(Credits: Netflix)

In Rian Johnson’s Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery on Netflix, Daniel Craig returns as the Southern sleuth Benoit Blanc, who winds up at a small parish in upstate New York.

In a conversation with Tudum, the director revealed that the idea of centring this Knives Out film in a church came rather early in the creative process when he and Craig were discussing the premise of the third movie.

“I thought a good way to bring it back down to Earth would be to attack something very personal. I told Daniel, ‘I want to make a movie about faith. I want to make a movie about church,’ ” he recounted. “This was the hardest script I have ever had to write,” Johnson continued.

Having grown up in a way the Oscar-nominated director describes as “very Christian,” Johnson opened up about how he used to perceive the world around him through the “lens” of his relationship with Christ during his teenage years to mid-twenties. Consequently, approaching Wake Up Dead Man felt rather personal and complicated.

The most recent instalment of Johnson’s mystery series takes place in a small parish in upstate New York, where the mean and corrupt Monsignor Jefferson Wicks has chosen a few townspeople, who are equally fearful and angry with him. “Wicks is at a place where he’s looking for everybody’s weakest spot and exploiting it,” says Josh Brolin, who plays the character on-screen. “His philosophy is if you can get to your worst, most feral place, then you can climb toward the light from there.”

While the movie kicks off with Father Jud Duplenticy’s transfer to Wicks’ church, the central mystery commences with the discovery of Wicks’ body in a tiny closet inside his own church on an Easter weekend. As a result, it doesn’t come as a surprise that the story is packed with references to the Bible. “I grew up very Christian, so the whole movie is rife with Biblical references because my head is full of them, even down to character names,” explains Johnson.

According to Johnson, Martha, the devoted servant of Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude, Glenn Close plays in Wake Up Dead Man, has its origins in the story in the Gospels. “Martha is constantly serving, and is frustrated that she’s not getting recognised for it,” he adds.

Similarly, the watering hole and pizzeria called II Diavolo literally translates to the devil. “They started decorating the restaurant with devil stuff because of its name, and the guy who owns it, Nick, is very popular in town. He doesn’t even like the devil, as he says in the movie,” says the director.

Moreover, Johnson also induced parables into the story. From a set piece inspired by Lazarus’s tomb to comparing Jud and Wick’s stand-off to that of David and Goliath’s, the film even references Eve’s apple now and then. While the movie is similarly packed with countless Easter eggs, for those still out of the loop, Wake Up Dead Man is currently streaming on Netflix.