Get Out (2017) - SPOILER-FREE Review
/Editor’s Note: this is an old, unformatted, unedited review. The author’s opinion might not match the original thoughts written in this article.
Directed by: Jordan Peele
Written by: Jordan Peele
Starring: Daniel Kaluuya, Allison Williams, Bradley Whitford, Caleb Landry Jones, Catherine Keener, LilRel Howery, Marcus Henderson, Betty Gabriel,
Runtime: 104 min
Chris Washington (Daniel Kaluuya) and Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) are dating for a few months now, so she invites him to meet her parents, Missy (Catherine Keener) and Dean (Bradley Whitford), on a weekend getaway. Initially, what seems to be just nerves from her parents since she's in an interracial relationship, happens to be much more than what Chris expected it to be and a lot of thought-provoking and disturbing discoveries lead him to something even more surreal.
Here in Portugal, Get Out was released later so I actually watched it at home ... twice. Yes, a movie like this needs a second watch, a more focused look at the details and a more concentrated mind to find all the clues to the expected twist in any genre film like this one. Well, I'm happy to say that Get Out is right up there in the contenders' list for the best movie of 2017 so far!
I never was a big fan of horror movies, but as time goes by I keep enjoying them more and more (maybe before I just watched the pretty bad ones). I didn't know the cast, but I did know Jordan Peele ... However, not as a director. My God, how great is he?! Excellent directing skills throughout the whole runtime: amazing camera-work (some cool long takes), efficient jump-scares with the adequate loud and brief background sounds, but his major achievement is definitely the screenplay. Thought-provoking, disturbing and it handles racism and any preconceptions in a way that, by the end, floored me. Great concept, executed seamlessly.
The unknown cast (to me, at least) is just an awesome surprise. Everyone shines in this brilliant movie and elevate it to a super captivating story that already has a fantastic mystery and intrigue surrounding it. Daniel Kaluuya is unbelievably amazing, all of the actors portraying the Armitage's family and housekeepers are equally spectacular and LilRel Howery (Rod Williams) is amazing as the comic relief guy. The tone switches a lot throughout the film. Peele goes from comedy to horror, from drama to thriller in an instant, but it's so well-directed that its fluidity is near perfection. Also, the editing is flawless to my knowledge and the way he depicted and explored every preconception and racist stereotype is really brilliant.
A movie definitely worth watching, at least, twice. It has a huge replay value and I already see it as a horror classic. Does it have flaws? Unfortunately, it does ... In the smallest details, but it does. Watching a second time I couldn't help to notice that some scenes are just weird, with no real meaning behind it. Rose's backstory is my main and only issue with the screenplay, but I really can't get more in-depth than this unless I spoil it for you, which I won't. I can just say that there's a plot point that I still struggle to accept/understand.
There are also some exposition scenes that could have been handled differently and the pacing dragged a little bit in the second act, but it didn't affect me that much since the writing is so great that it almost passed by without me really noticing.
Get Out is probably the most underrated movie in Portugal so far and I'm thrilled that I was able to catch it and watch it twice. Jordan Peele proves that his directing skills are something extraordinary, his screenplay is pure brilliance and his cast is unquestionably incredible, starting on the protagonist, Daniel Kaluuya, to LilRel Howery, the man behind the comedy bits in the film. A very important and thought-provoking movie with social preconceptions on other races explored to the tiniest detail, that only fails to deliver a precise backstory to Rose and it has some really minor issues with its second act's pacing and exposition scenes.
