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Get out of this thread if you haven't already seen Get Out! Open spoilers
So It Goes
We keep moving...Registered User regular
We keep moving...Registered User regular
So I just saw Jordan Peele's latest (first?) movie, Get Out, and it was great.
It deserves its own thread.
This thread has OPEN SPOILERS so don't come in here unless you've seen it or don't care about spoilers.
I suggest you try to see it unspoiled because it's a pretty fun reveal as it goes along
GET OUT
It deserves its own thread.
This thread has OPEN SPOILERS so don't come in here unless you've seen it or don't care about spoilers.
I suggest you try to see it unspoiled because it's a pretty fun reveal as it goes along
GET OUT
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Posts
@DarkPrimus give us your thoughts
I can't handle the horror genre so that's everything I have to contribute to this thread.
Jordan Peele knows how to effectively use humor as catharsis and there were some excellent moments in this film to get you to laugh because the tension was so palpable for most of it. The movie is a genre bender, even keeping you in the dark as to what type of film this really is until the end of the second act.
The main character seemed aware that he was in a horror film and things were not right. He was also not a dumbass, he is intelligent and resourceful once the shit hits the fan.
The performances in this movie were stellar. Daniel Kaluuya was fantastically expressive so you could always tell what he's thinking, even if he isn't saying much because he doesn't want to upset his girlfriend. Allison Williams as his girlfriend was great and they made a great, believable couple. Caleb Landry Jones made me incredibly uncomfortable for every second he was on the screen. Special shout out to LilRel Howery, who stole every scene he was in and was the major comedic relief of the film. So many good performances, though I would have liked some of the characters besides the main three to be fleshed out a little more.
The pacing was great, I never felt bored or uninterested in what's happening. The party scene full of microaggressions was cringe as fuck and I loved every second of it. The main character does a good job of walking around with a bemused WTF face all the time until he figures out what's actually going on, and then everything goes off the rails in a good way.
See this movie in a theater, the more diverse the audience, the better. I saw this in New York City, and the audience reactions were totally worth it.
Overall, I'd give it an 8 or 9 out of 10. It's not the best film in its genre, but it's something unique that we haven't seen before. A film that wants to talk about black issues and shine a spotlight on genre tropes, while also playing with your expectations a little as well.
There are so many little things about this film that are amazing when you dig a little deeper. Examples in the spoiler:
There was a lot of nice misdirection in the movie, feeding into the paranoia.
When the hypnosis stuff came in, I wondered if the entire family had been hypnotized. How deep did the brainwashing go? The video about the process that was "perfected in my own family" didn't give enough details about what it was, so there was still the thought that it was all brainwashing (although it didn't feel quite clever enough, too obvious) until the real horror was revealed.
And yeah, when the cop car drove up, lights flashing, the audience was split between horrified, "oh god!" and hysterical laughter of the kind people do when horrified, and some mix of that. When the door opened to show "Airport Security" and Chris's friend came out, we cheered.
*Oh yeah, and when Chris hit that point where he knew everything was too insane and he had to leave that very night, smart enough not to fall for the "oh we can leave in the morning" idiocy that people do in horror movies, we all realized that the trap was already sprung and it was already too late to escape.
Well shit, that's what I get for posting advanced thoughts about the film.
Honestly though, Spawnbroker's observations are spot-on. The film, despite supposed pacing issues in the latter half, is meticulously constructed to convince you that you know what's going on, and then continually challenge those assumptions. Just about everything in the film works on three levels: the reality of being black in America and dealing with constant microaggressions and subtle racism, the audience expectation level of "they are brainwashing these people, how fucked up is that," and then the third level of what is actually occurring. I think it's a film that will definitely reward a re-watch, and while I have a bunch of films on my list to see for the first time before a repeat, I feel like I'm going to pick up on a lot of subtle clues that I had missed.
To talk about a specific example of layered meaning:
The "groundskeeper" and his behavior. When he suddenly appears sprinting full-on towards Chris, before turning away as the lights turn on. That's freaky as hell, what the fuck is going on? Some sort of brainwash routine to keep him in shape? Some physical response of trying to fight against the indoctrination? We aren't sure exactly, but it's really creepy.
As we find out near the start of the film, the family's grandfather lost an Olympic bid to Jesse Owens, and never got over it. And then near the end of the film, we find out the grandfather also invented a technique to transplant most of a person's brain into another body, in order to harness the "superior physicality" or however they put it of a black person.
The grandfather might have thought that this obsession with black bodies was born out of admiration, not hate, but there's a mental trick here that all the white people in the film fell for - that if you admire black people, you can't hate them at the same time. Regardless of how much they purportedly admire and like black people (and how much is an act opposed to genuine is debatable, but let's assume some of it is genuine), they view black people as lesser than themselves, fit for exploitation for their own gain with no consideration given to the black person's thoughts or well-being.
Looping back around, it turns out that what Chris gets told by the "groundskeeper" is 100% the truth. He was out doing exercises, because he wanted to be physically fit, to a level probably beyond what he had ever been capable of in his original body. The reason why it sounds so stilted and creepy is because it is the vocabulary, grammar, and cadence of a well-educated elderly white man coming out of the mouth of a youthful, blue-collar black man.
The grandfather's admiration for his granddaughter in the same scene gets misinterpreted by Chris (and the audience) as some sort of weird romantic obsession combined with or modified by hypnotic suggestion. That's just how some grandfathers talk about their granddaughters, it's just not quite as creepy* when it comes from a 90 year old white dude.
*But it's still creepy
I have a feeling an entire damn book could be written analyzing the film like this.
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Hm I thought the pacing was near perfect.
I have some questions about grandma and grandpa around the house. Just wondering if the fact they were forced to be servants might have had something to do with the mom controlling them through hypnosis? Otherwise why would they be willing to do that menial work?
I found it perfectly believable that the grandfather would enjoy doing physical tasks and the grandmother enjoying domestic chores. When "company" isn't around, I'm sure they have a much freer association with the rest of the family.
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I assumed it's an attempt to make their victims feel more comfortable and less isolated, as well as a product of their own racism - they assumed he would find it strange if they were just around the house, but couldn't think of anything that was "appropriate" other than menial labors, or that he would find it strange if they sat down to dinner with them or whatever
but also grandpa wanted to stay super jacked so doing yard work and splitting wood and stuff makes sense. grandma loved her kitchen so much that they always keep a piece of her there (how blatant of a reference is that to Georgina, once you think back on it and realize he was talking about her). grandpa doing yard work and grandma fussing over drinks and dinner isn't that unusual really
I think I was reading too much into the moment when mom tells Grandma to go get some rest. I think she says that as well to Logan after he has recovered from his "episode"
And I still believe that this is one of the most slight movies I've ever seen (in terms of it dealing with the topic of racism). After seeing it with friends on Friday I recommended they check out BAMBOOZLED if they were interested in what I found to be a great comedic/drama take on racism in America that actually has some bite to it. The Obama line, that everyone knowingly laughed at in their own way, basically sets the bar for how Peele is going to tackle the subject matter here, and it never clear it again, settling for "Whites are awkward around blacks. . ."
I don't want to say that people are reading more substance into the movie than is actually there, but I just feel there's a lot less than there really is. I actually wonder how well this would have done critically say in 2010 or so.
The main character is hesitant to bring up their interracial relationship with his girlfriend. In a classic and well-meaning way, she believes it will not be an issue. She sticks up for him when they are pulled over. But you can see that he is more than happy to comply because the end game for popping off at a cop is almost always bad for a person of color. She is still using her privilege to stick up for him which is good but she doesn't seem to consider what kind of harm could come of her actions due to being treated differently. The Obama joke was just generally perfect. The family has this white completely out of control son who is allowed to be a literal thug and it is contrasted with the very careful and measured life story of the main character, who must be reserved at all times because everything he says and does is on a stage not of his own controlling. I would disagree with the idea that the "whites" were just awkward. They asked the main character to represent all black people and explain "the experience". They called him over and generally denied him agency in multiple scenes. The general co-opting of black bodies really hit home with the brain transplantation idea and went in a way I didn't expect. I assumed everyone was under hypnotic control. The girlfriend being an interracial fetishist and genuine trap really surprised me but I felt like it was more honest to demonstrate that she was 100% complicit in her family's actions. Also, it was a standard horror movie so it was jumping from very clever social commentary to scary stuff all the time. :P
I dunno. I found that awkward though I may be coloring it with personal experience. It's the same as the Obama line: it's just so obvious and inoffensive to have any real punch to it. And maybe that's the problem; I came in expecting something with a LOT more subtlety to it, and instead we have a movie that's just - as you say - screaming it's message over and over and over again without letting YOU come to that conclusion yourself. The trailers perhaps spoiled that for me, and I was waiting for the "winking" to stop.
White people need to be screamed at about the black experience. Otherwise we don't hear it.
Yeah, but if it's screamed too loud then people ignore it or get defensive.
I thought Get Out was just right in this regard. It wasn't subtle, but it didn't read as too aggressive, unlike something like Dear White People.
I think there are plenty of white people who "hear" about the black experience, but that's not really what I meant. I meant that NOTHING in this movie is anything I would say are surprises to many people, certainly not at the theater I saw the movie at. From the first cop car to the last, we all knew what was going on, what was being called out (it actually got annoying as I've never seen more "audience participation" than I've seen at this movie) and while fun to point it, just wasn't saying anything better movies (movies nearly two decades old) have already said.
And just for shits and giggles I looked up Bamboozled and how it reviewed and this is what RT consensus comes out as: "Bamboozled is too over the top in its satire and comes across as more messy and overwrought than biting." This is from 2000.
I assumed she saw the cop car pulling up or sensed it more than Chris, but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense given her further emoting in that scene.
I grabbed my boyfriend like ohh man I know what he's gonna find.
Up to then I was holding out hope the girl was just brainwashed by her mom. Newp.
Getting a quick death beats being left to bleed out. As soon as he saw her smile, he stopped because he knew that was what she wanted.
"Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor
My new novel: Maledictions: The Offering. Now in Paperback!
She was a harder character to get a read on than the older adults, because of the obvious reason that her motivations weren't spelled out for us.
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One of the interesting things about this movie though that I didn't get was the brother with that iron mask thing. Was there any meaning behind that? I feel like perhaps both the brother and sister both had a job of capturing black people, the brother by force and the sister through relationships.
That's exactly what it was. The brother grabbed the guy at the very beginning and the dad later comments that he tends to 'damage' them before they're able to do the brain switch thing. Which is also why the brother is so chafed at Chris during the dinner scene.
"Readers who prefer tension and romance, Maledictions: The Offering, delivers... As serious YA fiction, I’ll give it five stars out of five. As a novel? Four and a half." - Liz Ellor
My new novel: Maledictions: The Offering. Now in Paperback!
other things
-dad killed by deer after going on racist tinted tirade about deer
-fight scene between Chris and Jeremy, Chris keeps trying to open door and Jeremy kicks it close, then when Jeremy kicks it a last time, Chris is ready with the knife, call back to Jeremy's talk about jujitsu and having to plan one step ahead
-People mentioned that Rose didn't want to cop to check Chris's ID so they wouldn't know he was out there
- i think the grandparents doing menial work had to do with keeping the charade up in front of Chris, plus Grandpa seemed eager to do hard exercise
- for whatever reason i just didn't catch that the auction scene was an auction, like 'whats up with silent bingo and the picture of chris', totally clueless there
-all the white people sports, lacrosse, bocce ball, hunting rifle
Arch,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_goGR39m2k
Also fuck white people.
As Tube pointed out in SE++, the dad specifically goes on a tirade about bucks, which is a derogatory way to refer to black men. And of course, it's bucks that have antlers, so...
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I actually like that it became a more typical horror plot in the end because it added some impossible fantasy and let me relax a bit.
From this movie I learned milk is the official beverage of white power supremacy, because the vast majority of non-white adults are lactose intolerant. Your ability to digest milk shows your racial purity, and Rose is a very very white girl.
Also, remember the asian guy (japanese I think) who asked about the African American experience? Was there any significance to him being asian? Some kind of callback? A retired neurosurgeon? Was he amongst the people bidding for Chris? Seems odd for him to just randomly be in a group of all whites.
Oh cool. Missed that part
Yeah I thought it was great that it was a minority asking another minority a totally ridiculous question that is impossible to answer. "Being black in America, was that an advantage or a disadvantage for you?" is such a stupid fucking question that it's perfect it came from another minority who wouldn't be called out on it.
As a white person who could easily be counted among the villains of this movie, this movie really made me think hard about the way I think about minorities. It's a very disturbing film for white people to watch, and I think it's important that the villains of this were not racist hillbillies. They're white liberal "allies".
The script says she just enjoys being choked out. I dunno if they went a different direction with how she acted it, but she was just supposed to be a freaky sociopathic sadomasochist.
Also, everybody in the movie but the mom could have been brainwashed. It's probably hard to imagine the mom brainwashing her daughter to fetishize black people, but I don't know if you can assume anybody went along with the scheme fully willingly.
Also, the black man who Chris temporarily frees at the party was probably the best "the meaning changes" part of the film.
At first, you think that they're just being brainwashed into being obedient servants. So his drinking is an tiny rebellion he's chastized for, he's brainwashed into acting white, he's complaint with being shown off because you assume he's an object, he snitches on Chris being more comfortable with him around because it's a hypnotic defense mechanism, he says "I'm glad to be myself again" because he's been told to act normal.
But actually, he's that woman's husband in a new, fit black body. His wife doesn't want him drinking because she suspects it's how he got dropped out, he's acting white because he is white, he's twirling about to show off how awesome his new body is, he snitches on Chris because it's hilarious to him that he's assumed to be black, and he's truly glad to be "himself" again because for a bit he was dropped out while the original mind surfaced.