REVIEW: Get Out

Normally at the end of the month, I try to watch a movie that I know is going to be garbage going in. It's something of a tradition around here, allowing me a chance to really let loose and have fun just tearing something apart; variety is the spice of life, as they say. That said, considering the pure and utter tripe I've put myself through over the past month, I feel as though I've earned myself a little break. With Halloween right around the corner, I'm on something of a horror kick and, coming off of The VVitch, found myself hungry for more quality scares. With that in mind, it seemed obvious to check out the one film even I can't believe I didn't see back in March, director Jordan Peele's Get Out.

The plot feels like something straight out of a classic Twilight Zone or Tales From the Crypt episode; Chris and Rose (Daniel Kaluuya and Allison Williams) are a young, interracial couple who've been seeing each other for a few months. As one might expect, they reach that all important part of a relationship that all young couples dread: meeting the parents. The two depart for Rose's family home, an opulent ranch-house secluded in the woods, where Chris is introduced to Rose's mother and father (Catherine Keener and Bradley Whitford). A hypnotherapist and a neurosurgeon, the two seem to be making almost too much of an effort to make Chris comfortable (leading to more than a few good-natured but still cringe-inducing remarks) and all seems to be going about as well as expected. That is, until Chris begins to notice odd occurrences around the house, leading him to believe that everything is not quite as it seems. Much like with The VVitch, this movie is far better the less you know going in, so I'll end my plot summary here. If you want to know what happens, go watch the movie and find out.

The most important part of a movie like this, one so reliant on its subtext, is that said subtext actually works. So often you'll get a situation where the filmmaker gets too swept up in his or her own metaphor, tamping the message down the viewer's throat, completely sinking the film in the process. Get Out is a film that avoids this pitfall simply by reaching higher than the low-hanging fruit dangling right in front of it. Distilled to the most general terms possible, this is a story about the ills of racism. Now, had Jordan Peele wanted to simply deliver a generic parable about how racism is bad, he could have very easily set this movie in the deep south, instead of what looks like upstate New York or Vermont. He could have littered Rose's family house with confederate flags and jugs of moonshine instead of souvenirs from trips to Africa and bottles of expensive wine. He could have had every white character angrily shout racial slurs instead of smiling politely while mentioning how they know Tiger Woods.

This sense of subtlety, this challenge Peele took upon himself when telling this story, is exactly what makes Get Out work as well as it does. This isn't a movie about your generic, after-school-special kind of racism; the villains aren't boisterous right-wing southerners, they're just seemingly well-meaning liberals who are completely disconnected from Chris' world view. The conflict in this story shows that racism (excuse the pun) isn't entirely black-and-white, highlighting how progressive "ally" culture can be just as harmful as overt bigotry. This is a movie about how a well-intentioned majority can, through their seemingly progressive actions, rob those whom they seek to help of their voice and autonomy. Again, I don't want to delve into spoiler territory, but there's a specific point during the climax where the film lays out exactly what it's really about in spectacular fashion. All in all, it ends up coming off like a reverent throwback to the early films of George Romero and Paul Verhoeven, all while remaining fresh enough so as not to feel in any way cliché or done-before. Everything about the way this movie conveys its message subverts expectations (especially in regards to the ending), ignoring the most trite, obvious symbolism and instead going for something much more clever and, most importantly, real.

That said, all the biting subtext in the world doesn't amount to much if the film itself doesn't function properly. I'm pleased to report that, while some may find the tone somewhat inconsistent, this is a very structurally sound film (especially impressive considering, like The VVitch, this is a first-time director). The performances are all-around excellent, but I have to give some extra credit to Daniel Kaluuya in the lead role of Chris. He's our everyman, the one the audience is clearly supposed to identify and sympathize with as the situation unfolds before him. Kaluuya's performance is solid enough that it wasn't for some time after the film had ended that I realized how little there was to Chris as a character. On paper, he isn't too clearly defined; he is, in every sense, your average, ordinary guy. Kaluuya manages to elevate this, however, purely through his performance. So much is conveyed through simple facial expressions or the use of his eyes; they're even front and center on the poster I chose for this Review. Kaluuya managed to take a protagonist that, in the hands of a lesser performer, could have been totally flat and unengaging and turned him into the perfect lifeline connecting the viewer to the plot.

At the same time, we also have LilRey Howery as Rod, a TSA agent and Chris' best friend. He's our primary comic relief and I'm convinced that in any other movie, this character would have been completely insufferable. Through the combined efforts of Howery, Peele, and the screenwriters, Rod ended up one of my favorite aspects of the entire film, not only providing some legitimately effective levity, but actually contributing to the plot as more than a mere joke machine. Again, we see this movie's commitment to ignoring the low-hanging fruit; it would have been so simple for Rod to have ended up as your basic "goofy best friend" character. He'd spit out a few jokes, maybe act as a vehicle for some product placement, and overall just be an obnoxious, unnecessary addition used to pad out the runtime. Instead, he goes above and beyond in terms of what this kind of character usually ends up being, and the benefits of this effort are plain to see.

Get Out is a movie I simply cannot recommend enough; while it's definitely more of a suspense/mystery (with a hefty dose of satire) than an outright horror movie, it still feels like a loving throwback to a simpler time, when horror films weren't afraid to get inventive in order to get their point across. It takes what could have easily been your classic one-note exploitation premise and turns it into something a  lot more nuanced and inventive than what one might initially expect. One of the things that makes horror so special as a genre is its ability to act as a sort of universal catharsis. When the weight of the world seems that much heavier, some of us ease the burden through sunshine and lollypops, others through ghouls and gore. Whenever there's turmoil and tumult in society, the artists get busy; quality may vary, but Get Out is definitely a prime example of how it should be done.