Like his previous movies, Jordan Peele's 'Nope' is a film where the less you know before watching, the better. It also cements him as a leading voice in modern horror who deserves to be mentioned alongside directors like Sam Raimi and John Carpenter. 'Nope' is a movie that has a lot going on, and there are multiple layers to digest, but you can also enjoy it on a purely superficial level. Film students can dig deep into the themes of animal exploitation, the erasure of black contributions to cinema and even nods to how plastic is ruining the ocean, but you can also just appreciate it as a people versus UFOs movie.
It revolves around Otis and Emerald Haywood (Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer), a brother/sister duo who run a ranch that provides horses for movie and television productions. After some electrical disturbances and unusual behaviour from their horses, Otis becomes convinced he sees a UFO in the night sky. He persuades his sister to help him install cameras and hopefully record evidence of alien activity, partly motivated by the need to "get the Oprah shot," and party because he suspects the visitors have something to do with his father's unusual death six months earlier.
And honestly, even that brief synopsis is giving too much away. But rest assured, 'Nope' starts out like an alien abduction movie, but it messes with the genre tropes in much the same way that 'Us' so masterfully played with a 'C. H. U. D' template. It's also a great example of how to pace a film. The first thirty minutes seem a bit drawn out, but 'Nope' builds and builds into an unbearably tense, white-knuckle finale. It also has at least one pivotal scene that is brutally horrific and instantly sears itself into your brain as nightmare fuel. The subplot involving a mid-nineties sitcom that goes wrong isn't a cakewalk either.
In other words, this movie rules. If you're even remotely interested in horror (and to a lesser extent, westerns), check this out as soon as you possibly can. Peele is now three for three.
It revolves around Otis and Emerald Haywood (Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer), a brother/sister duo who run a ranch that provides horses for movie and television productions. After some electrical disturbances and unusual behaviour from their horses, Otis becomes convinced he sees a UFO in the night sky. He persuades his sister to help him install cameras and hopefully record evidence of alien activity, partly motivated by the need to "get the Oprah shot," and party because he suspects the visitors have something to do with his father's unusual death six months earlier.
And honestly, even that brief synopsis is giving too much away. But rest assured, 'Nope' starts out like an alien abduction movie, but it messes with the genre tropes in much the same way that 'Us' so masterfully played with a 'C. H. U. D' template. It's also a great example of how to pace a film. The first thirty minutes seem a bit drawn out, but 'Nope' builds and builds into an unbearably tense, white-knuckle finale. It also has at least one pivotal scene that is brutally horrific and instantly sears itself into your brain as nightmare fuel. The subplot involving a mid-nineties sitcom that goes wrong isn't a cakewalk either.
In other words, this movie rules. If you're even remotely interested in horror (and to a lesser extent, westerns), check this out as soon as you possibly can. Peele is now three for three.