Looking for the right kind of horror and mystery, which is often boring or tainted these days, you sit through “Get Out,” wondering at the beginning what is the point of it all. But then, as you keep on going, you find out its true intentions, and eat up the mystery the movie unfolds. “Get Out” is an entertaining example of that.
As the movie begins, Rose (Allison Williams from HBO’s “Girls”) is preparing to introduce her African American boyfriend Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) to her parents (Bradley Whitford and Catherine Keener) and brother (Caleb Landry Jones) at their private estate. As his tour commences, Chris notices that all their servants are African American, smiling, and talking in unusual ways. Rose’s mother (Keener) is a psychiatrist, who is able to hypnotize her patients. Chris, who is trying to quit smoking and move on from a painful memory, becomes her next patient. Every time she stirs her teacup, he falls in a deep trance. And when he wakes up, he knows something is up. Once you sink into the movie’s narrative, you’ll find out there is more to it.
The performances from Kaluuya, Whitford, and Keener are amazing; Kaluuya’s intelligence and Whitford and Keener’s true nature are what makes them so likable. And the movie’s comic relief character is Chris’ TSA friend Rod (LilRel Howery from TV’s “The Carmichael Show”), who starts to unfold the mystery of the smiling African Americans, while guessing they are sex slaves. I’ve never heard of Howery before, but seeing him in this, he may have a future.
“Get Out” was written and directed by Jordan Peele (from the comedy duo Key & Peele), whose last screenplay, “Keanu,” was not the hit he was hoping for. I liked that movie, and consider it a guilty pleasure, but sitting in the director’s chair for “Get Out,” he is really kicking it up a notch. He knows his chills and thrills, and even adds sly wit into the mix. I wish I could have felt the same way about Kevin Smith’s “Tusk.” Like I said, the beginning a little hard to grasp, but the more you watch it, the more satisfied you’ll be.
⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
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