Review: Nope (2022)

“This spectacle, it’s going to change you.”

Jordan Peele’s third feature film has surpassed all form of expectations that I had before watching it. This film definitely tops Us (2019) and even Get Out (2017) for me by a very long shot. It feels like Peele is finally able to let loose, to create something that not only able to stand on the shoulders of giants, such as Spielberg’s Jaws, but to deliver something wholeheartedly original and nuanced.

Just like Peele’s previous movies, Nope puts racial prejudice at the center of the film. The whole film revolves around this idea of putting someone, or in this case, something, in a box. To strip them of what they are and label them as solely one thing instead of many. This theme is shown multiple times throughout the film, like how the Gordy’s incident is a result of the chimpanzee bursting out of its ‘box’ it’s been confined to for so long, and how Jupe’s experience of being stripped of what he really is ever since he’s a child, eventually led him to the same fate as the people that put him there in the first place.

This, in turn, results in people that are marginalized by the ‘box’ to go on an endless pursuit of chasing the money shot, chasing the spectacle, so that they can be seen as something more than one thing. The chase for the top of the mountain is, as Holst have said, “A dream you never wake up from”

That in the pursuit of illusionary greatness perpetuated by racial oppression, lies a giant black hole in the sky that will eventually consume us and spit out the parts that are unwanted.

As I watched this film, it feels like the true nature of the events that unfold are hidden from me, that the film is holding back on something that I deserve to see. But this is exactly the point, we as consumers have been so desensitized by violence, tragedy and the concept of spectacle itself that we can’t help but to want to see more. We want to see how the chimpanzee mauled the actress, we want to know why the alien is here, and we want an understanding of something that we’re supposed to run from.

This need for an explanation directly translates to the film’s depiction of grief, of how sudden the death of Keith David’s character, Otis Haywood Senior, impacted his son. OJ’s need for a meaningful explanation and closure of his dad’s death and Emerald’s meaningless chase of fame and glory, directly puts both of them in the same sinking ship. Sometimes things just happen and obsessing about why they happened often leads to our own demise.

In terms of technicalities, this film delivers the best visuals out of Peele’s filmography. The wide shot of the landscape and the sky are just breath-taking to look at and it truly gives an immense sense of scale to the movie. Acting-wise, Keke Palmer and Daniel Kaluuya gives one of the best performances of the year, their chemistry is just so fun to watch, and they might be my favorite siblings in any horror films. Not to mention, the movie itself is very scary and heart-pounding at times, especially the scene where the alien is intimidating our main characters.

I haven’t even begun talking about the alien itself or how it could be an embodiment of grief and spectacle that have always been lurking in the clouds, waiting for the right moment to strike. I guess that’s what’s so special about this movie, how it can be a lot of things at the same time. It can be just another movie where a group of misfits hunts an alien, but if you decide to look closer, you might just see something you’re not supposed to.