupil Cat McCoy who becomes his dance partner in school but who has a boyfriend.
Once again, the film resists temptation and presents this merely as an episode in Chuck's life - not the beginning of a magical love affair that will blossom through the decades like Jenny and Forrest Gump.
What we're watching, of course, is Flanagan and King's deconstruction of an ordinary man's life and the forces that influenced it.
We see what shaped him and how it might have taken a very different direction.
But it's also a film that very much accepts its audience will bring their own experiences of life, love and loss to screenings and project them onto the characters.
Not everyone who sees Flanagan's film may be prepared to go where it takes them but there is no doubt 'The Life of Chuck' is certainly a unique and brave cinematic experiment.
Flanagan, who memorably directed the movie of another King tale 'The Shining' sequel 'Doctor Sleep,' skilfully avoids his adaptation becoming twee or consumed by sentimentality.
While there's a bit of a Spielbergian 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' feel to the first act, there's also a creeping 'War of the Worlds' sense of doom that creates a disorientating air of mystery.
There are shades too at various stages of Damien Chazelle's 'Whiplash' and 'La La Land,' Robert Zemeckis' 'Forrest Gump,' Jeunet and Caro's 'Amelie' and Frank Capra's 'It's A Wonderful Life'.
Flanagan is too smart, though, to simply regurgitate sequences from those films.
Instead he weaves them into a beguiling plot that is original, dreamlike and definitely unconventional.
While it's probably a bit too morose on occasions to really win over multiplex audiences, 'The Life of Chuck' is beautifully shot by Eben Bolter and is well paced, thanks to Flanagan's disciplined editing.
In fact, it's so intriguing, it may well have you scurrying back for at least one more viewing.
Like Frank Darabont's adaptation of another King novella 'The Shawshank Redemption,' the film thrives on the strength of its cast - most notably Ejiofor, Gillan, Lumbly, Lillard, Sara, Hamill, Pajak, Tremblay and especially Hiddleston whose dancing skills will surprise and delight audiences just as much as Ryan Gosling's in 'La La Land'.
And while the movie doesn't quite hit the heights of Darabont's beloved film, it's still possible to see how Flanagan's feature could develop a cult following in years to come despite its rather tepid performance at the box office.
Hopefully 'The Life of Chuck' will find the audience it deserves on streaming platforms because it's certainly worth ten 'Lilo and Stich'es, twenty 'Jurassic Park: Rebirth's and twenty five 'Jay Kelly's.
If it does find a fanbase, hopefully they will demand to see it where it really belongs - on a cinema screen instead of a smartpad or smart TV.
('The Life of Chuck' was released in UK and Ireland on August 20, 2025 and was made available on streaming services on 2025)
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