Nope is weird

 
Hey guys! I just got done seeing Nope, by Jordan Peele. It's weird.

I like Jordan Peele. I really enjoyed his last two movies, Get Out and Us. I realize he's done some other projects, but I call those his last two major works. Anyway, they were good. Original, imaginative, and genuinely terrifying.

Nope has some really good elements. There are a couple seriously scary moments. And the main idea - that the thing in the sky might NOT be a spaceship after all - was really creative and interesting and freakishly horrifying. 

I feel like this would have been a much better movie with better actors. The main character, played by Daniel Kaluuya, was not bad. He plays a character that is not always comfortable in his own skin, and he does that well. But since he's the main character, sometimes I feel uncomfortable watching his performance, and not in a good way. But his sister, played by Keke Palmer, annoyed the crap out of me. If they had had a different actor playing his sister in a less obnoxious way, the entire movie would have been more enjoyable. She's supposed to be funny, and I only found her annoying. All of the other actors were pretty good (though Michael Wincott's performance was unnecessarily off-putting), but this is the first Peele production where I felt like the writing was flat. Not much wit or snappy dialog. 

I won't give you any spoilers. The stuff in the sky was well done - great special effects, and there were some really scary moments. The scene where we find out what happened to the people who'd been sucked into the sky was one of the most horrific things I've ever seen on film. 

There is a strange subplot about a monkey that never seems fully integrated into the bigger story. It's like Peele had two ideas and tried to shove one into the other story. Didn't work. Sad, because it was a good and scary little story by itself. You just keep wondering what it has to do with the bigger picture. Turns out the answer is: nothing, really.

Finally, I'd say go see it, but I don't HIGHLY recommend it. Go in with lowered expectations and just know that it's going to be ... weird.