Jordan Peele’s ‘Us’ unapologetically distresses audiences while breaking the horror genre tropes
Jordan Peele’s Get Out was such a massive success that no one expected Peele’s follow-up to measure up, but Us is a truly great film and an entertaining addition to the horror genre.
Us begins a mysterious tragic moments during a summer trip to Santa Cruz and young Adelaide stops speaking and is truly damaged by the incident. While we’re unclear of what actually transpired, Lupita Nyong’o’s adult Adelaide is a strong mother of two and her family is headed back to that death. Gabe (Winston Duke), Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph) and Jason (Evan Alex) all bring interesting dynamics to the family until they come face to face with bizarre doppelgängers in a bizarre twist about tethering.
Each actor plays their doppelgängers as well and the performances are both mesmerizing and terrifying. Duke pulls off a healthy dose of humor for his part on Peele’s fast paced script. Us plays with stereotypes and cliches, finding ways to smash them along the way and keep the audiences off balance, yet thirsty for more.
Us has elements of The Shining, Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Jaws. Peele completely flips the horror film racial components with the African-American family being the protagonists while relegating the wealthy white friends (great performances by Elisabeth Moss and Tim Heidecker) as expendable characters.
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The film is full of spraying blood, shocking “jumps” and some laughs as Peele builds and builds for an M. Night Shyamalan moment.
Us gets 4 stars out of 5 stars
This isn’t quite Get Out quality, but the bar just got raised again for horror films.
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