A bloodied chimp is on the set of a sitcom with a body strewn across the floor close to him, then the chimp turns and faces the screen. Not the opening I was expecting, but it sure caught my attention. Then we are back in modern time, and we are on a ranch with O.J and his dad. They are doing their normal duties around the farm, when it goes silent, and the electronics stop working. Then it sounds like hail starts to pelt the ground and metal fence, but one of the objects hits O.J’s dad, and he falls off the horse, and he dies shortly after. A nickel had fallen from the sky and sliced his face/eye. This was blamed on an airplane unloading unexpectedly, but O.J did not believe this, something else was afoot.
This leaves O.J as the owner of the ranch and the family business of renting out horses to be in shoots for commercials and movies, but he is not much of a people person, so he calls in his overly energetic sister, who is not the most reliable. When they get back to the farm after a shoot going wrong, strange occurrences continue to happen, and O.J explains to Em, his sister, that he thinks he saw a UFO. Both of them being in dire straights and in need of a serious influx of cash, decide to try and capture it on video, initially just with the help of Fry’s Electronics and one of their staff members, Angel, but then they get one of the best cinematographers, Antler Holst, to come and try to capture their monster on film, and he came loaded with a film camera that does not require any electronics to run, so it should be able to capture it. If they survive.
Jordan Peele has quickly become one of the most popular directors contemporarily. He is only on his third film, Nope, and even after only having three films out for his career, he has been granted the title of being a great of horror auteur. An impressive feat, and his movies are considered must see, so they are a big draw to the box office. (It beat out Thor this weekend) Peele got off to a great start, with his first release, Get Out. It was so excellent, that it gained enough traction to almost make it into the Oscars as a best picture contender, but sadly horror does not get the credit it deserves in the awards world typically. Peele makes movies with grand messages around them. They all seem to be pointing at grand flaws in society, but they do so in a terrifying way, which makes it all the better.
The overarching message in Nope seems to be pointing out that people are exploiting things that should not be exploited, and that it usually ends poorly. This starts with the opening scene of the chimp attacking the sitcom family, because wild animals are not made to be on sitcom sets, they are made to be in the WILD! If this was the real world, this incident would have been the cause for shows to start having hired security on hand to tranquilize animals if they attempted something like this.
Then with the UFO creature, Jupe tried to use it as a part of his wild west show, to help him make money, but it ended up eating him and all the members of the audience. Finally, when O.J and his crew tried to capture it on film, it led to multiple deaths. Predators are not meant to be exploited, and this is not just a reference to animals. This lesson was also supposed to be widespread across all forms of media. There was the live show where everyone got eaten. Then a TMZ reporter showed up to O.J’s farm right as they were trying to lure the UFO, and it ended badly for the media member trying to film people without their permission. It also ended badly for the master cinematographer. So it does not matter if you are trying to make high art cinema or just trying to run a dumpy side show, do not exploit predatory violence.
One of the take aways, that I have not heard discussed about this movie is about the encroachment of humans into wild spaces leading to violence by the animals. In Nope, the UFO might not have been a native species to the Californian foothills, but who knows, it could be a modern sasquatch story. They never explicitly said where it came from, so that could have been its home terrain. It did not seem interested in expanding its hunting radius. In the outer world these conflicts are becoming more and more prevalent. Not with UFOs, but with wild animals attacking due to the encroachment of people and the constant expansion of developed land. Sadly in the real world when the attacks occur, the animals often get chased down and killed, even though they are just trying to protect themselves. It is quite the conundrum.
The acting in this movie was very good, and it all started with Daniel Kaluuya as O.J. He played a surly rancher, and there was something about him that exuded unhappiness and a sense of hopelessness. There is just a certain look in his eyes that no one else could replicate, and he does a good job of saying, “Nope,” which is a necessary since that is the title. Steve Yeun’s character also worked well as a storyteller and a show man, and when he would stare off in the distance and reflect on his tragic past, it always worked. Then there was Em, played by Keke Palmer, who brought the energy and emotion. If things were going great, she was all in, and when they were going poorly, she was vocally opposed and ready to run.
The Monster in this movie was interesting and atypical. At first it seems like it is an alien run UFO, but eventually it is discovered to be a sentient being in itself. The UFO is consuming the people and horses, and it regurgitates the metal that the people had on them. It is never explained what it is, and it has no way in which to communicate, at least none that the people knew of. The only thing that they really figured out about it, was that it goes after things that look it in the eye, and that it did not like to eat things that were big and plastic. Towards the end, it transforms into some mega beast with ribbons streaming off of it, but there is no explanation why this happened or what it meant for the monster. The most terrifying scene with the monster in it came from the moment where it showed the people being “eaten.” They were sucked into a vertical tight passage way that was constricting them in a claustrophobia inducing way.
The first time I went and saw a movie in the 4DX, I was beyond disappointed. It was Marvel's The Eternals, which was a two plus hour slog, and I was being shaken in my seat way too much. It was like rubbing salt in a wound, not only did the movie suck, but it really wanted to irritate me by constantly having me be thrown around. Since then, I have refused to go back to a 4DX movie.
On Fridays, I like to go to the movies right after work, and there was only one showing that fit the slot, and of course it was in the 4DX theater, so I decided to give it another chance. I thought maybe since it was a less action-packed flick that it would not be as jostling. Thankfully I was right. Also I was incredibly tired, and Nope was over two hours, so even if it was really good, the chances of me coming close to nodding off were really high. This made the periodic shake and spray of water more welcomed because it kept me focused on the film. There were a few low spots that I came close to getting groggy, but I preserved.
I still do not think that the 4DX experience is great. It is definitely not worth the extra eight dollars for the ticket I had to pay on top of my unlimited subscription. The few extra dollars for the RPX is okay, and so is the seven extra for the imax, but the eight for that, is insane. I get that it costs more money to set-up the crazy seats and water sprayers and such, but I would like to meet a person who finds that enjoyable and tell them that they are wrong. The best part was the smoke machine they had at the front that they played at certain times, that was cool, except for the one time where they put out too much smoke, and it made the screen hard to see.
Overall I like this movie, it had points where it was really entertaining, but it also had moments that were very slow moving. There were also parts where it felt very incoherent. It is a very hard movie to describe and try to break down. It is shot beautifully though. There were many shots that stuck in my head. They use vast landscapes, and the lighting always seems to be perfect. One of my favorite shots was a still of the house after the UFO had rained blood down upon it. It looked perfect for the set of a murder house in a slasher. I could see this being a movie that is very contentious on whether people like it or not. It is different from Peele’s first two movies, but it does still feel like a Peele film. You must see it, so you can form your own opinion. Do not let the horror genre scare you, because there is barely anything scary in the movie, it is more suspenseful than anything. I originally gave it 3 stars, but I bumped it up to 3.5. A day after seeing it, I still feel like I am digesting what I saw, which is a good thing for a movie.
Other Movies This Week:
The Gray Man: A Netflix action movie that fits the mold of a Netflix action movie.
Bob's Burgers Movie: Nothing special about this tv show made movie. It does have some laughs, but it does have too much bad singing. Maybe if you are a fan of the show you will like it?
New Rankings:
Nope: 3.5 Stars
Bob's Burgers Movie: 2.5 Stars
The Gray Man: 2.5 Stars
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