Review: Get Out Is As Scary As It Is Funny
- Apr 26, 2017
- 2 min read
As I waited for the film to begin a poster was projected onto the screen. It read, as expected, Get Out. I probably should have followed that advice.
Chis (Daniel Kaluuya) is about to visit his girlfriend's parents. Rose (Allison Williams) tries to convince him that everything will be fine but Chris has his doubts, he is black after all. When he arrives it quickly becomes apparent that all is not as it seems, but what exactly is going on?
Horror comedy is a genre I enjoy, at least when it's done well. Evil Dead 2, Braindead, Shaun of the Dead, Black Sheep and many more. But what does it take to be a good horror comedy? Well, it's in the name. There has to be scary parts, there has to be funny parts and they have to work together. When a horror comedy is neither funny nor scary it tends to become strange and dull, case in point, Get Out.
What should be an enjoyable story with plenty of laughs stemming from the pure absurdity of it's plot is instead an hour and forty five minutes of poor racial parallels, stupid characters doing stupid things and a decent fifteen minute which also happens to be the last fifteen minutes of the movie. An over-reliance on jump scares sets the tone early on. You won't be afraid, just aggravated. A stereotypical fat black man in a movie that claims to be against such things shows a clear picture, Jordan Peele put all his best writing into Keanu.
While I'll give the man props for his directing as it is well done, the writing is that of any other horror movie and views best when there's no talking and very little acting. The cast gives some solid performances but you'll be hard pressed to recall any of their characters names, let alone what they were trying to achieve. There's a "twist" in the loosest sense of the word in the third act that serves to lengthen a movie that overstayed it's welcome half an hour before.
It isn't funny, it isn't scary and it definitely isn't worth your time. It doesn't follow it's own logic and feels like it was rewritten halfway. Too many loose ends, wasted ideas and disappointing reveals renders Get Out boring at best and bad at worst, give it a miss.
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