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Notes -
Maybe I just missed it, but a little surprised to see no discussion of Knives Out, Wake up Dead Man on the forum given the culture war angles of the previous two (immigration, tech billionaires). Disclaimer - I haven't seen glass onion. I will avoid major spoilers but minor spoilers may be included. I wouldn't read if you haven't watched it yet and want to.
Wake Up Dead Man certainly seems to be set up to skewer the church, and conservatives, with characters including a sci-fi writer-> substack blogger who is paranoid of the "libtards", a failed right-wing politico, who is attempting to build a following through youtube videos, and Monsignor Wicks, the bombastic preacher who exclaims that he must "fight" the decay in the country.
However, despite this, I was drawn to the film by the character of Father Jud - a young priest who killed a man in a boxing ring before coming to the priesthood, he is a compassionate character who pushes against the excesses of Wicks while nonetheless being devoted to Christ and to his faith. He offers eloquent verbal parries to Detective Blanc's (the main character in the Knives Out series, played by Daniel Craig) rationalist, atheist worldview, and takes his vocation seriously (a scene with him praying for a woman on the phone stands out as a highlight - might opine on it more in a comment later). The sacrament of confession also plays a role and is highlighted in its entirety. Father Jud seems almost more apolitical than political to me despite his opposition to Wicks and the other more conservative characters.
Anyway, curious to hear what others thought of it.
If anything I found it less culture warry and more entertaining than Knives Out 1 and 2, with 2 being particularly bad, but it's pretty clear at this point that assembling a spread of culture war punch bags and pitting them against each other is the established format for Knives Out.
The part that stood out to me the most was the church building. I didn't realise there were such textbook English parish churches in America with lych gates and yew trees and everything, and apparently they're Catholic(?). And now I've taken the time to check and apparently it was filmed in Essex, which makes a bit more sense.
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