‘Get Out’ is one of those films you can’t just watch once and move on. This is due to there being so many little details scattered throughout the film that you cannot pick them all up on initial viewing. I’ve only seen it three times and I feel like there is still a whole other layer I haven’t cracked yet. The film follows Chris, a black man, who is meeting his white girlfriend’s family for the first time. Throughout the first interactions there are played out race related quips that Rose’s parents, especially her father, say to Chris, creating a slight hostility in the air, which you ideally don’t want when meeting your possible future in laws. But again, this is something we have seen in almost any film featuring a biracial couple, which writer/director Jordan Peele uses to his advantage throughout the film. This point is further driven during the party sequence in which Chris is subjected to even more of these off putting comments.
But it is because of these tropes that Peele uses that viewers who had no idea what the film was about going into it, I only knew it was about Chris meeting Rose’s family, that the final act of the film is truly horrifying. It is a horror film after all, I’m talking to you Golden Globes. How could audiences have seen this coming? Rose’s family brain swaps their friend’s and family’s brains into black bodies because they feel they are most ideal? And they argue that it is progressive? How backwards can these people be? Just thirty minutes ago they were making typical quips towards Chris, so how could it become something so horrible so quickly? Well perhaps the sinister nature of these characters can been interpreted as early on as out initial introduction to Rose.
On my second viewing, I saw the opening car crash scene in a completely different way. By now everyone who has seen the movie has made the connection of the deer throughout the film. There’s one that dies in the opening and of course the deer head that Chris uses to finally take down Rose’s father during the final sequence. But the conversation I want to focus on in the beginning is the one between Chris, Rose, and the police officer that comes to their aid after the accident. When the officer asks for his ID, Chris goes along with it until Rose starts to protest that he wasn’t the one driving. I initially saw this as an example for the audience to see that Rose is aware of the racial discrimination in society. But during my second viewing I thought about this interaction being much more sinister. What if Rose was protesting so they couldn’t trace Chris after he went missing?
I know I am far from being the first one to discover this, but it is still a great example of how Peele uses our knowledge of society and media against us. Since this film came out at a time where police brutality against black people is a hot topic, of course many, if not all viewers saw this a Rose being aware too. This interaction is an excellent example of how Peele uses our own knowledge to make the twist even more surprising, despite the fact that he was giving us clues the entire time.
The film is up for four Oscars, Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. I have a feeling that it will win the latter as all the evidence you need is watching the film more than once to pick up on all the things you missed before. I hope that Peele wins Best Director as well, since for his directorial debut for a feature, he did an outstanding job. As for Best Picture, I would say that it is easily in the top three of my favorite films of this year, but it does have some stiff competition this awards season.