Nope Review

Jordan Peele’s highly anticipated horror Nope is finally in theaters! This time, Peele reteams with Oscar winner Daniel Kaluuya and brings in the talented Keke Palmer, Oscar-nominated Steven Yeun, and newcomer Brandon Perea to round out the cast.  With a talented cast and his largest budget to date, does Peele’s third film live up to audiences’ immense expectations?

What’s it about? 

Nope focuses on the Haywood family, who are ranchers and professional Hollywood horse trainers.  The patriarch Otis Haywood Sr. (Keith David) is abruptly killed by debris falling from the sky from a mysterious “plane crash.”  OJ (Daniel Kaluuya) and Em (Keke Palmer) are left to keep the Haywood horse business going.  OJ feels responsible for carrying on his dad’s legacy, but his introverted, quiet disposition doesn’t work well with Hollywood types.  Em is full of personality and charisma, has little interest in the business, and is unreliable.  This causes a slight rift between the two.

But that rift doesn’t last long because a UFO is circling their ranch!  OJ experiences a sighting while attending to a lost horse and tells Em what he sees.  Are they terrified? Sure, but they also are broke, and their family business is struggling.  Em sees this as an opportunity to make some serious cash for the family. If OJ and Em can get good footage of the UFO, they can use that money to save the business.  However, the UFO is in the area for something much more nefarious.

My Reaction.

When I saw the second trailer for Nope, I thought that it uncharacteristically gave too much of the plot away. Part of director Jordan Peele’s charm is his film’s mystique. After seeing Nope, I believe that the movie’s mystique is still intact. The plot goes to some unexpected places that make the threat to the Haywood family more immediate.

However, the movie’s plot twist isn’t the reason to see this film.  Peele’s team accomplished some very creative visuals and breathtaking cinematography.  Like other Jordan Peele properties, there doesn’t feel like there was a shot that wasn’t purposeful.  Peele proves that his imagination and creativity are scalable and, hopefully, his 100–150-million-dollar movie will soon come.

Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer’s chemistry is excellent.  I like that the characters’ relationships weren’t extreme. Frequently films fall into tropes of having the siblings hate each other or on the opposite ends of the spectrum.  But Peele wrote these characters to be much more nuanced.  They bicker and fight like siblings do but also have tremendous loyalty to each other. OJ and Em are, in some ways, complete opposites of each other and yet fit perfectly together.  

Keke Palmer really delivers here.  She showed some range with her performance and didn’t wilt while acting alongside Academy Award-recognized talent. She has been working a lot recently, but I hope this role elevates her options even further. Like the bump that Get Out gave Daniel Kaluuya, I can see Palmer springboarding into even more projects.

Steven Yeun and Branda Parea are great in their supporting roles as well. Yeun’s role as Jupe is understated, as he deals with the trauma he experienced as a child-tv star while profiting on people’s curiosity surrounding that trauma. You don’t know if Yeun is someone to be trusted or not, as Yeun succeeds in making his character likable and yet suspicious.  Yeun doesn’t have much screen time but does a lot with the space allotted to him.  Parea’s character is a lot more straightforward. He is responsible for the audience’s comic relief and plays that role well, especially when engaging with Keke’s character on screen.

Nope does have some underlying themes, but they are not as prevalent as they are in Peele’s previous work.  Nope has something to say about the toxicity of Hollywood and the commodification of viral moments in general.  The cliché Hollywood cultural stamps such as shallow relationships and fake interactions have seeped into other aspects of the larger society.  There seems to be a warning of destruction if society continues down this path.  Maybe the most direct jab at this could be Peele quoting the biblical verse, “I will pelt you with filth, I will treat you with contempt and make you a spectacle.” (Nahum 3:6).  Are we making spectacles of ourselves? Who knows.

What I do know is that there wasn’t time to focus too much on underlying themes because I was worried about how the Haywoods would survive night-to-night.  For the movie title being Nope, these characters seem to scream YES to danger. Instead, due to financial circumstances, desire for fame, or both, these characters keep poking the bear that is this UFO.  

Overall Rating.

Nope is really good.  It is not as great as Get Out or trippy as Us, but it is his most visually impressive film and most traditional when it comes to horror. I hesitate to use the word “traditional” as his approach to shooting scenes is highly creative and does add something to the genre. Couple that with some great performances and a thrilling ending, and I give an enthusiastic “Yes!” to seeing Nope in theaters.