Movie Monday: ‘Us’
Dalton Baggett: To celebrate the wonderful time of the year that is Spooky Season, the next three weeks on ̶M̶o̶v̶i̶e̶ Spooky Monday we’ll be taking a look at three very different horror movies. First up is Us, Jordan Peele’s sophomore follow up to Get Out, his Oscar winning directorial debut. While it is definitely a horror film, that genre alone isn’t big enough to hold everything that Us contains. Like the tunnels under America, there’s always something lurking underneath whatever is happening on the surface of this movie. Whether it’s cultural commentary or sneaky pop culture references, Peele deliberately made this movie an homage to everything that came before it, while also cutting the tether and allowing it to be something entirely unique. It was extremely rewarding on a re-watch and I’m excited to get down to the nitty gritty.
Now Sonny, I believe I’ve heard you make the case that you like Us better than Get Out. That doesn’t seem to be the popular opinion, which makes yours the more interesting opinion by far. Care to elaborate?
Sonny Giuliano: Oh Dalton, I’d love to elaborate. Elaborating on my movie opinions is one of my all-time favorite pastimes. I love elaborating on my movie opinions like the proverbial fat kid loves cake. I love elaborating on my movie opinions like LeBron James loves winning NBA Titles (still basking in the glory of LeBron’s fourth NBA Title). I love elaborating on my movie opinions like Jordan Peele loves making fantastic and thought-provoking horror films.
I think the initial impression of readers will be that I didn’t enjoy Get Out, but that’s just not true. I thought Get Out was a terrific horror flick that doubled as a brilliant and very important bit of eye-opening social commentary. It’s deserving of all of the praise it received, and I think a decade from now — or maybe more accurately, “right now”, and even more accurately than that, “in the moment” — it seemed a little silly that Get Out didn’t win Best Picture at the Academy Awards. It was the most talked about film of the year, and again, very, very good. Sometimes the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences really overthinks this stuff.
What readers should know is that I almost certainly enjoyed Us more than most people did. Sure, Us was a critically acclaimed film that did tremendously well at the box office, but it also my second favorite movie of 2019 — behind future Movie Monday candidate Uncut Gems — and would be my choice if someone asked me what my favorite horror movie ever is.
Now my Us > Get Out take could have something to do with the fact that I watched Get Out in my bedroom months after it was released, and I watched Us the weekend of its release. I’m a firm believer in the theory that settings and circumstances have a lot to do with your initial and long-lasting impressions of a film. However, I’ve re-watched both and still give the edge to Us. I like that it’s a more traditional horror flick, even though as you said, the genre alone isn’t big enough to hold everything that Us contains. I like that it’s a little more unpredictable and outwardly ambitious, and just as willing to dabble in cultural commentary — although not as bluntly — as Get Out was.
But as they say, Comparison is the thief of joy. Rather than comparing these two films any further, how about we go ahead and give Jordan Peele his roses? Granted, I probably dip my toes in the horror end of the pool less often than I do other genres, but in the last fifteen years, I’ve only seen five horror films that have truly stood out …
Us
Get Out
A Quiet Place
Paranormal Activity
The Strangers
… and Jordan Peele is the mastermind behind forty percent of those films. I have to imagine (and really hope) he’s got plenty more ideas brewing.
DB: An elegant response as always, my friend. I do have one line that I’d like to examine though. You said that the handling of cultural commentary wasn’t done as bluntly in Us but I have to disagree. While the exact message may not be as clear as in Get Out, Jordan Peele has moments in this movie where he gets ham fisted about making sure you know the message is there. One line in particular takes me momentarily out of the movie every time I hear it and it’s when Gabe asks Red “Who are you people?” and she responds with “We’re Americans.” It just feels so blunt and forced into the script, like Jordan Peele was momentarily unconfident that the classism message was getting across with everything else he was doing. With the rest of the movie being as meticulous as it is, that one line just doesn’t belong.
SG: I need to offer a little bit of pushback on that last point you just made about the “We’re Americans” line.
Let’s go back to the very first moments of the movie … before the rabbits, before the haunted Hall of Mirrors, and before Adelaide’s father is called “Whack-a-Mole Guy” by a carny. Let’s go back to where we little Adelaide is sitting on her couch watching television before she heads to the Santa Cruz Boardwalk with her parents. One of the commercials Adelaide sees on the TV is for the “Hands Across America” public fundraising event. Here’s some of the key dialogue from the commercial:
“It’s Hands Across America. A four-thousand mile-long chain of good Samaritans standing hand-in-hand. Through fields of grain, past purple mountains, and across fruited plains, from sea to shining sea. This summer six million people will tether themselves together to fight hunger in the United States.”
Even though we haven’t come right out and discussed it yet, there is a major twist ending to Us which reveals that Adelaide and Red swapped places in that Hall of Mirrors in 1986, and that means the “We’re Americans” moment isn’t a moment where Peele was being blunt and forcing his classism message into the script. This was the first BIG hint that Adelaide was really Red, and Red actually Adelaide. The “Hands Across America” commercial was the last thing little Adelaide saw before her parents took her to Santa Cruz Boardwalk, so in her mind, the Tethered’s attempt to form a massive human chain is what made them Americans.
I won’t stand for any more Jordan Peele slander, Dalton. Let’s move on to a category.
What is the Best Sneaky Reference or Easter Egg in the Film?
DB: Jordan Peele filled Us with a system of underground tunnel’s worth of Easter eggs to try and catch while you’re watching. Whether it’s hints about the tethered, or homages to past horror classics, there’s enough stuffed in there to be rewarding on multiple re-watches. (Just please don’t let the Easter Bunny get anywhere near the Tethered).
My favorite references aren’t as hidden or clever as some of the others, but they had me looking like Leo in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood when I realized what they were.
The Shining is one of my favorite horror movies, so I got excited seeing the homages Jordan Peele paid to the classic. The first comes early on when we get the eerie helicopter shot of the Wilson family driving alone on a highway seemingly in the middle of nowhere, much like the Torrance’s in the 70’s.
The other obvious homage to The Shining is a pair of extremely creepy twins.
Do not like.
Hell, Jordan Peele even dressed as Jack Torrence when doing interviews for the film. I love him a great deal.
SG: I haven’t come armed with a bunch of photos to use as proof like you have, but I too have a favorite “sneaky reference or Easter egg” in Us. Unlike yours, mine relates to a slasher franchise that I don’t even necessarily love. However, I appreciate the depth to which you need to be thinking about horror film history in order to not only catch, but fully understand this reference.
The name of Adelaide’s mask-wearing son “Jason” is a not-so-subtle tip of the cap to the Friday The 13th film franchise, but many people tend to forget that the killer in the original Friday the 13th was not the hockey-mask wearing, machete-yielding, potentially unkillable super-villain Jason Voorhees. No. The killer in the original Friday the 13th was Jason’s mother, Mrs. Pamela Voorhees. And as we’ve already discussed, the big twist ending in Us is that back in 1986, Red secretly took Adelaide’s place in the world above, while the real Adelaide became Red.
Outside of the numerous fun references to movies of the past, Peele also sprinkled in all sorts of symbolism in the early stages of the movie that I love. The “Happy Family” decal on the back of the car and the four shadows at the beach are an early warning that Wilson family is being followed by their doppelgangers.
In addition, the baseball game that Gabe is watching is tied at 11–11, and one of the teams playing in the game is the Minnesota Twins.
Now listen, we’re over 1,500 words into this thing, and I haven’t been able to gush about Lupita Nyong’o yet. Have we arrived at the point in this piece where we can gush about Lupita, or do I need to keep waiting?
DB: Wait, wait, I have something to add to your 11:11 thing. I noticed two instances of people wearing Black Flag t-shirts, and it just so happens that the Black Flag logo looks like 11:11.
Ok now we can do:
Who is the Underrated Star of the Film?
And you can tell me why it’s Lupita Nyong’o.
SG: Whoa, whoa, whoa! I did not say that I was prepared to crown Lupita as the Underrated Star of the Film. That wasn’t the direction I planned on going.
That’s because Lupita deserves something so much greater than Bingeable’s Movie Monday Underrated Star of the Film. She delivered a pantheon level horror movie performance as TWO DIFFERENT FUCKING CHARACTERS. She was the protagonist AND antagonist of Us and knocked both performances out of the fucking ballpark. The game is no longer tied 11–11, Dalton. Lupita just won it with an extra innings grand slam. And yes, in case you were wondering, I’m still waiting to fist fight whoever it is that’s responsible for Lupita not getting nominated for an Academy Award for her performances. Plural. Tell me who to fist fight, Dalton.
Hey, speaking of fights, if you don’t mind, I’d like to briefly skip past Underrated Star of the Film and transition into …
What is the Best Shot of the Film?
Back when we did our decade end Top Ten lists in December 2019, I called the Underground Dance Fight scene between Red and Adelaide the second best movie scene of the decade. That holds true. Even if some of the many “holy shit” moments in Us wear off with repeat views, that scene remains a masterpiece. Plenty of credit should be given to the choreography and music of the scene (we’ll get there), but it’s Lupita Nyong’o who delivers in the biggest way.
The story she is able to tell in this nearly five-minute long sequence — again, as two different characters — just using a variety of facial expressions, grunts, hollers, and body movements that are unique to each of those characters is a testament to Lupita’s chops as an actress. For Red and Adelaide, this is the culmination of years and years of worry, anger, confusion, and planning. It climaxes in a showdown that is as beautiful and complex as it is intense and terrifying.
You could pull any number of singular shots from this scene and choose it as the “Best Shot,” but this is the one I like the best. There’s something really powerful about the idea of Red and Adelaide face-to-face, staring into each other’s eyes, having to confront the truth about what happened in 1986 when the rest of us have no idea yet. “Red” knows that “Adelaide” is an imposter. “Adelaide” knows that she is responsible, in some way, for “Red” and the uprising of the Tethered. And all we, the viewers, know is that we’re in the midst of movie magic.
DB: Look at us, we finally have different choices for best shot this week. Or I’m just not a big copycat like you. Either way, here’s mine:
This is at the beginning of the movie when Adelaide wanders into the VisionQuest “fun” house and runs into her Tethered doppelganger Red. The way that Adeline’s face transitions from nervous apprehension to outright terror when she realizes what she’s seeing is incredible acting from Madison Curry, but also sets the tone for the rest of the movie. A seemingly mundane moment switching instantly to fear and horror is the set up for this shot and the movie as a whole.
Along with setting the tone, the way Jordan Peele shot this is chilling in and of itself. The deep blues he uses to accentuate the whites of Adeline’s eyes as they expand makes it much more effective than it could’ve been in different hands. It reminds me of this shot from Parasite:
Bong Joon-ho and Jordan Peele are masters. May we keep getting movies from them forever.
Now, can we get your actual thoughts on underrated performance please, Sonny?
Who is the Underrated Star of the Film?
SG: So I’ve gone the music route before, picking Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross as my Underrated Stars of The Social Network. I want to go a similar route this time, but I’m opting not to be so straight-forward with selecting Michael Abels, composer of Us and mastermind of the “Tethered Remix” of “I Got 5 On it” that is used so heavily throughout the film.
And I hate to step on your IMDB research, but did you know, Dalton, that the Abels-crafted instrumental version of “I Got 5 On It” was not included in the original cut of the film? That’s right. It was used exclusively in the film’s first trailer, released on Christmas Day 2018, and viewers/test audiences were so enamored by it that it encouraged Jordan Peele to include it in the underground dance fight between Adelaide and Red. Had it not been for the trailer, one of the all-time great scenes in horror film history would be irrefutably worse.
That brings me to my pick for the Underrated Star of the Film … the Us trailer and TV spots that aired in the months leading up to its release.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNCmb-4oXJA
Universal Studios reportedly spent nearly $80 million on promotion and advertisements for Us, and it showed. You couldn’t get through a commercial break of a football or basketball game in January, February, or March 2019 without getting one of those masterful TV spots for Us. And it turned out to be a great investment … they rode that “Tethered Mix” and a few hand-picked highlight moments from the film to $255 million showing at the box office.
DB: I really appreciate what you did there. The trailer was an inspired choice! But my pick is still Lupita. You and I are the only people I know personally who actually care about The Academy Awards and what those awards represent. Unfortunately they then become the lens through which I view and interpret movies. Maybe I’m sick, but I’m too old to change. So, with that in mind I have to give this to Lupita. As you mentioned she wasn’t even nominated for her DUAL performances. Both are drastically different but somehow still “tethered” to each other in spirit. She should’ve been recognized by the Academy. As to who you can punch in the face, I think you have a large group of mostly old, white guys to blame. You might need to get in line though.
Oh, and not to worry about doing a little IMDB fact finding of your own, I’ve had my research done for a while.
Most Interesting Thing Learned with an IMDB Deep Dive
DB: This picture of Winston Duke:
Look at that scarf!
Progression:
Us > Winston Duke
Sonny Giuliano Movie Monday Rankings
1. The Social Network
2. The Godfather
3. Us
4. Star Wars
Dalton Baggett Movie Monday Rankings
1. Star Wars
2. The Social Network
3. Us
4. The Godfather
