Jordan Peele’s sophomore effort ‘Us’ is so hard to review because depending on your individual viewpoints and biases it can be interpreted so many ways. The only way it can’t be interpreted is on face value. Throughout the film one goes through the emotions of “What?”, “Oh, I get it”, “Uhhh?”, “OMG”, “That doesn’t make sense”, “What’s that mean?” And pretty much a dozen other feelings too numerous to mention. I can’t say one will walk away from this film satisfied, but you will walk away thinking and talking about this film for a long time to come. Despite that nebulous praise, I think it falls a bit short of Peele’s debut offering ‘Get Out’ from two years ago, but ‘Us’ is something to definitely be proud of and I think seals Peele as a new “it Director” in Hollywood.
‘Us’ opens in1986, complete with console TVs showing ads for ‘Hands Across America’ (do you remember that? Then you are showing your age). A young Adelaide Wilson is vacationing with her family on the Santa Cruz Boardwalk. The tone is eerie and dreamlike as Adelaide observes the revelers around her. Adelaide becomes separated from her father while he is playing a carnival game and wanders into a funhouse hall of mirrors. Peele shows his adeptness at creating horror and tension as Adelaide panics as she is unable to find her way out among the multiple reflections. When the images in the mirror stop mimicking Adelaide our terror increases with hers. At the end of the prologue, Adelaide sees something profoundly horrifying in one of the mirrors and we are left wondering what as we are whisked to present day.
The grown-up Adelaide (the beautiful Lupita Nyong’o) is grown and has a husband Wade (Winston Duke) and two adolescent children. She has obviously moved on from whatever childhood trauma she experienced. We realize Adelaide is not completely over what happened when Wade announces that he has arranged a vacation at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk with old friends of theirs (Kate Moss and Josh Tyler). In a quiet panic, Adelaide resists, but she is eventually talked into the trip on the condition they don’t go out at night. Even with those conditions, Adelaide starts noticing coincidences, each small, but too numerous to be inconsequential once they arrive. When finally one late evening, they are mysteriously confronted by another family of four in their driveway, they are taken hostage by what they come to realize are their evil doppelgängers. A premise that sounds cheesy as I write it, but effectively done with horror and surprising humor in Peele’s hands.
What follows is the predictable ‘Survive the night’ horror trope as the family escapes only to realize that the whole town has been invaded by each citizen’s evil doppelgänger. The film converts into a zombie film in the second act, but we never let go of the “WTH is going on?”, disorientation. Peele shows his love of the horror genre with his mix of horror and humor that he obviously grew up with. We see obvious clues and puzzle pieces everywhere of what is happening, but they don’t fit together easily for the audience… or at all. No matter what is happening, we struggle with understanding what is actually going on.
As the third act gets underway, Peele throws in the twists and turns. He starts answering questions, but his answers sometimes confuse us more than we were before the questions. The new ‘Twilight Zone’ series is narrated by Jordan Peele and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the revelations at the end very much reminds one of that TV series. There is a twist ending, but as I have said before, it leaves us more confused than satisfied. Maybe that was the intention. Your views and individual perspectives will determine how you interpret it.
No matter how well this film does or how it is received, Jordan Peele is no longer just a sketch comedy actor. He is a full fledged Hollywood director. Much like M Knight Shyamalan, Peele as a unique artistic vision that makes him a welcome change from current Hollywood cookie-cutter products. I won’t rate this film as high as ‘Get Out’, but I will give credit where credit is due. If you aren’t averse to horror movies, then I highly recommend you give this one a try. It won’t blow your mind, but it will definitely twist it a little.
I give this film *** out of 5 stars.
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