I didn’t know what to make of this movie when I watched the trailer.
I could tell it was an inter-racial couple; going by the old but increasingly irrelevant term that characterised a black white intimate relationship. An African-American man, Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) is dating a white woman, Rose Armitage (Allison Williams). Ok, I thought, looks interesting.
Initially, judging by the title of the Movie: Get Out, I was immediately drawn to the old 1980s Eddie Murphy stand up comedy performance (Check it on Youtube) talking about scary movies. Whereby white people tend to stay in haunted houses and how black people, upon hearing a demonic spirit exclaim: “Get Out!” They would hightail it out of there.
But no, this movie has no ghosts and if Get Out means anything, it appropriately means: escape – run for your life.
In the same generic themes as The Stepford Wives and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner; Rose is bringing her black boyfriend to meet her wealthy professional up-state parents for the first time (played by Bradley Whitford and Catherine Keener). She is very liberal, intolerant of racism, even from police officers, and thinks it unnecessary to mention race at all to her parents (who can argue with that?)
This movie was craftily written and well directed by Jordan Peele, who is one of the creative talents of the successful comedy duo: Key & Peele.
Most people would probably view Get Out as a horror movie; whereby a young unsuspecting man is drawn to a remote out-of-the-way trap to fall victim to a group of sociopaths with sick experimental tendencies that would make Nazi eugenicists proud. But, I think there is much more to Get Out than appears on the surface.
I saw way too many metaphors throughout the movie to simply typecast it as a standard run-of-the-mill disturbing scare flick. Apart from being a horror/suspense story its main story telling device is satire; the use of irony, exaggeration and, especially, the ridiculing of generally held social, political or racial beliefs.
Many commonly held views in both the African American and wider Community are subtly dealt with in the story, via metaphors. Some that were quite prevalent e.g.
* How successful black men are being seduced, controlled, compromised and destroyed by predatory Jezebel-type white women; and in turn
* Black men date white women in order to raise their social status, albeit reluctantly, (or, in turn, white women think they secretly harbour a desire to be intimate with them); and how
* Modern Slavery Auctions still exist in modified forums for fine physical specimens of black men: also
*Black people are hypnotised (controlled) by unscrupulous whites into foregoing who they truly are using their troubled past, social disadvantage to control their minds and bodies; whilst
* Black people are losing (selling out) their culture and becoming (behaving, dressing and talking) ‘White’ in order to succeed in mainstream (code for: White) society; and how
* Black people are losing a sense of themselves to conform but the ‘real’ them is being subjugated or suppressed below the surface;
* The movie also shows how classical and neo-liberalism (Left paternal acceptance) is just as demeaning and degrading to black people as intolerant right wing racism. Self-respecting men and women simply seek acceptance for who they are not what they are.
The parents highlight their social distinction (they would’ve voted for Obama a third time if they could) by suggesting they are tolerant ‘good’ white people (they do employ black domestic help after all) who don’t judge people – but do exactly that – out of disguised concern and pity (a remnant of the Guilt Industry) masked as familiarity and kindness. All the while done to get black people to lower their guard so nefarious Whites, with an agenda, can get close enough to hurt and control them.
These messages were subtly embedded, ridiculed, or humorously dealt with, throughout the story; thereby creating a unique movie genre of horror and racial satire.
Black/White relationships, the above widespread beliefs were cleverly satirised throughout the movie.
A powerful scene in this movie is near the end when in the dead of night we see a cop car roll up the driveway of the country estate to a violent bloody scene. Everyone in the audience knows this doesn’t look good for the dishevelled black man standing. Why? Because in that moment we revealed our latent prejudices and racial stereotypes in one go: that even an innocent black man will automatically be suspected of wrong-doing when he is standing, hands raised, in a crime scene (you need only visit Youtube to see that even holding up raised hands will not guarantee police in America will not shoot). The issues raised in this scene, highlighted by the Black Lives Matter movement in recent years, has certainly impacted the world’s consciousness.
The screenplay is so well done that whatever perspective you take (that’s its genius) you’ll still enjoy the movie; destined to be a cult-classic.
4 Stars.
Written & Directed by Jordan Peele.
