Rating of
3/4
NOPE - Review
Matthew Brady - wrote on 12/31/22
“This dream you're chasing, where you end up at the top of the mountain, all eyes on you... it's the dream you never wake up from.”
Nope? How about hell yeah!
‘Nope’ is a slow-paced Sci-Fi horror movie that takes the alien genre and turns it into something more contemplative. When I say slow-paced, I mean it is patient and leaves the audience questioning what specific imagery they are seeing means. I had more fun reading about the meaning after the movie was over.
It’s a visual spectacle that also analysis how people take a tragic event and turn it into wonder. Or how we abuse mother nature for our selfish gain. Everything from turning a tragedy or an ugly time in history and making a profit, while the sufferers get nothing. We, as the audience, want to see what we know we shouldn't see but cannot help it. Our imaginations run wild, yet we crave confirmation. The movie asks complex questions that have yet to be answered.
The movie is a mixture of ‘Jaws’, ‘Signs’, and ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’, but a Jordan Peele joint. The movie takes a while to get going, and yet, when it does, it is out of this-world tense.
Everything from a technical standpoint is stellar. The cinematography and the sound work were the highlights for me, especially the alien voice being filtered screams which elevate it from being a flying predator to something almost Lovecraftian.
I loved how they filmed the dark-blueish night-time scenes, as it was originally filmed in the daytime and then made it look like night-time; it felt very like Steven Spielberg, in some sense.
The alien, known as Jean Jacket, is unique in its design, as it is not anything that's been done before and subverts expectations of what we imagine as a UFO. It’s portrayed more like an animal than anything else. The rainy blood scene involving the house where the alien empties its digestive system is creatively scary and shows off how dangerous this threat is.
In the performances, everybody was engaging and had memorable character traits. Keke Palmer brought fiery energy, while Daniel Kaluuya was more grounded and the strong silent type with personal baggage. Michael Wincott plays a filmmaker that is never satisfied with the work he produces and will go to great lengths to achieve the “perfect” shot. Most of his lines and scenes have stuck with me long after I saw the movie. Steven Yeun plays a character that is the most troubled of them all; he is a man who repeats a fatal mistake and does not learn his lesson, something we are all guilty of doing.
Not sure where to rank this one compared to Jordan Peele’s other work. He is three movies in, and I think he is one of cinema's most enthralling and fresh voices. Hopefully, he doesn’t go down the road that M. Night Shyamalan with ego. While not flawless, I'm still looking forward to whatever he does next.
Overall rating: This was dope.
