GET OUT of your house and go watch this now!

Rating: 9/10 (24 February 2017)

This is Jordan Peele's feature directorial debut, and what's interesting here is that GET OUT is uncharted territory for him as he comes from a comedic background. But, watching this movie, it felt like he's been directing horror his whole life. To put it simply, the guy knocks it out of the park.
It's an artfully crafted and remarkably accomplished debut. He exploits an atmosphere impregnated with tension and skillfully choreographs an escalation of unrelenting suspense and crowd-pleasing thrills. The camera-work was absolutely ingenious; there's a scene involving hypnosis, in particular that had my jaw hitting the floor. I loved how they visually achieved that heightened state of suggestibility on a visual level.
GET OUT is as much satire as it is horror though. And its most impressive feat is how masterfully it blends the two together. I can't remember the last time I saw a movie that so seamlessly shifts from sequences of jubilant laughter to instances of insidious horror in a matter of minutes.
Writing satire is tough, writing good satire is even tougher, and writing good horror-satire is as rare of a commodity as you get in the film industry these days. To achieve this a film must have exquisite timing and near-prefect pacing, which is exactly what GET OUT has. The run-time is 103 minutes, yet it felt more like an hour. I guess I got so invested in this engaging story that I lost all sense of time, which is what you ultimately want in any movie, really.
Daniel Kaluuya showcases his acting chops with an impressive range of emotions; it's not necessarily what he says but what he doesn't say that has the biggest impact. Other standouts include Allison Williams, Bradley Whitford, and Catherine Keener. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention comic Lil Rel Howery, who plays TSA agent Rod, aka the protagonist's best friend. He's definitely a scene-steal-er, breaking the film's uncanny tension with a number of gut-busting interludes.
While GET OUT sets out to mainly entertain and shock, it's also accompanied with some poignant social commentary. It shines light on the aspect of ourselves that we'd rather not acknowledge. No matter how much we try to convince ourselves that we're above implicit stereotyping or forming preconceptions, we aren't. Peele uses this unavoidable, unflattering truth to draw out anxiety, and then he uses that anxiety as fuel for the film itself.
GET OUT is one of the best movies to come out of 2017 thus far. I can't recommend it enough.