There are movies that you watch and get because of your own background, then there are movies that illuminate a truth about other peoples existence... this is one of those few movies that 95% of South Africans will get ...especially black South Africans. Let's dig in...
Jordan Peele is famous for his Saturday Night Live skits. He had a funny movie out last year with his collaborator Keegan-Michael Key "Keanu', yes the one about the cat. So he's back in his first directorial debut in Get Out.
Off the bat, Get Out feels like a trippy episode of The X-Files meets an episode of Blackish meets Invaders of the Body Snatchers. It's not a straight up horror flick. Yes, the film has all the horror tropes - the jump scares, it has its gory moments, the musical cues but it also has a some very clever wit and menace to it that's uniquely Get Out.
The mix of horror, satire and comedy gives the film a very strange feel, which is good. These days it's so rare to find something different. So when films like Split, Dear White People and Get Out come out, basically hybrids of genres, they become a breath of fresh air 'cause they play and subvert genre expectations.
Then there's the race issue. Films - especially horror movies - have always been centred on the white experience. From Deliverance to Scream to Nightmare on Elm to Halloween, the protagonists have always been white, dealing with white surburbia issues or white fears. We've been following the white lead in horrors for ages.
Jordan Peele centres the black experience and reflects black fears, throws in some wish fulfilments and you have a film that is more than just a nice night out. It becomes a comment on white liberalism (i.e. we see you Helen Zille and company), a comment on eugenics (pokes fun at stereotypes around African bodies), a comment on white privilege and mediation on violence that Frantz Fanon would approve of.
Daniel Kaluuya, whom we last saw in Sicario as the goody two shoes FBI agent - the young British dude imbues his young American character Chris Washington with sensitivity and is able to emote his discomfort and pain without shouting it out. I'm really looking forward to seeing him in next year's Black Panther movie.
Jordan Peele has written and directed an incredible movie that not only entertains but speaks to the moment we find ourselves in politically and socially.
It does something also great, it challenges white hegemony in a way that it is still accessible to the general public. It does not lose its commercial sensibilities while critiquing white hegemony. Get Out is possibly the first really great movie of 2017 followed closely by Logan thus far.
Rating
*****
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* trash ** ja nee ***with aromat its bearable ****almost perfect ***** Instant classic