"Get Out" - Horror Through Perspective | 5 Nights of Halloween #4

Get Out is a phenomenal film. It serves as a killer horror flick, but then also serves as a brilliant social commentary. And, in all honesty, it is quite humorous at times too. For our purposes today, we're ignoring the social commentary and just talking about the scary bits.

Written, produced, and directed by comedian Jordan Peele, the Oscar and BAFTA winning film tells the story of young black man, Chris Washington (played by Daniel Kaluuya) who goes to visit his white girlfriend's (played by Allison Williams) mother and father (Catherine Keener and Bradly Whitford respectively) at their estate in the countryside. As Chris explores the estate, he begins to realize that all is not as it seems to be.

Beware of spoilers. We're talking about the whole film here, and getting to specifics of the various twists of the plot. Caution is advised.

Daniel Kaluuya in Get Out

Get Out creates tension in an unique way. It develops fear through the worldview of its protagonist and the his particular perspective. How|? Simply because Chris is black. It's as simple as that. Starting from there, Peele slowly creates a terrifying story with a brand new twist.

The film takes a lot of inspiration from the 1967 feature Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, in which a white woman brings her black fiance to meet her parents for the first time. Take the race out of it and everyone relates. Get Out does the same thing. When Chris and Rose are on their way to Rose's parents place, Chris' fear is being "chased off the lawn with a shotgun". While this being a bit of a jest, it does show his initial fear of this new setting.

These fears are put to rest when we meet the parents. They are presented as liberal and good natured people. They don't seem to care about Chris' race. They make a few dumb comments, but nothing malicious. But this continues to build. As we meet more and more of Rose's rich, white friends and extended family, more and more of these stupid comments come out, and soon turn quite malicious.

And while that aspect of the film's tension builds, we are lulled into some security through two different characters. Rose, the girlfriend, and Jim, the art dealer.

Jim is a character introduced in the second act of the movie. In as scene involved a big family get
together in which the extent of Rose's family acts increasingly dumb around Chris, we meet a character who is not like the rest. Jim is aware of the stupidity of the other family members and recognizes the struggles of Chris. Jim has already figured all of this out.

Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) and Jim (Stephen Root)

In the same fashion, we trust Rose. While Chris is used to getting stupid comments like the ones he gets from Rose's family, Rose herself is not used to that. Throughout the film's first two acts she always comes back to Chris embarrassed by the antics of her family. Peele makes us trust Rose because she's just like many of the white viewers in the audience - bewildered.

Peele makes us trust these two more and more so we never see it coming - both of these characters are out to get Chris.

Originally, we were going to be told from the beginning that Rose is an enemy to Chris, but then Peele had another idea:

"And at some point I realized, wait a second - if you could pull some Keyser Söze shit, why would you not pull some Keyser Söze shit? So at that point it's like we're going to take the up on notch, if I can do the impossible and I can hide the fact that this woman is literally bringing him into harm's way - if I can hide the fact that she's in on it, then I'll have a really great revelation."

- Jordan Peele, on the Q&A with Jeff Goldsmith Podcast

We trust Rose because if she was in on it, while would she be complaining about her family so much. There would be no reason for it. She sympathizes with her boyfriend's experience and so we think she has to be the good guy. All of the stems from the specifics of the protagonist.

The horror of Get Out is a slow kind. There are some films which are scary from the get go. Something like The Babadook (which we'll talk about next time|) wastes no time getting into the horror elements. Get Out waits until the end of the second act to scare you. All of the elements need time to slowly build on one another so that the ending has any sort of weight. By the end, the stakes are high and the pressure is on.

Catherine Keener and Bradley Whitford in Get Out.

All of the cards are now on the table. We know who the enemies are and what Rose's family's true purpose is. But Get Out has one last trick up its sleeve. In a film riddled with twists, nothing is out of picture until the credits role. Earlier in the film, Rose and Chris have an unfortunate interaction with a racist police officer. After hitting a dear, the officer who comes to the scene of the crime is standoffish of Chris' race and think he must be the culprit. Rose gets in the way before anything truly harmful can happen, but the tension is certainly there.

In the final scene of the film, Chris has escaped Rose's family in a car and has a final showdown with Rose on the same stretch of road where they hit the dear in the beginning of the film. Chris stands over a dying Rose. Then lights. The flashing lights of a police cruiser. The first immediate threat to Chris becomes the last threat. But this is a movie of twists and this final scene is no exception. The officer doesn't step out. Instead it's Chris' friend Rod, who's been doing his own thing as the film goes on.

Get Out plays the long game when it comes to both its horror and the ending. While all the clues are there, the film takes its time in setting up a phenomenal ending. It uses the uncommon nature of our protagonist to create an excellent film riddled commentary, excellent characters, and some brilliant scares. We need more films like Get Out that are willing to subvert expectations to give us something so purely unique and original.


Up Next: The Babadook


Get Out quick facts
Written & Directed by: Jordan Peele
Starring: Daniel Kaluuya, Allison Williams, Catherine Keener, Bradley Whitford,
Run Time: 103 minutes
Released: February 24th, 2017