Rory’s movie reviews: Get Out, Dunkirk, Shape of Water
A look back at the year in Best Picture nominees that The Cageliner already covered.
Dunkirk — One of These Movies Is Not Like The Others, October 2017
By Rory Donnellan ’18
“I didn’t know that it was possible for me to hold my breath for two hours, but I did it while seeing this film. Christopher Nolan perfectly portrayed the trouble that the real life soldiers were in with stress-inducing music and raw moments. Harry Styles, making his big screen debut, did an okay job, but the real star of the movie was Tom Hardy. The film grabbed me as soon as it started, and it didn’t let go until the credits started to roll.”
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The Shape of Water: The Hype Is Reel
By Rory Donnellan ’18
Note: The Shape of Water is rated R for good reason, and is not meant for younger students.
The trailers for Shape of Water, directed by Guillermo Del Toro, interested many people for two reasons: the 1950s aesthetic and the apparent romance of a human woman and a male fish person. The movie itself isn’t that cut-and-dried, but those elements are present. Now, there’s a third wrinkle: The movie is nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.
The lead character, Eliza Esposito (Sally Hawkins), does not talk, using sign language to communicate. She works at a top secret government facility on clean-up detail with her friend Zelda (Octavia Spencer). Her other friend in the movie is her neighbor Giles (Richard Jenkins). In the facility, agents have secured a human-like fish creature from South America.
As Eliza and Zelda work in the facility one night, they are asked to clean a special chamber, where Eliza discovers the fish person (Doug Jones, no relation to the Alabama Senator) chained up. She immediately feels sympathy for the creature, sensing its personality from eating and communicating with it. Over the next couple of days, while Eliza is supposed to be cleaning the chamber, she begins bonding with the creature using hard-boiled eggs and starts teaching it sign language. As her visits increase in amount and length, the dynamic shifts from owner-pet relationship to romance. Eliza’s attraction to the creature escalates to planning a prison break.
While the plot is reminiscent of a rated R version of Beauty and the Beast, the cinematography is relatively dark, with the color green scattered throughout. Some have compared the movie to the video game Bioshock, which is under-water with the same 50s aesthetic, while others say it reminds them of a 1950s diner. One of the most underrated parts of movies is how the movie immerses the audience into the atmosphere, similar to the opening of The Lion King. While The Lion King shows a sunrise on the desert, The Shape of Water takes the audience through Eliza’s apartment as it is immersed in water while the opening credits roll. The choices that Del Toro makes, no matter how big or small, improve the overall quality of both the feel of the movie and the atmosphere.
The Shape of Water earned rave reviews, garnering a 92% on Rotten Tomatoes and winning multiple awards at the Golden Globes. However, many people were still initially put off by the film because of the romance between a human and a fish person.
Yes, it is weird and kind of unsettling, but the way Del Toro portrays Eliza and the creature’s connection makes you root for them. Del Toro arouses your sympathy and empathy to make you almost feel jealous of the wholesome relationship between a woman and a fish. This movie is rated R, but it is definitely worth the watch. Don’t be intimidated by the fish person, but also keep your distance.
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A Racially Charged Adventure
By Nikita Snejnevski ’17
Editor’s note: Spoilers throughout!
Get Out is the first directing role for Jordan Peele, famous largely for his role in the comedy duo Key & Peele. While the movie does have many satirical and comedic moments, its primary objective is to examine racial issues through the lens of a horror film.
This is a critical movie in many regards, as it helps to dissolve the boundaries of horror cinematography and to bring awareness to many issues circulating in our society. The overall awkward feel surrounding most of the film’s interactions create a very tense environment, and the majority of the plot builds around rising racial tensions.
The movie begins with a peculiar crime scene: a truck driver takes an African-American man hostage during the night. After this, we jump to the main plot and meet Chris and Rose, an interracial couple planning to go to dinner to meet Rose’s parents. Chris is initially afraid because Rose’s parents do not know that he is black, but Rose assures him that it is fine because her parents are “openminded.” At first, the meeting with Rose’s parents is comfortable; however, tensions begin to rise when the couple meets the groundskeeper and the maid, both of whom are black and act very oddly. Later on, Rose’s brother, Jeremy, joins the dinner party and his aggressive dialogue hints that everything might not be as it seems in this household.
Peele seems to be making a point about micro-aggressions, considering that up to this point there is no overt racism, but small bits coalesce to reveal a monster. After dinner, Chris goes outside to smoke a cigarette and is horrified to see the groundsman run up at him and then turn away right before he gets to him. Chris hurries inside to Rose’s mother sitting on the couch with a teacup and a teaspoon. He sits down and does not notice that he is being hypnotized by her, and wakes up the next morning in his bed having had lost his cigarette addiction from her hypnosis.
The next day, the family has a party, where Chris is treated as an exhibit rather than a person, where the guests code switch and talk with him about “black things.” At this point, the hidden plot is revealed: the Armitage family attracts black people to their property to put them through hypnosis, and Chris is just the next victim. In fact, the movie is called Get Out because Chris accidentally takes a flash picture of a black guest, prompting him to escape his hypnosis and yell “Get out!”
The story gets only more bizarre, as we find out that the whole event is actually serving as an auction for Chris. Auction winners go through hypnosis and extend their lives through neurosurgery by relocating their consciousness into the bodies of black people. In the end, Chris manages a miraculous escape from the house before he goes through the surgery. The movie explores the fact that many white people admire black culture, but treat it as an abstract item they can obtain instead of something that is rooted in African-Americans alone.
The white guests at the party are clearly fond of black culture, but they use black bodies to extend their own lives. This points at the fact that white people might sympathize with African Americans, but this is out of the desire for approval, or to get something out of the interaction, rather than out of genuine empathy. Microaggressions play a massive role in the movie — they show that the white people who interact with Chris are aware of his race. The movie points out that making others feel welcome and wanting their approval can actually make blacks feel isolated. An example is when a white person in the movie says “I would’ve voted for Obama for a third term if I could.” Get Out also references police brutality by including a scene with a police car, where a policeman interrogates Chris by asking him for his I.D. even though Rose was driving the car, thus adding racial tension to the plot.
In many ways, this movie reflects the fact that America is not postracial. Sure, we have twice elected a black president, but that is not proof that either conservatives or liberals are any less racist against African Americans. For this reason, Peele made sure to stage the movie in a northern, liberal city to show that racism is not a product solely of the rural, conservative south. This movie boldy examines race and poses that a lot of racism in this country is hidden. It is chilling from the beginning to the very end. If you have not already done so, get out and see it.
