Who could forget Get Out? The 2017 feature quickly made Jordan Peele one of the more prolific filmmakers in Hollywood, but more importantly, it tackles issues in society that are often never addressed in horror films. To recall, Daniel Kaluuya plays Chris Washington, a successful photographer who has finally reached an important stage in his relationship with Rose. She invites him for a weekend with her parents. All goes well at first; however, Chris notices strange patterns that could result in trouble for the new beau, and increasingly disturbing discoveries leads to a horror that he could’ve never imagined.
Now, one of the most interesting aspects of Get Out is the racial themes explored throughout the film. Peele doesn’t fully nail the horror feature as there are several head-scratching plot holes. However, the most interesting aspect is never fully addressed: Why has the upper-class White society targeted Black men and women for their experiments? It’s quite genius that Peele never gives us direct answers as it allows the audience to piece together their own conclusions and theories, but its also a missed opportunity. This is clearly a very cult-like society. How many members are there? What is the world like for Rose and her family when it comes to Black people? Obviously, there’s value in Black men and women because these White rich snobs are stealing their bodies and using them as their own.
Doing some research helps answer some of these questions. Roman – who’s using groundskeeper Walter as his vessel – is the man behind this whole society of kidnapping and brainwashing Black people. He participated in the 1936 Olympics but lost to Jesse Owens. This fueled his hatred for Black people and manifested into the Order of the Coagula, who have implanted their brains of old relatives and friends into the bodies of the young and fit Black people. This story opens up a new set of questions, but more importantly, it’s an opportunity to tackle racism from a new perspective. Why does Roman feel inferior to Black people? What’s his world like growing up? Surely, this guy is a racist because no one wakes up one morning and decides to form a cult that kidnaps and brains washes Black people. At the same time, why would a racist put his body into a Black man? Why not a younger and fitter White dude? The mythology around this world is fascinating, and it could open up more discussions about a topic that remains prominent in modern times. Not too often do we get the perspective about racism towards Blacks from White people.
The true horror of Get Out is the notion that this could happen to Blacks in society. The thought of such evil people who have little disregard for Black lives because they want immortality is more freighting than any of the horror presented throughout history. The spin-off would be best served as the focus of how this all came together and the depths of how a group of people think that this okay. What are their morals? Do they even feel any sort of remorse for taking the life of a human being for their selfish greed and jealously? More importantly, it would be interesting to see the perspective of their kids. Jeremy is a complete douche, but Rose is sweet, though extremely manipulative. How could these young impressionable lives be fine with this act? If there’s another big flaw in Get Out is that everyone White in this film is seemingly evil. There should’ve been at least one White person who didn’t agree with this culture. Rose genuinely seems to be into Chris, though that can be chalked up to her ability to easily manipulate these men. However, the struggle to fall in love with someone while undercover could’ve been a fascinating arc to explore. Perhaps Peele was afraid that this would be the White savior moment if he did create such complexity.
But if would create a nice balance of the world. Not every White person would agree with this, and it would’ve been cool to have that good White guy (or girl) to indicate more of a reflection of our world. This could actually play a big part in the development of Rose’s first mission, the battle of what’s good and evil. Not very often do horror features need a prequel, but Get Out isn’t an ordinary horror movie. There’s so many layers to this feature that it could’ve easily spawned into a character driven piece that intelligently explores racism, while giving more insight to these characters. Everyone has more than one layer, and it would great to explore that with the Armitage family.
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