Movie: Wake Up Dead Man; A Knives Out Mystery (2025) Caution Spoiler Alert

 

Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery

Came out; 2025

Time; 2 hours 24 Minutes

Watched: Netflix

Rated: PG-13 for violent content, bloody images, strong language, some crude sexual material and smoking

IMDB Rating; 7.5/10

Rotten Tomatoes:

Tomato Meter 92%

Popcorn Meter 94%

Caution; Spoiler Alert

Staring;

Daniel Craig as Benoit Blanc

Josh O'Connor as FR. Jud Duplenticy

Glenn Close as Martha Delacroix

Josh Brolin as Mons. Jefferson Wicks

Mila Kunis as Chief Geraldine Scott

Jeremy Renner as Dr. Nat Sharp

Kerry Washington as Vera Draven, ESQ

Andrew Scott as Lee Ross

Daryl McCormack as Cy Draven

Cailee Spaeny as Simone Vivane

Thomas Haden Church as Samson Holt

Jeffrey Wright as BP Langstrom

Story Line;

Benoit Blanc returns for his most dangerous case yet

Thoughts:

I knew they were coming out with another one, but I had no idea it was out. We turned on Netflix to watch something, and this was the top movie.

Having loved the first two we immediately turned this one on

This was creepy, funny and kept you guessing.

I'm not religious but loved the undertones of this

CAUTION; Spoiler Alert

Jud Duplenticy, a former boxer turned Catholic priest in upstate New York, is reassigned after punching a rude deacon. He is made assistant pastor of Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude, a rural parish led by Monsignor Jefferson Wicks. Wicks is the grandson of Reverend Prentice Wicks, who forced Jefferson's mother, Grace, to remain at the church with the promise of receiving his inheritance, only for the fortune to disappear after his death; Grace ransacked the church and destroyed its crucifix, which the younger Wicks refuses to replace. Jud comes into conflict with Wicks over his incendiary preaching, which has driven away all but his most loyal parishioners. During a Good Friday service, Wicks dies suddenly in a storage closet near the pulpit, stabbed in the back with a knife fashioned from a devil's head lamp adornment that Jud previously stole from a bar and threw through a church window. Though the evidence is inconclusive, suspicion falls on Jud.

Police chief Geraldine Scott summons private detective Benoit Blanc to investigate the death. He recruits Jud to assist him despite Geraldine's objections, assured of his innocence. After Wicks' burial in Prentice's mausoleum, Jud and Blanc question the congregation, learning Wicks had abruptly disavowed his followers at a meeting just before his death. Failed politician Cy Draven reveals that Wicks allegedly found Prentice's fortune and was planning to use it to pursue a career in politics with Cy, who he had learned was his illegitimate son. Jud drops out of the investigation, tired of Blanc's singular focus on the murder and the mystery of the fortune, choosing instead to focus on his ministry.

While returning to his rectory at night, Jud appears to witness Wicks exit the mausoleum and embrace groundskeeper Samson. He is knocked out pursuing them and wakes up next to Samson's corpse. Blanc stops Jud from turning himself in, having noticed a second devil's-head adornment missing from the bar, stolen by town doctor and Wicks follower Nat Sharp. Blanc and Jud go to Nat's house and find his corpse dissolving in a tub of acid alongside Wicks' body. The following morning, the police and the congregation convene in the church for Jud's confession, only for Blanc to explain how Nat killed Wicks: he spiked Wicks' private flask with tranquilizer and attached the second adornment to his vestment to fool Jud, covertly switching it out and stabbing Wicks whilst pretending to examine the body. Midway through his summation, however, Blanc has an epiphany and abruptly declares he cannot explain Wicks' resurrection, and the congregation leaves.

Before Geraldine can arrest Jud, Martha—the church's longtime secretary—reenters, ready to confess: Prentice killed himself by swallowing his fortune in the form of a valuable diamond, which Grace sought in her desperation to escape the church. Martha kept the secret of the diamond's existence until Jud challenged her to confess her deepest sin to Wicks, but she soon realized he was plotting to retrieve the diamond from Prentice's corpse after learning of its existence. To stop Wicks, she plotted his murder with Nat, persuaded Samson to be entombed in Wicks' place to retrieve the diamond, and had the two stage Wicks' resurrection to restore faith in the church while planning to destroy the diamond afterwards. Nat killed Samson to get the gem for himself, framing Jud in the process, but Martha tricked him into consuming a cup of coffee he had poisoned and intended for her. After revealing this, she collapses, having now taken the remainder of the poison, which Blanc had realized during his denouement, hiding his final deduction to allow her to come forward on her own. With her last breaths, she prays for forgiveness from all victims including, at Jud's urging, Grace. Jud performs absolution before she dies, and she drops the diamond.

One year later, Jud is about to reopen the church, now renamed Our Lady of Perpetual Grace. Most of the former parishioners have moved on with their lives, while a disgruntled Cy threatens to sue Jud, Blanc, and the church if the diamond is not returned, but they all proclaim ignorance. As new parishioners enter for Jud's first service, the diamond is seen hidden inside the church's new crucifix.