Wake Up Dead Man
Director: Rian Johnson
Writer: Rian Johnson
Sequel to: Knives Out, Glass Onion
Cast: Daniel Craig, Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack, Thomas Haden Church, Jeffrey Wright, Noah Segan, Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Seen on: 13.12.2025

Plot:
After becoming a little uncomfortable for his higher-ups, yound and idealistic Reverend Jud Duplenticy (Josh O’Connor) is sent to a small parish that has been long in the hand of Monsigneur Jefferson Wicks (Josh Brolin). Wicks has his core of faithfuls, but his congregation has been dwindling, and maybe Jud can bring some fresh wind. But Wicks’ welcome to Jud is harsh, his way of doing things even harsher. And then he is murdered in a seemingly impossible way. When Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) arrives to investigate, he quickly enlists Jud’s help to solve the case.

Wake Up Dead Man continues the strong track record of the Benoit Blanc movies so far with a film that tackles religion in many ways, but more importantly matters such as forgiveness and grace, all while being very entertaining.

My relationship with religion has always been fraught. I never belonged to any organized religious group and when I approached any chruch with curiosity (especially in my teens), the experiences were alienating, or even downright hostile. Nowadays I’d say that I am an atheist who has learned to appreciate what religion can do for other people, and is wary how toxic it often is. Plus, spending most of my life in Austria, I have gotten a healthy dose of catholic socialization because there is simply no escape here.

I write all this down because I want to underscore how right the film felt to me with its approach to religion. On the one hand, there is the contrast it draws up between the fire-and-brimstone catholicism that Wicks preaches and the social worker approach that Jud takes, the latter being the perfect embodiment of why we also call priests “Seelsorger” in German – literally “soul carers”. If all priests were like Jud (and the institution of the Catholic church therefore impossibly as corrupt as it is), I’d be pretty happy to belong to this church. On the other hand, there was the contrast between Jud and Blanc, the latter a staunch atheist who has no interest in religion but is critical of the institution, mirroring my own take on things in many ways. But the beautiful thing was that Blanc can appreciate Jud’s work, and vice versa, and it never is about who is right about religion. The question of whether there is a god or not never comes up. It just isn’t important. What is important is how we choose to spend our lives right here and now, for whatever reason. It’s just lovely.

Now, the film gives us all these layers, but it is not a philosophical treatise. It is funnier than expected, with Daniel Craig obviously relishing Blanc’s ridiculous accent and other pecularities, but always ready to get back to serious ground. The film plays with a classic crime story trope – the perfect murder. The cast brings their A-game, no matter how small their parts, with Andrew Scott as the MAGA courting liberal particularly great in a repulsive way. But Josh O’Connor is the one who keeps this film on earth, emotionally speaking. His Jud is the one we go along with much more than Blanc, and he nails every emotional moment.

I really had a great time with this film in any case – and I am not even a great crime fan. I can only imagine that if you do like crime movies and/or have lived much more closely to Catholicism than I ever did, the movie must be even better. No matter where you stand with religion though, it is worth seeing.

Summarizing: excellent.