Justin Chang

That goes for its ideas as well as its genre trappings.

Just as the first two Knives Out movies skewered racism, classism, billionaires, and tech bros, Wake Up Deadman takes sharp aim at what it sees as the intolerance and insularity of the Christian right.

The political jabs aren't always subtle, and sometimes the petty, ill-tempered parishioners sound too alike in their strident bickering.

But that just makes Father Judd all the more appealing a character, as he sets out to humbly yet radically love his community.

Given how good O'Connor has been lately, in movies like Challengers and The Mastermind, it's saying a lot that this is one of his best performances, and one that elevates this snarky, satirical murder farce to a genuinely contemplative plane.

Even as tensions mount, there's more than one victim, and possibly more than one killer.

The movie becomes a kind of theological debate, pitting Judd the earnest believer against Blanc the fierce skeptic.

Who emerges the winner?

Let's just say that with a puzzle as satisfyingly constructed as Wake Up Deadman, God really is in the details.

Anyone will tell you that these are tumultuous, borderline apocalyptic times for the film industry.

Box office is down.

The threat of AI looms.

Billionaires and tech giants are laying waste to what remains of the major Hollywood studios.

I'm not entirely sure how to square all this bad news with my own good news, which is that I saw more terrific new movies this year than I have any year since before the pandemic.

True, most of those movies weren't from here, but all of them played in U.S.

theaters in 2025.

and all of them are well worth seeking out in the weeks and months to come.

The best new movie I saw this year is Sirat, a breakthrough work from a gifted Spanish filmmaker named Oliver Lache.

It's a nail-biting survival thriller set in the desert of southern Morocco during what feels like the end times.

It's a little Mad Max, a little Wages of Fear, and all in all, the most exhilarating and devastating two hours I experienced in a theater this year.