Johnson On Third “Knives Out” Cinema Push

Filmmaker Rian Johnson hopes his third “Knives Out” film “Wake Up Dead Man,” which is set to hit this Fall, will be released in more cinemas than the second film “Glass Onion”.

Netflix gave the second film a highly successful one-week run in a limited number of cinemas over Thanksgiving 2022 – bringing in around $15 million for the title several weeks ahead of its debut on Netflix on December 23rd of that year.

At the time, it was the widest release Netflix had ever done for one of its original movies, with around 600 screens and playing at the three biggest movie chains in the country. Touted as an experiment, it appeared to be a big success on the surface.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings admitted in late 2022 to Insider that a lot of money was left on the table by not giving the film a more standard wide theatrical release, but called it more of a “promotional tactic” for the streaming release which was also a major success.

Cut to this year and Johnson tells Business Insider he’s going to push as hard as he can to get the new film some sort of theatrical run:

“I want this in as many theaters for as long as possible, We’re going to push for everything we can get in terms of theatrical because I want as many people as possible to see it in that form.”

Netflix is set to release Greta Gerwig’s “The Chronicles of Narnia” on IMAX screens Thanksgiving 2026 ahead of a release on the streamer around Christmas 2026. There’s hope Johnson’s film can get a similar style arrangement this year.

Johnson was also asked about Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos’ recent comments at the Time100 Summit calling cinema an outdated concept. Asked if he agreed with Sarandos’ remarks, Johnson says:

“Obviously, I don’t, because I love movies. I love going to see movies. But also, I have a feeling talking to Ted, it would be a different thing than one quote taken and kind of tossed at me in this context. So I don’t want to phrase this as I’m having a proxy discussion with Ted right here.

I think theatrical is not going anywhere. I think we’ve seen if you put a movie people want to see in the theaters, they are going to show up for it, and that experience of being in a full house and having that experience is so important. It’s something that I love and I want more of in the world.”

Daniel Craig returns as master detective Benoit Blanc and is joined by Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack and Thomas Haden Church in the new film. No word on a release date as yet but that’s expected to be revealed as part of Netflix’s Tudum event at the end of the month.

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