{"id":208420,"date":"2025-09-07T19:59:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-07T19:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/208420\/"},"modified":"2025-09-07T19:59:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-07T19:59:09","slug":"knives-out-sequel-wake-up-dead-man-makes-raucous-debut-at-tiff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/208420\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Knives Out’ sequel ‘Wake Up Dead Man’ makes raucous debut at TIFF"},"content":{"rendered":"

TORONTO (AP) \u2014 For the third time, the knives were out at the Toronto International Film Festival.<\/a><\/p>\n

Rian Johnson on Saturday night premiered the third movie in his whodunit series, \u201cWake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery.\u201d Like the previous two movies, \u201cKnives Out\u201d<\/a> and \u201cGlass Onion,\u201d<\/a> Johnson brought a cavalcade of stars to Toronto\u2019s Princess of Wales Theatre for what was easily the hottest ticket of the festival.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is my favorite place to be in the world,\u201d said Johnson, recalling the similar TIFF first weekend premieres of his first two mysteries. <\/p>\n

\u201cWake Up, Dead Man\u201d is arguably Johnson\u2019s darkest, most intricate and most star-studded \u201cKnives Out\u201d mystery yet. It includes plenty of the quips that have characterized the first two movies (there are \u201cStar Wars\u201d and \u201cScooby Doo\u201d references), but the film is also more ambitiously existential. <\/p>\n

Daniel Craig\u2019s Benoit Blanc returns for a murder case involving a local church, with themes of truth, lies and grace threaded throughout. Josh O\u2019Connor stars a young priest named Jud Duplenticy, with Josh Brolin as the Monsignor and Glenn Close as a devout parishioner. The cast also includes Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Daryl McCormack, Andrew Scott, Kerry Washington, Thomas Haden Church and Cailee Spaeny.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first one was kind of a cozy, Agatha Christie family mystery. The second one was a big blow-out vacation mystery. And with this third one, we\u2019re going back to the roots of the genre,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cAnd the roots of genre actually lie in Edgar Allan Poe. A little gothic. We\u2019re going to go by way of Poe into some John Dickson Carr. We\u2019re going to veer into some G.K. Chesterton with the Father Brown mysteries. And we\u2019re going to go back to church.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the screening, the cast spoke about their joy at being inducted into Johnson\u2019s \u201cKnives Out\u201d ensembles. Renner said it was \u201clike winning the lottery.\u201d Washington compared it to an all-star team. <\/p>\n

\u201cPutting this many stars into one film is literally like herding cats,\u201d said a beaming Craig. <\/p>\n

After the first \u201cKnives Out\u201d was released in 2019 by Lionsgate, grossing $312 million worldwide, Netflix scooped up the sequels in a $400 million package.<\/p>\n

Though Netflix has prioritized its streaming platform over theatrical, it gave \u201cGlass Onion: Knives Out 2\u201d a run in 696 theaters in 2022, including the biggest chains AMC, Regal and Cinemark. Though much smaller than a traditional theatrical opening (big productions typically launch in 3,000 to 4,000 theaters), the movie was estimated to gross $15 million in its first week.<\/p>\n

\u201cWake Up Dead Man\u201d will open in select theaters Nov. 26 for a two-week run before it begins streaming on Dec. 12. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO (AP) \u2014 For the third time, the knives were out at the Toronto International Film Festival. Rian…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":208421,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[38367,40690,114499,114500,67398,114498,114496,171,22016,114497,94679,114502,32743,59753,114495,72274,49626,53,20428,45980,114501,8790,85256,67,132,68,32405],"class_list":{"0":"post-208420","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-agatha-christie","9":"tag-andrew-scott","10":"tag-benoit-blanc","11":"tag-cailee-spaeny","12":"tag-daniel-craig","13":"tag-daryl-mccormack","14":"tag-edgar-allan-poe","15":"tag-entertainment","16":"tag-fairs-and-festivals","17":"tag-glenn-close","18":"tag-jeremy-renner","19":"tag-john-dickson-carr","20":"tag-josh-brolin","21":"tag-josh-oconnor","22":"tag-kerry-washington","23":"tag-mila-kunis","24":"tag-movie-premieres","25":"tag-movies","26":"tag-rian-johnson","27":"tag-royalty","28":"tag-thomas-haden-church","29":"tag-toronto","30":"tag-toronto-international-film-festival","31":"tag-united-states","32":"tag-unitedstates","33":"tag-us","34":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115164791669306464","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}