Fim Review: NOPE

...If Jordan Peele's next film is called "Come On, You're Joking", I'll have called it. Anyhow...

Hey, fun fact before I properly start this, um, odd review: The movie theater I go to hangs posters for upcoming films relatively high above the path towards the theaters, and they're also relatively small posters too. So for the longest time, I would see this poster for NOPE up there, and with distance + the generally dark look of the picture, until the trailers I had no idea the thing floating in the sky was a horse.

Actually, I think there's something to be said of this film's marketing, where everything was kept fairly vague and cryptic. You may have some idea of what's going on, but there's too little in the trailers to actually piece it all together. There was an air of mystery to the entire thing, and God damn it - I wished Hollywood did that more often nowadays, because that's the exact reason why I went to see this film. I was intrigued, I wanted to see what the Hell that was all about, they got my butt in a seat to view the spectacle they had crafted.

(Another fun tidbit of info: The title they went with for the Quebec dub of the film is "Ben non", which roughly translates to "Come on", usually on the tone of "You're kidding me" or something along those lines. Hence my quip at the very beginning.)

It's very hard for me to say anything about the film that won't spoil part of it, and for once I do want to uphold the marketing's mysterious nature around it, so you might think that the plot recap is a little dry - it's on purpose. This is the story of the Haywood siblings, O.J. (Daniel Kaluuya) and Emerald (Keke Palmer), who are the descendants of the Black man riding a horse, their great-great-greatgrandfather, on the first piece of film ever created. They inherited the ranch after their father's death six months prior. Their ranch used to rent horses to Hollywood studios for various productions, but lately they've struggled to make ends meet. The best they get, by this point, is loaning horses to the cowboy-themed amusement park operating nearby, which is owned by an ex-child star (Steven Yeun). After their latest business venture fails, the Haywoods get together at the family home. Following a power outage of only a few seconds, they start to notice very bizarre things, which seem to be happening in the skies above them...

And that's where I stop.

The film is somewhat odd in its construction. I promise that, much like the marketing, the first 30 or so minutes will leave you completely confused, and some of the early scenes only start making sense once you realize the film's message. It also feels more slow-paced than the average Hollywood film, with the scene taking its time to be set before the important events of the plot kick in. Even then, things sort of remain slow while characters either attempt to figure out the nature of the supernatural elements at play, or find themselves basically powerless to confront them. But slow is good, because it creates an ambiance and a tone that really make the reveals later down the line all the more satisfying.

Another decision that may feel odd to viewers at first glance is how the film is cut into "chapters", so to speak, all titled with the name given to an animal in the film (mostly the Haywoods' horses, such as Lucky, Clover or Ghost). Like all other aspects, this eventually makes sense in the end.

Acting's solid, and all the characters are likeable - even many of those that get killed, a horror movie necessity, don't give the impression that they deserve it. You'll either appreciate the pacing, or feel that it's too slow for a considerable chunk of the film and too fast once we approach the climax. That's probably not going to click with everyone. That said, the horror scenes are definitely memorable. And if you walk into the theater with the tidbits from the trailer fresh in mind, you'll wonder just how exactly they combine into a single story - and as happened to me, you'll be pleasantly surprised to see those pieces fall into place.

I recommend this film, and I hope I didn't reveal too much - seriously, it's worth checking out, especially if you were as intrigued by the concept and marketing as I was.