Three years after Glass Onion, and six since the original Knives Out, Daniel Craig has once again returned on screen to bless us with the silky southern tones of his murder solving character, Benoit Blanc. Set in a small rural Catholic parish, Wake Up Dead Man, the third instalment in the film series, was sure to turn heads as audiences waited to see what sort of depiction Netflix had planned for the Church, her priests, and her teachings.
For those entering the film with such anticipation, the first forty minutes, entirely absent of Craig’s character, will make for tough viewing. The back story, dominated by the overwhelming personality of the spiritually abusive parish priest and murder victim, Monsignor Jefferson Wicks, whose crusade against sinful liberal culture was fought by shaming his parishioners from the pulpit, was frustrating. It came off more like forced political jabs than well crafted character building. Furthermore, missing details, such as the priest not giving absolution after confessions, only underscored the sense that the film was set to join a long list of other out of touch Hollywood productions intent on making a mockery of the Church without the courtesy of simple research.
