Writer-director Jordan Peele, the comedic performer from TV’s Key and Peele and the adorable/funny cat movie Keanu, delivers a huge cinematic surprise with Get Out, a twisted, darkly satirical horror film that pulls no punches when it comes to race relations and dating.
Peele has cited Night of the Living Dead and The Stepford Wives as inspirations for this journey to the dark side of his creative soul. Those films’ influences are detectable; you could also throw in a pinch of Rosemary’s Baby and a side of Being John Malkovich.
Two of the hardest things to accomplish with a movie are making people laugh, and getting them legitimately scared. Get Out manages to do both throughout its running time. Peele takes taboo subjects and stereotypes, and doesn’t let his pen get restricted by a fear of offending anybody. This is an appropriately evil, scabrous movie.
Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), a young African-American man, is a little nervous. He’s going to visit the parents of Rose Armitage (Allison Williams), his white girlfriend. Allison is relaxed about the trip, but Chris is a little on the anxious side.
Upon their arrival at her family’s large estate, Rose’s parents like Chris. They really, really like Chris. Actually, parents Missy and Dean (Catherine Keener and Bradley Whitford) like Chris at a level that is a bit unsettling. Chris shrugs it off at first, as does Allison, but strange things start happening.
For starters, Walter and Georgina (Marcus Henderson and Betty Gabriel), two black people employed by the Armitages, have personalities that are a little off. They have vacant stares; they are overly polite; and Georgina can cry projectile tears while smiling and carrying on a conversation. Something is definitely wrong with them.
Chris smokes, and Missy doesn’t like that. When he gets up to sneak a cigarette in the middle of the night, Missy offers to hypnotize him. Chris is reluctant, but eventually finds himself under Missy’s anti-smoking spell. Or does the spell cover more than just smoking? I won’t give too much away other than to say Missy and Dean are not what they seem, and this movie will put a lot of people off of using hypnosis as a means of quitting smoking.
Kaluuya (Sicario) delivers a performance that should put him on the map for a long time to come. The role requires him to go to many extremes, utilizing both his comic timing and his ability to appear paralyzed with fear. His big scene with Missy is an acting powerhouse, with Keener setting the pace. It’s going to go down as one of the movie year’s most memorable scenes.
Williams absolutely nails her part. The movie simply wouldn’t work if Williams delivered one wrong note with her work. What she does here is a deft class on how to act in a horror movie. She will knock you on your ass.
Providing solid, pure comic relief, Lil Rel Howery is the perfect goofball as Rod, Chris’s TSA friend who thinks his buddy has been sold into sex slavery.
Stephen Root has a couple of memorable scenes playing a blind man, something he did so memorably in O Brother, Where Art Thou? His character is among the horde of people who show up for a family gathering. Also in attendance: Andrew (Lakeith Stanfield), another oddly behaved black man who really hates it when you take his picture.
Whether it’s trying to make you laugh, make you squirm or just plain freak you out, Get Out is a victory on all the horror and comedy fronts. Peele demonstrates a keen sense of what is scary and funny, and has also made one of the better-looking horror films in recent years. It should be pointed out: This is his first movie as a director. When it comes to daring, risk-taking directing debuts, Peele is toward the top of the list.
This is one of those times where a groundbreaking piece of work just comes out of nowhere and bedazzles. Don’t miss Get Out.
Get Out is playing at theaters across the valley.