Nope

Jordan Peele’s latest may be his most mass-accessible elevated horror film with a great cold open, tight first act establishing the characters and premise, a superb, thrilling second act that was tense, scary and exciting, and a slightly muddled third act where Peele just missed nailing the ending bullseye for the sake of awe and spectacle. There were a few points in the last 30 minutes of the film where Peele could have ended it and it would have been great! But that rushed, over-wrought finale with (new) characters exhibiting slightly odd - thus far uncharacteristic - behaviour brought the thinking audience out of the intense moments Peele had expertly crafted prior. 

There were still social, racial, religious and critical commentary seeded through the film, as typical of Peele, but it was less overt than “Get Out” and definitely “Us”. This could be his way of getting more mainstream, but some may see it as the start of selling out. Regardless, this film was a spectacular. A large screen - IMAX - early Spielbergian spectacle (with a tinge of subversion in the gape-and-awe genre) that was gorgeously shot by Hoyte van Hoytema with superb sound design by Johnnie Burn and music by Michael Abels. 

Acting wise, the core pairing of Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer. Kaluuya continued to shine after his recent Oscar win and his eyes remained as fascinating expressive as ever; Palmer, always an underrated actress, was funny, tough, vulnerable and even child-like, and really held your attention. Steven Yeun was great as usual but this was not his story although his character had a great (largely unexplored) arc. And Brandon Perea was a good horror surrogate/ comic relief. 

“Nope” was a summer blockbuster with under-the-line Oscar potential that should be watched on the big screen! A sequel won’t be surprising.