FilmSnobReviews

Title: Nope
MPAA Rating: R
Director: Jordan Peele
Starring: Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Brandon Perea
Runtime: 2 hr 10 mins

What It Is: Upon the sudden and strange passing of their father at their home in the California desert, siblings OJ (Kaluuya) and Emerald (Palmer) attempt at taking the reigns of his animal entertainment business. OJ, the lead horse wrangler, finds himself having a more difficult time forcing himself into the spotlight while the bombastic aspiring-actress Emerald has a difficult time staying on topic. In the meantime, former child-star Jupe (Yeun) prepares for the performance of a lifetime as he buys a few of OJ’s horses. As the nights go on, strange and invasive occurring in the desert intensify as OJ, Emerald, and tech-savvy Fry’s guy Angel (Perea) experience a possibly extraterrestrial threat that intends to make them all disappear.

What We Think: Wow wow wow wow. Like any Peele movie, prepare for the hype on this one. This makes Peele’s third and, in my opinion, most complete work. While Get Out expresses the horror of contemporary racism and the fetishization of minorities, and Us tries to show us how the cycle of leaving behind the working and lower classes leads to an unexplainable uprising, Nope collects all these higher-level ideas and themes and performs on them tenfold, as well as with far more depth, support, and viscera. You still get the full breadth of Peele-isms, though him being a far more seasoned director in Hollywood pays off in this film as he and the teams come back with more memorable and endearing characters, fantastic individual arcs for literally almost every person and animal within, and some very genuinely creepy scares. Unique again as horror goes, the horror is simulated and experienced with fantastic buildup. The film is constantly showing its heart on its sleeve as everything is connected; while typically horror films tend to want to hide their secrets, Peele in contrast displays them in full view, not throwing them at the audience as to say, “Hey, look how much lore and stuff I hid,” but rather “You need to be paying attention the entire time.” The allegory is incredibly strong and impactful throughout, as the point is definitely to try and reach the masses about the monstrous horrors that we tend to brush off of our shoulders every day.

Technically, the film, as Peele wanted it to be, is a spectacle. From the scares both visual and conceptual to the vast cinematography set mostly in the expansive desert and an old house, to the intense original score. The sound design is also one of the most amazing feats of the film, it’s hard to explain why without spoiling. The creature design–immaculate. The relatable sense of humor keeps the film grounded while the unrelenting horror and pacing are akin to older films such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind, or even Poltergeist.

It honestly feels that maybe some of the sometimes half-baked ideas or themes from Us are far improved if not complemented by Nope as well, which is so incredibly satisfying to see. And, of course, the cast is brilliant, forcing you to really get attached to these characters, people you could otherwise see hanging out with and having the same sort of reactions and conversations, making the wins and losses feel much more.

Our Grade: A+, Seat gripping, clever, often cheeky, and likely one of the most entertaining movies you’ll see all year, Nope is a rewarding blockbuster sure to permeate your dreams the night you see it. I already cannot wait to see it again, hopefully, I’ll be able to catch it in theatres as the audience’s reactions to everything also adds to the entertainment.