Us

While the 2017 film Get Out was a huge success for once comedic writer now turned horror director Jordan Peele, he was slightly dismayed that his own film suffered a case of ‘’genre confusion’’. Being someone who seems to love pop culture and has a great understanding of how to incorporate several different genres into a specific movie, his next film was going to be something a lot more directly specific and more importantly, openly scary as opposed to something like Get Out which was more psychologically unnerving. With a concept appropriately creepy and just a few years after the release of his last film, the 2019 slasher-esque film, Us goes for more full-on horror rather than the existentialistic horror, but still features several great updates and changes to a classic formula that made his past work so successful. Returning to Santa Cruz, California with her family,  Adelaide (played by Lupita Nyong’o) is weary about the trip after a traumatic incident involved getting lost and stalked in a hall of mirrors on the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk caused her to withdraw from her parents, she is willing to make this vacation work with her husband Gabe (played by Winston Duke), teenage daughter Zora (played by Shahadi Wright Joseph) and son Jason (played by Evan Alex). Like a perfect lightning strike of ironic circumstances, the family is confronted by a family of four dressed in red garbs and carrying dangerous weapons in their driveway, and only after being attacked by them do they notice that look identical to each one of them. These doubles are called The Tethered, clones of people who are forced to exist and live opposed to their originals without their own free will. Now on the surface and ready to take over, the family is forced to escape their own clones, as well as the rest of the world, and survive while being chased by someone who figuratively, and very literally, thinks exactly like them. Us is nothing like its predecessor yet remains as a vastly well-made horror movie with very effective suspense, tension, creativity, and tons of social commentary to chew onto. While it may stumble a touch in regard to its screenplay and conclusion, Us is another great addition to Jordan Peele’s line-up with fantastic acting, a perfect creepy idea, good shots, great music, and plenty of allusions to classic scary movies and shows.

The hardest task that Jordan Peele had to accomplish with this movie was to not only try and create a film that is 100% different from his last movie to avoid falling into a repetitive formula, but also craft a narrative that is not only clever and insightful but also with material that works in a proper horror environment and not one that just has creepy subtext. With a heavier focus on scares, the film could have easily committed itself to being a standard predictable slasher with a hint of a clever edge, but it could be argued that the movie almost went too far with how much is tucked beneath the surface of this film. The concept of clones taking over their original person’s life is nothing new; even going as far back as the Twilight Zone episode ‘’Mirror Image’’ made in the 1960s, but thankfully much like what Peele did previously, the use of the clones is more a commentary on several lifestyle aspects of current America; the importance and blind obedience to privilege and remedial goods, the separation of class and poverty, the effects of classism and marginalization, duality of American society, etc, it all fits perfectly with the concept and takes from a sci-fi stable and makes it realistic in order to create something familiar but still terrifying. The film is also pleasantly scary without having to rely on any jump scares or loud noises, but by having legitimate good build-up, suspense and perfectly creepy performances that make people squirm in their seats. The film may have been a little overly ambition with how much it packs into its one concept; directly going against Get Out’s more straightforward but brilliantly creepy twist, this one is effective and has seeds planted throughout, but requires a touch too many questions for it to be as flawless or as digestible as the previous twist. Also, the opening section of the film is pretty corny and not always the best acted, but when its horror game starts rolling, that is when it starts to get good.

As stated before, the acting within the opening segment of the film is not as good a representation as what would be given later on. None of the main four family members really talk like a family and their chemistry feels much more like co-workers than a loving family unit and when it’s a major focus of your film, it can be a touch distracting. With that said though, these performers are at their best when they are in the horror situation as every single one of them is perfect when the gloves are removed, and the scissors come out. Lupita Nyong’o as the lead heroine and as the main antagonist is brilliantly effective. Already being an actress that feels pretty criminally underrated, her delivery in this movie as both characters feels vastly different from most of her other work and everybody agreed she was easily the best part of the film (with many even getting upset she wasn’t nominated for an Oscar). Her role as the lead is nice and believable and allows for some great moments at the end where she breaks the usual motherly demeanour and goes more feral, and her performance as the tethered clone is downright chilling in moments with her deathly voice, stiff moments and perfectly insane facial features allowing for some great moments throughout and the twist surrounding her is legitimately sad (if, as stated before, a little hard to follow and starts to not make sense once you properly look into it). The rest of the family are clearly having a lot of fun playing their counterparts with how basically evil they can portray them as. It feels like the goofily scary tone of the film benefits in this moments particularly, as everybody is allowed to go a little bit over-the-top with some of their performances, but they are held back just enough so that they still feel legitimately threatening with how they command themselves, from Winston Duke’s animalistic demeanour, to Shahadi Wright’s doll like smile, and Evan Alex’s feral animalistic pose and presence, each of them truly feel like separate entities despite being the exact same person and that is a sign of good acting. The cameo appearances of other clones allow for some variety outside of the family and also leads to a lot of great mugging from some talented actors, particularly Elisabeth Moss, who is clearly having as the friendly but still privileged friend of the family.

While Get Out was able to use its pristine home environment and classy atmosphere to heighten the tension of the film perfectly leading to its closing points, this film goes for a more outgoing Santa Cruz hip hop pop culture type vibe, allowing the film to go a bit more old-school and engross itself within a style that feels pretty spot on to a casual horror movie, with famous settings, symbols, and allusions to various pop culture icons, famous horror movies and even several cultural changes. It leaves the physical symbolism not being nearly as prominent, but it helps out on the verbal side with phrases that have double meanings and would later be called back to later on. The camerawork by cinematographer Mike Gioulakis, is effective and has its fair share of cool shots, but it never feels to distracting to take away from the atmosphere of the moment, which is essential in a horror film. The writing for the film allows the film to have a realistic enough edge that it can be bought as a horror setting but with that added touch of awareness of what they are referencing to. The humour in the film is something that can take people a while to fully understand its purpose as overall it is nothing that special or even really that effective. It’s not meant for laughs; it’s meant for levity. It’s a break in the storm of stressful often very intense moments that happen throughout this movie, and without it the film could have become a slog to get through. In certain moments when they stakes are not high, this method still isn’t too effective, especially with the father in the beginning which starts to get irritating after a while, but as the film progresses it flows a lot better, and the tone doesn’t clash with it in any way. The mixing and editing of the really solid musical score by Michael Abels allow for some great comedic moments involving a certain smart app and even some legitimately intense, scary, and even cool moments especially with the climax.

Us didn’t need to be as amazing as Get Out, but there would have obviously been some harsh pressure behind the film to at least be a favourable follow-up and it very much paid off in that department. The concept is taken advantage of in a big way, the acting is insanely entertaining and great at being creepy, the commentary is interesting and creative even if it’s a bit crowded, and the handling of the story is a bit confusing but overall filled with a lot of great moments, ideas, visuals, and atmosphere. Us could become as much of a stable to horror as Get Out has become to more psychologically-intense thrillers, and while it’s not to the same level of ingeniousness as that film as its handling of a complex idea through a fashion that is outlandish but can be grasped rather quickly is a bit stronger than this film which has a more comprehensible twist, but starts to lose sense the more things are explained about it. The film that tries to promote harmony and civility in the bloodiest way possible, Us (or U.S. which becomes more obvious as the film keeps going) is definitely worth a viewing.