Finally this movie played in Indonesia after it already premiered in the US for almost 2 months. Not really sure about the reason for such delay, but I was already thinking of worst possible scenario that the movie might not play here. So it was a pleasant surprise to hear the information from Indonesian cinemas' social medias regarding its premiere date on 7 April. Yesterday my wife happened to be hanging out with one of her best friend from food blogging world, Hans, the man behind the famous @eatandtreats. And so the 3 of us went to see the movie at 7.15 PM. Well let us move on to the movie itself.
Brief Story Line
Chris Washington (Daniel Kaluuya - Kick-Ass 2) was quite a brilliant photographer. He was having a girlfriend named Rose Armitage (Allison Williams - Girls TV series). They were planning for a trip to Rose's home to introduce Chris to her parents. Chris was worried whether Rose' parents would be shocked to find out that the man she was dating happened to be a black guy. But Rose was very confident that they would not have any problem. So off they went to Rose' house. During their trip, Chris asked his best friend Rod Williams (Lil Rel Howery) to take care of his dog Sid.
When Chris and Rose reached the location, they were met by Rose's father Dean (Bradley Whitford - Saving Mr. Banks, The West Wing TV series etc) and her mother Missy (Catherine Keener - Being John Malkovich, The 40 Year Old Virgin etc) who was a psychiatrist with good ability of hypnosis. They seemed to be quite receptive of Chris even though he was a black person. In the Armitages' house, there were also the black gardener named Walter (Marcus Henderson) and the black house keeper Georgina (Betty Gabriel - The Purge: Election Year). They were actually acting strange and Chris felt there was something off about those two.
Later on Rose's brother Jeremy (Caleb Landry Jones - The Last Exorcism, X-Men: First Class etc) also came home and they had a nice dinner. That night, Chris was unable to get some sleep and went out for a smoke. This was when some weird stuff started to happen and made Chris felt uneasy. On the following day, he was not sure whether what he experienced was real or a nightmare. But he had no time to analyze it as there would be a party attended by all the Armitages' friends and neighbors.
When the party started, Chris again had the very eerie feeling of the guests whom he felt were a bit racist. Things got even more odd to Chris when he met with another black person who was part of the guests but acting very strange, and he also felt a feeling of familiarity with him.
So what was actually going on in the Armitages' home? Why were all the black people in that location behaving very strangely? Find them all in this unique psychological trailer.
End of Brief Story Line
This movie was one of the best psychological thriller movie that I have seen. The story was very unique and brings a racism topic quite intelligently. And I think because of this unique perspective, most audiences (especially the US audiences) were amazed by it. The movie itself was directed by Jordan Peele who was famous as comedian and contributed his voice as Beta-wolf in Storks. In my personal opinion though, had the movie not been directed by an African American, it might not be as widely accepted as it did.
The great thing about the movie was the sound effects. The background music was very successful in creating such an eerie feeling and suspense. And the makeup effect also were pretty good for such a low budget movie. This was another example of a movie with low budget can be successful commercially if it was done in a smart way, such as Don't Breathe, The Shallows, or Lights Out which coincidentally were all thriller or horror movies.
Talking about coincidence, I did have a sense of similarity between this movie and another psychological thriller movie titled The Invitation which had the premise of people gathering in a house and ended with lots of surprises. It even had a similar surprising scene in the early part of the movie itself. However, in that movie, the build up to the thrilling part was taking too long and a bit boring, while in this case, it was also taking a bit long, but it did not feel boring since the eerie and tense feeling were done magnificently through the characters of especially Georgina.
The movie did not have lots of special effects but that's not required for this type of film. There were also some funny moments involving Rod character which was played nicely by a funny comedian. I think his presence also added a nice touch of fun during the tense moments. Oh if you are waiting to see if there is anything after the end credit scene, there is no need to do so as there was nothing till the very end.
So, if you happen to be looking for a good psychological thriller with unique story line and a bold way of telling a story relating to racism, then you would definitely love this one. However, if you prefer a full tensed movie with lots of blood spattering from beginning till end, then you might not find this enjoyable. The choice is yours.
Happy watching!
Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars
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