A study in contrasts: The cinematography of Wake Up Dead Man

Rian Johnson has another Benoit Blanc hit on his hands with Wake Up Dead Man, in which Blanc tackles the strange death of a fire-and-brimstone parish priest, Monseigneur Jefferson Wicks (Josh Brolin). It’s a classic locked-room mystery in a spookily Gothic small-town setting, and Johnson turned to cinematographer Steve Yedlin (Looper, The Last Jedi) to help realize his artistic vision.

(Minor spoilers below but no major reveals.)

Yedlin worked on the previous two Knives Out installments. He’s known Johnson since the two were in their teens, and that longstanding friendship ensures that they are on the same page, aesthetically, from the start when they work on projects.

“We don’t have to test each other,” Yedlin told Ars. “There isn’t that figuring out period. We get to use the prep time in a way that’s really efficient and makes the movie better because we’re [in ...