What would you do if extraterrestrial life suddenly revealed itself to you? What would your first thought be? In this age of craving Instafame and becoming TikTok hot, your natural instinct would be to find a way to monetize it. Get it on tape. Capture it on film. Do whatever it takes to get that “Oprah shot.” Murderous or otherwise, aliens make for great viral content. It is exactly what our heroes set out to do in this movie, and it might just be the most authentic response to “Holy shit, aliens!” that we’ve ever seen on screen.
Nope is brilliant. Nope is layered. Nope is strange as shit. It is a monster movie that will make you think. It is a summer spectacle with a quick wit and an almost crazed intellect. It is old fashioned and yet completely rooted in the now. It is proof that Jordan Peele might be the last Hollywood director who can deliver blockbuster popcorn fare that is also beautifully cerebral.
Horses in Motion
Nope introduces us to OJ (Daniel Kaluuya) and Em Haywood (Keke Palmer), the proprietors of Haywood Hollywood Horses, “the only black-owned horse trainers in Hollywood.” Their big claim to fame is that they are descendants of the unnamed jockey featured in Eadweard Muybridge’s late 19th-century images of a rider and horse; a foundational moment in cinema history that would make their great, great (great) grandfather, Alistair E. Haywood, the very first movie star.
The movie begins with brother and sister at loggerheads, disagreeing as to the future of their business, and struggling to cope with the tragic and untimely death of their father (Keith David). He is killed in a freak accident during the opening of this movie that leaves both siblings reeling in different ways: OJ retreats into himself while Em doubles down on her hustle.
But when strange things start happening in the sky, the siblings come together to take advantage of this mysterious opportunity (or “bad miracle” as OJ calls it) as a way to reclaim their Hollywood heritage, make a name for themselves, and save the family business.
There is absolutely no pretension here. This is a simple story about humanity and nature, about how we are formed by the tragedies of our past, and the sometimes grand gestures we need to take to move past them. This is all you need to know going into watch this movie. In fact, the best way to experience Nope is to sit in a darkened room and spend its runtime trying to figure out what’s going on.
Make You a Spectacle
Where Get Out and Us were intimate in scope and story, Nope is sprawling. Peele’s characters are still incredibly claustrophobic, each one lost within their own personal tragedies, only this time he places them in wide open spaces. He contrasts their closed off natures with the gorgeously rendered vistas of the California desert. He uses the boundless beauty of the vast open sky to evoke within them a sense of uncertainty and terror.
All of this is bolstered by five pitch perfect performances. Daniel Kaluuya is a once in a generation talent whose magnetic charm transcends the minimal dialogue he has in this movie. Keke Palmer’s infectious energy makes her a heroine you can’t help but root for. And then there’s Steven Yeun. Steven Yeun. Steven Yeun. The stunning Steven Yeun, who uses his Kodak smile and carny enthusiasm to hide much deeper traumas. Rounding up the cast is the scene stealing techie Angel, played by Brandon Perea, and Peele’s very own Quint, cinematographer Antlers Holst played by Michael Wincott, whose beautiful eccentricity speaks to one of Nope’s underlying themes about the power of cinema.
Don’t Look Up!
Jordan Peele’s encyclopedic knowledge of cinema provides the foundations upon which Nope is built. This magnificent treatise on Black erasure, surveillance culture, and our fixation with fame, that is also a denunciation of our exploitation of wild animals for entertainment, a reappropriation of the American Western, and an uncompromising celebration of movies, might just be his most clever and complex work yet.
Peele wears his influences on his sleeve. Even so, it would be a mistake to say that Nope is in any way derivative of the movies that it reminds you of. Yes, it is unflinchingly Spielbergian. Sure there are moments that mimic the casual silliness of Ron Underwood’s Tremors. And there’s no mistaking the origins of that infamous bike slide shot. From Akira to Neon Genesis: Evangelion, from Close Encounters of the Third Kind to Jaws, from Alfred Hitchcock to Christopher Nolan, Peele has absorbed everything that has come before, he nods at it, he uses it, he builds upon it, in order to create something that is utterly thrilling and completely original.
Nope has a lot more pageantry that any of Peele’s previous movies, but none of that detracts from the intricacy of his work. His ability to balance thought-provoking ideas with the spectacular demands of large scale moviemaking is second to none.
Nope isn’t a slow burn. It is deliberately paced. There isn’t a single moment in this movie that doesn’t belong. Every frame is perfectly composed, with every element – performance, dialogue, colour, composition, music – contributing to the narrative. Start peeling back those layers and you will find that every object on screen means something. Therein lies the real thrill of every Jordan Peele movie. In dissecting and deciphering all of the parts that make for this magnificent whole.
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