Wick's Review

Summary - Really Great 4.5

Get Out melds edgy African-American humor with classic horror movie tropes, the admixture delivered with near Hitchcockian mastery. That’s how Jordan Peele’s brilliant movie brings the Black Lives Matter sensibility to horrific life. The conceit is not that whites don’t care if blacks live or die, it’s that whites hunt down blacks, for sport or some crazy shit. IOW, the whole paranoid racial schtick runs rampant in Get Out.

It’s a spectacularly effective premise for a movie, which Peele & Co. deliver spectacularly well. No wonder Get Out is breaking box office records. Now it deserves to score with the Oscars, notwithstanding the Academy’s prejudice against comedies and horror movies. Plus, the Academy never recognizes movies broadly popular with black audiences. Is that also prejudice? More like snootiness IMO, but it’s still there.

I may be wrong about the whole prejudice thing, being as I’m white. In fact, my entire theater seemed to be white, well, white, latino and asian, this being Silicon Valley and all. Racial divide notwithstanding, Get Out worked with we non-African-Americans, judging by the frequent LOLs and screams throughout the audience. Oh no, does that mean we were guilty of cultural appropriation? Nothing is simple anymore.

Get Out sure isn’t simple, even though it springs from elemental fears and features some simply terrific performances. Nor is it helpful to racial comity. But it sure is entertaining, and is surely a benchmark.

Acting - Really Great 4.5

Daniel Kaluuya delivers a star-making performance as a normal guy plunged into some very weird shit. He comes across as level-headed and relatable, racial divide notwithstanding. That said, his appearance is key to his role, including his deeply brown pigmentation and huge eyes. Filmmaker Jordan Peele uses the contrast of those large white orbs set in a very dark face to great effect as the horror of Get Out plays out.

Allison Williams is somewhat less impressive as his girlfriend, a rich white girl never lacking self-confidence. Nonetheless, Brian Williams’ daughter clearly has a promising acting career ahead of her.

Bradley Whitford is tremendous as her father, a gentry liberal of the sort that helped ruin the Democratic Party. The great Whitford has been terrific in so many roles over the decades, this one recalling his role in The Cabin in the Woods, another whip-smart horror-comedy.

Catherine Keener uses her trademark empathy to increasingly great effect as his wife, a deceptively powerful psychiatrist.

Caleb Landry Jones is scary good as the fourth member of their family. He jumped offscreen in Contraband as a doofus, and does so here as a brainy deviant. That’s range.

Other Notables

• Zailand Adams as an 11-year old boy dealing with tragedy
• Lil Rel Howery as a TSA agent who finds the power to get up and do what needs getting done. Let’s see more of this funny man.
• Betty Gabriel impresses as a housekeeper with a strange demeanor.
• Marcus Henderson likewise impresses as a caretaker with a strange demeanor.
• LaKeith Stanfield shows range playing a streetwise guy and a strangely refined partygoer. Stanfield previously played Snoop Dogg in Straight Outta Compton.
• Stephen Root always jumps offscreen, here as a blind bastard.
• Erika Alexander comes across as rooted and sexy as a put-upon police Detective.

Film - Really Great 4.5

Jordan Peele has jumped up a quantum or two in the Hollywood orbit by writing and directing Get Out. It captures a certain zeitgeist, and delivers it with consummate filmic skill.

Edge - Risqué 2.5

Beware. When blood starts to flow, Get Out turns spectacularly violent.

Reality - Surreal 2.1

Never mind the relatively restrained reality liberties in Get Out, at least in terms of most horror movies. The movie is such a phenomenon because of its take on the conditions of blacks in America today.

It posits that whites covet blacks for their bodies but not their minds, and that whites don’t believe that black lives matter. As to the former, I’m in awe of Jordan Peele’s mind. His body? Not so much. As to the latter, not in my rather extensive experience.

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