movie reviews us

We are republishing this piece on the homepage in allegiance with a critical American movement that upholds Black voices. For a growing resource list with information on where you can donate, connect with activists, learn more about the protests, and find anti-racism reading,  click here . #BlackLivesMatter.

“Therefore this is what the Lord says: ‘I will bring on them a disaster they cannot escape. Although they cry out to me, I will not listen to them.” – Jeremiah 11:11

In Rodney Ascher ’s  documentary “ Room 237 ,” four theorists attempt to explain the hidden messages in Stanley Kubrick ’s movie “ The Shining .” The ideas about what the movie is about range from the possible to the downright bizarre. One theory fixates on the possibility that “The Shining” was Kubrick’s way of confessing he faked the landing on the moon footage, and another obsesses over the details of the hedge maze. The other two see evidence that the 1980 film indirectly references either the genocide of Native Americans or the Holocaust.

Like “The Shining,” there are a number of different ways to interpret Jordan Peele ’s excellent new horror movie, “Us.” Every image seems to be a clue for what’s about to happen or a stand-in for something outside the main story of a family in danger. Peele’s film, which he directed, wrote and produced, will likely reward audiences on multiple viewings, each visit revealing a new secret, showing you something you missed before in a new light.

“Us” begins back in 1986 with a young girl and her parents wandering through the Santa Cruz boardwalk at night. She separates from them to walk out on the empty beach, watching a foreboding flock of thunderclouds roll in. Her eyes find an attraction just off the main pier, and she walks into what looks like an abandoned hall of mirrors, discovering something deeply terrifying—her doppelgänger. The movie shifts to the present day, with Janelle Monae on the radio as the Wilson family is heading towards their vacation home. The little girl has now grown up to be a woman, Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o), nervous about returning to that spot on the Santa Cruz beach. Her husband, Gabe ( Winston Duke ), thinks her reaction is overblown, but he tries to make her feel at ease so they can take their kids Zora ( Shahadi Wright Joseph ) and Jason ( Evan Alex ) to the beach and meet up with old friends, the Tylers ( Elisabeth Moss and Tim Heidecker ) and their twin daughters. After one small scare and a few strange coincidences on the beach, the family returns home for a quiet night in, only to have their peace broken by a most unlikely set of trespassers lined up across their driveway: doppelgängers of their family.

Part of the appeal of “Us” is how you interpret what all of this information and images mean. No doubt the movie will give audiences plenty to mull over long after the credits. In the film, the Jeremiah 11:11 Bible verse appears twice before pivotal moments, and there are plenty of other Biblical references to dig into, including an analogy to heaven and hell. Perhaps Jason’s “ Jaws ” shirt is a reference to the rocket sweater the little boy wears in “The Shining” or it could be a warning about the film’s oceanside dangers. In the ‘80s scene, when young Adelaide walks into the mysterious attraction, the sign welcoming her is that of a Native American in a headdress above the name “Shaman Vision Quest.” When the family returns to the beach, the sign has been replaced with a more PC-friendly sign bearing a wizard advertising it as “Merlin’s Enchanted Forest,” a bandaid solution to hiding the racist exterior and the horror inside its halls.  

As he did with “ Get Out ,” Peele pays significant tribute to the films that have influenced him in “Us.” Though this time, there doesn’t seem to be a consensus. As I spoke with others who saw the movie, we focused on different titles that stood out to us. For me, “The Shining” looked to be the film that received the most nods in “Us,” including an overhead shot of the Wilson family driving through hilly forests to their vacation home, much like the Torrance family does on the way to the Overlook Hotel. There’s also a reference to “The Shining” twins, a few architectural and cinematography similarities and, in one shot, Nyong’o charges the camera with a weapon much like Jack Nicholson menacingly drags along an ax in a chase. However, “Us” is not just a love letter to one horror movie. Peele also pays tribute to Brian De Palma with a split diopter shot that places both Adelaide and her doppelgänger in equal focus for the first time in the movie. There’s also a tip of the hat to Darren Aronofsky ’s “ Black Swan ” in terms of dueling balletic styles and a gorgeously choreographed fight scene that looks like a combative pas de deux.

This delightfully deranged home invasion-family horror film works because Peele not only knows how to tell his story, he assembled an incredible cast to play two roles. The Wilsons are a picture of an all-American family: a family of four that looks to be middle class, with college-educated (Gabe is wearing a Howard University sweater) parents doting on their two children. Their doppelgängers may look like them and be tied to them in some way, but their lives are inverses of each other, and their existence has been one of limits and misery. It’s one of the most poignant analogies of class in America to come out in a studio film in recent memory. For the actors, it’s a chance to play two extremes, one of intense normality and the other of wretched evil. In “Us,” Duke shows off his comedic strengths as the dorky father who often embarrasses his kids, and his doppelgänger is a frighting wall of violence with little to say other than grunts and fighting his adversary. If Nyong’o doesn’t get some professional recognition for her performances here, I will be very disappointed. As Adelaide, she’s fearful, trying to keep some traumatic memories at bay but putting on a brave face for her family. To play her character’s opposite, Nyong’o adopts a graceful, confident movement for her doppelgänger, sliding into the family’s home with scissors at the ready. The doppelgänger looks wide-eyed and maliciously curious as if she’s looking for new ways to terrorize this family. She whispers in a raspy but sinister voice that would make many people jump and run away.

A suspenseful story and marvelous cast need a great crew to make the film a home run, and “Us” is not short on talent. “ It Follows ” cinematographer Mike Gioulakis creates unsettling images in mundane spaces, like how a strange family standing at a driveway isn’t necessarily scary, but when it’s eerily dark out, they’re backlit so that their faces go unseen and the four bodies are standing at a higher elevation from our heroes, so it looks like evil is swooping in from above. Kym Barrett ’s costume designs not only supply the doppelgängers’ nefarious looking red jumpsuits but also the normal, comfy clothes the Wilsons and Tylers wear on vacation. Michael Abels , who also composed the score for “Get Out,” and the ominous notes from the sound design team lay the groundwork for nerve-wracking sequences.

Jordan Peele isn’t the next Kubrick, M. Night Shyamalan, Alfred Hitchcock or Steven Spielberg . He’s his own director, with a vision that melds comedy, horror and social commentary. And he has a visual style that’s luminous, playful and delightfully unnerving. Peele uses an alternate cinematic language to Kubrick, seems more comfortable at teasing his story’s twists throughout the narrative unlike Shyamalan, uses suspense differently than Hitchcock, and possesses the comedic timing Spielberg never had. “Us” is another thrilling exploration of the past and oppression this country is still too afraid to bring up. Peele wants us to talk, and he’s given audiences the material to think, to feel our way through some of the darker sides of the human condition and the American experience.

This review was originally filed from the South by Southwest Film Festival on March 9, 2019.

Monica Castillo

Monica Castillo is a critic, journalist, programmer, and curator based in New York City. She is the Senior Film Programmer at the Jacob Burns Film Center and a contributor to  RogerEbert.com .

• Evan Alex as Jason Wilson
• Tim Heidecker as Mr. Tyler
• Winston Duke as Gabriel "Gabe" Wilson
• Kara Hayward as Nancy
• Lupita Nyong’o as Adelaide Wilson
• Shahadi Wright Joseph as Zora Wilson
• Elisabeth Moss as Mrs. Tyler
• Jordan Peele
• Michael Abels

Cinematographer

• Mike Gioulakis
• Nicholas Monsour

Leave a comment

Now playing.

Speak No Evil (2024)

Saturday Night

The Killer’s Game

Girls Will Be Girls

The 4:30 Movie

Sweetheart Deal

¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor!

Latest articles

TIFF 2024: Millers in Marriage, Sketch, The Deb

TIFF 2024: Men of War, Fanatical: The Catfishing of Tegan & Sara, Ernest Cole: Lost and Found

TIFF 2024: On Swift Horses, Meet the Barbarians, All of You

Natasha Rothwell Finds New Life in Hulu’s Winning “How to Die Alone”

The best movie reviews, in your inbox.

Find anything you save across the site in your account

Review: Jordan Peele’s “Us” Is a Colossal Cinematic Achievement

The success of Jordan Peele’s 2017 film, “ Get Out ,” bought him time, he said, in a recent interview with Le Monde —for his new film, “Us,” he had twice as many shoot days. The expanded time frame allowed him to produce a work of expanded ambition: “Us” bounces back and forth between 1986 and the present day, and its action, compared to “Get Out,” has a vast range—geographical, dramatic, and intellectual. The movie’s imaginative spectrum is enormous, four-dimensionally so: it delves deep into a literal underground world that lends the hallucinatory concept of the “sunken place” from “Get Out” a physical embodiment. And it captures the transformative, radical power of a political conscience, of an idea long held in secret, as it ripens and develops over decades’ worth of time. “Us” is nothing short of a colossal achievement.

Structured like a home-invasion drama, “Us” is a horror film—though saying so is like offering a reminder that “The Godfather” is a gangster film or that “2001: A Space Odyssey” is science fiction. Genre is irrelevant to the merits of a film, whether its conventions are followed or defied; what matters is that Peele cites the tropes and precedents of horror in order to deeply root his film in the terrain of pop culture—and then to pull up those roots. “Us” is a film that places itself within pop culture for diagnostic—and even self-diagnostic—purposes; its subject is, in large measure, cultural consciousness and its counterpart, the cultural unconscious. The crucial element of horror is political and moral—the realities that metaphorical fantasies evoke.

Peele reaches deep into the symbolic DNA of pop culture to discover a hidden, implicit history that he brings to the fore, at a moment of growing recognition that the deeds of the past still rage with silent and devastating force in the present time. After a title card notes the presence of a vast hidden network of tunnels (as for abandoned railways and mines) beneath American soil, the action begins with a bit of pop archeology: a shot of an old-fashioned tube TV set, on which a commercial is playing for “Hands Across America,” a 1986 philanthropic fund-raising event that involved an effort to create a human chain from coast to coast. (The announcer’s voice-over says, “Six million people will tether themselves together to fight hunger in America.”)

At that time, a young girl named Adelaide (though her name isn’t heard until much later in the film, when she’s an adult) is visiting a Santa Cruz beach with her squabbling parents. The child (Madison Curry) wanders off, enters a beachside haunted-house attraction, and, there, walking through a hall of mirrors reminiscent of the one in Orson Welles’s “The Lady from Shanghai,” sees not her reflection but her physical double. After the incident, her parents find her traumatized, but just what happened isn’t clear to them. In the present day, Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o) is married to Gabe Wilson (Winston Duke), and they have two children, Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph), a teen-ager, and Jason (Evan Alex), who seems to be about eight. The Wilsons are prosperous—they’re heading to a summer house by a lake, where Gabe buys a speedboat (albeit a beat-up, run-down one) on a whim. It’s not clear what they do for a living; Adelaide used to dance but gave it up. What is clear is that she now has an aversion to the beach because of the haunted house, which is still there, in a slightly different guise. Her memories and flashbacks suggest that the trauma from whatever happened in the house has haunted her for her whole life.

The Wilsons are black, a fact that, as depicted, has little overt effect on their lives. Avoiding the stereotypes of black Americans in movies, Peele instead knowingly depicts them as a stereotype of a financially successful, socially stable, and cinematically average American family. It’s as though they naturally and unintentionally use what Boots Riley’s film, “Sorry to Bother You,” would call their “white voice,” the voice of white-dominated corporate prosperity. (There’s even a wink back to “Get Out,” regarding the Wilsons’ utterly untroubled confidence in the police.) Their summer companions are a white (and wealthier) family, the Tylers, Kitty (Elisabeth Moss) and Josh (Tim Heidecker), and their twin daughters, Becca (Cali Sheldon) and Lindsey (Noelle Sheldon).

Back at their summer house that night, Adelaide experiences premonitions—she tells Gabe that she feels that her double is out there somewhere. “My whole life I’ve felt as if she’s still coming for me,” she says, and, on this night, she feels as if “she’s getting closer.” Moments later, Jason sees another family standing outside the house; it turns out to be four doubles of the Wilson family, distinguished by their matching red jumpsuits (reminiscent of prison uniforms) and tan sandals, their static posture—holding hands side by side, in the manner of Hands Across America—and their silence. The doubles soon burst into the house, facing off against the Wilsons while Adelaide’s double (named, in the credits, Red)—the only one of the four doppelgängers to speak—states, in a hoarse and halting voice, her demands.

No less than “Get Out,” “Us” is a work of directorial virtuosity, in which Peele invests every moment, every twist, every diabolically conceived and gleefully invoked detail with graphic, psychological resonance and controlled tone, in performance and gesture. Here, as in “Get Out,” Peele employs point-of-view shots to put audience members in the position of the characters, to conjure subjective and fragmentary experience that reverberates with the metaphysical eeriness of their suddenly doubled world. (Recurring nods to Hitchcock’s “The Birds” suggest a mysterious transformation of the natural order.) Exactly as the title promises (and as the drama delivers, when Jason identifies the intruders, saying, “It’s us”), the movie turns the screen into a funhouse mirror in which the distortions prove to be truer representations of the state of things—in the world of its viewers—than more familiar, realistic depictions.

A distinctively American vision is planted throughout the action of “Us,” with an explicit and monitory allusion to the notion of national destiny. As a child, Adelaide sees, at the beach, a silent beachcomber-prophet with a sign that reads “Jeremiah 11:11.” In that chapter, God grants people land on the condition that they keep their covenant with Him, but when they revert to “the sins of their ancestors,” they face divine retribution: “Therefore this is what the Lord says: ‘I will bring on them a disaster they cannot escape. Although they cry out to me, I will not listen to them.’ ” When Adelaide asks the family’s doubles “What are you people?,” the wording of the question (not “who” but “what”) is less offensive than it is literally ontological: Are they alive or dead? Are they zombies or robots or creatures from space or figments of their imagination? Red’s answer is “We’re Americans.” (Even the title, “Us,” doubles as “U.S.”)

“Us” is intensely suspenseful (it would be sinful to spoil its twists or even to hint at its scares) and moderately gory—yet the bloodshed rigorously serves the drama. It’s never there to gross out viewers or to test their threshold of shock or disgust. (And I’m squeamish.) In particular, the explicit violence provides a serious view of life-threatening dangers that compel bourgeois characters to get their hands dirty with the act of killing—it shows what they’re up against and what they have to face, and to do, in an effort to save themselves. Yet “Us” also offers that safety, that salvation, with bitter irony. (It brings to mind Florence Reece’s pro-union song “ Which Side Are You On? ”) It’s a movie that, true to its genre, is plotted with hair-trigger mechanisms that tweak suspense with surprises—intellectual ones along with dramatic and sensory ones.

With its foretold emphasis on tunnels, “Us” proves to be something like Peele’s version of “ Notes from Underground ,” complete with its fiery arias of torment from those whose voices otherwise go unheard. (There’s a relevant wink along the way at Samuel Fuller’s jangling masterwork “ Shock Corridor .”) The term that describes the link between the Wilsons and their doubles is called “tethering”—and that word, in its many grammatical forms, recurs throughout the film (not least, in repeated allusions to Hands Across America). The nature of bonds—social bonds, voluntary and involuntary connections of some people to others—is at the heart of the movie, the desire for solidarity with some, the intended or oblivious dissociation from others.

The movie’s many pop-culture references—whether kids wearing T-shirts for “Thriller” and “Jaws” or the presence of “Good Vibrations” and “Fuck tha Police” on the soundtrack—are no mere decorations. Peele’s radical vision of inequality, of the haves and the have-nots, those who are in and those who are out, is reflected brightly and brilliantly in his view of pop culture, current and classic (including riffs on romantic melodrama and on the notion of emotional expression as a luxury in itself). Mass media is presented in “Us” as a rich people’s culture, if not in the immediate origins of its artists, then in the production, distribution, marketing, platforming, and lawyering of the work—in the very notion of its valuable and ubiquitous legacy. (In the Le Monde interview, Peele cited the soundtrack as another principal benefit of his higher budget.)

“Us” highlights the unwitting complicity of even apparently well-meaning and conscientious people in an unjust order that masquerades as natural and immutable but is, in fact, the product of malevolent designs that leave some languishing in the perma-shadows. (Designed by whom? The movie doesn’t name names, but it winks and nods and nudges in a general direction that runs from the sea to the lake.) It dramatizes this world, but with a twist—one that (avoiding spoilers) risks overturning conventional values and sympathies with ecstatic fervor. Suffice it to say that “Us” reserves empathy for its unwitting villains while gleefully deriding their comfortably normal state of obliviousness—and the ordinary absurdities of the world at large.

The movie’s exquisite perceptiveness and its alluring details are part of a vision that ranges between the outrageously sardonic and the grandly tragic. It renders the movie, for all its suspense, violence, and moral outrage, as much of a joy to recall, moment by moment, as it is to watch. Zora, after wielding an improvised weapon in a desperate, defensive rage, wiggles her arm in fatigue, as if she’d just completed a household chore. Gabe, challenging the doppelgängers with a metal baseball bat, adopts a stereotypical black-dialect voice as if, by doing so, he could make himself more menacing. Jason, suspicious of his own double (named Pluto), crafts a chess-like strategy leading to results and images of anguished grandeur. There are all kinds of magnificently world-built elements that only make sense in the light of big, late reveals, such as a strange and bloody preview, on the Santa Cruz beach, of the Wilson family’s doubles, and Adelaide’s early success as a dancer (and her double’s ability to use it against her).

This world-building has a stark thematic simplicity that both belies and inspires immense complexity. “Us” is a movie that defies the jigsaw-fit, quasi-academic interpretation that pervades recent criticism. As much as the movie offers a metaphorical vision of the enormities of social and political life, it also offers implications of an inner world, a projection of Peele-iana that maps his personal vision onto that of the world at large—and that, in turn, calls upon viewers to receive that world as intensely and consciously and imaginatively as he tries to do. The results of doing so, he suggests, are intrinsically political, even revolutionary.

Advertisement

Supported by

Critic’s Pick

‘Us’ Review: Jordan Peele’s Creepy Latest Turns a Funhouse Mirror on Us

• Share full article

‘Us’ | Anatomy of a Scene

Jordan peele narrates a sequence from his film..

“I’m Jordan Peele. I’m the writer, producer, and director of the movie “Us.’” “There’s a family in our driveway.” “So here we have the scene where the tethered family arrives at the Wilson house for the first time. Jason, of course, says “there’s a family in our driveway.” A line designed, giddily, to attempt to be an iconic line, like “they’re here” from the “Poltergeist” movie and sort of help congeal this sense of an Amblin-esque predicament with a black family in the center of it.” - [heavy breathing] “What?” “Zora, give me your phone.” “I’m not on it.” “Zora!” “This is the point in the movie where I want the terror to really kick into a new gear for the audience. One of the techniques that I utilized to get that terror was that all of a sudden we go into real time. The movie before this has been going from some time dashes here and there. When we get into this moment where the four family members are standing holding hands outside, then we go into this sort of fluid — we use a lot of the Steadicam with very few edits. Really trying to subliminally signal to the audience that this sort of relentless, real time event has begun and is taking place.” “Wait, wait, wait, just one sec — Gabe.” “So we see Gabe leave. He goes out. He’s the dad, he’s got to deal with it. This is kind of like — probably pulled from my own anxieties of being a father and realizing, yeah, you got to man up sometimes.” “Hi. Can I help you?” “One of the things in this scene that really inspired me was the scene in “Halloween” where Michael Myers has the ghost sheet over him. And no matter how many questions he’s asked, he just doesn’t respond. The less response you get, the more impending and physical, I think, the threat gets. Probably after the second time someone doesn’t respond, you know one of you’s got to go down. [laughing] “A’ight, I asked you nice. Now I need y’all to get off my property.” “One of the pieces of this scene that works really well is we’ve got Winston to this spot where he’s code switching. You know, he goes back to some of his roots, as it were, to try and intimidate this mysterious family out there. That maybe if sort of reasoning with them doesn’t work, a good old fashioned low register, throwing some bass into his voice, coming out with a little swagger and a bat might work.” “O.K., let’s call the cops.” “Winston is just remarkable in this scene, and the audience really I think is in this tug of war between feeling the tension ratcheting up and the fear of what’s to come and the little bit of a comic relief of watching this kind of goofy dad who’s in over his head.” “Gabe.” “No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. All right.” “Gabe!” “I got this.”

By Manohla Dargis

• March 20, 2019

Jordan Peele’s new horror movie, “Us,” is an expansive philosophical hall of mirrors. Like his 2017 hit, “Get Out,” this daring fun-until-it’s-not shocker starts from the genre’s central premise that everyday life is a wellspring of terrors. In “Get Out,” a young black man meets a group of white people who buy — at auction — younger, healthier black bodies. What makes “Get Out” so powerful is how Peele marshals a classic tale of unwilling bodily possession into a resonant, unsettling metaphor for the sweep of black and white relations in the United States — the U.S., or us.

“Us” is more ambitious than “Get Out,” and in some ways more unsettling. Once again, Peele is exploring existential terrors and the theme of possession, this time through the eerie form of the monstrous doppelgänger. The figure of the troublesome other — of Jekyll and Hyde, of the conscious and unconscious — ripples through the story of an ordinary family, the Wilsons, stalked by murderous doubles. These shadows look like the Wilsons but are frighteningly different, with fixed stares and guttural, animalistic vocalizations. Dressed in matching red coveralls and wielding large scissors (the better to slice and dice), they are funhouse-mirror visions turned nightmares.

The evil twin is a rich, durable motif, and it winds through “Us” from start to finish, beginning with a flashback to 1986 at a Santa Cruz, Calif., amusement park. There, a young girl (the expressive Madison Curry) and her parents are leisurely wandering the park. The girl is itsy-bitsy (the camera sticks close to her so that everything looms), and she and her parents maintain a chilly, near-geometric distance from one another. She’s clutching a perfect candied apple, a portentous splash of red and a witty emblem both of Halloween and Edenic forbidden fruit. Movies are journeys into knowledge, and what the girl knows is part of the simmering mystery.

The Wilsons, a family of four headed by Adelaide (a dazzling Lupita Nyong’o) and Gabe (Winston Duke), enter many years later, introduced with an aerial sweep of greenery. The bird’s-eye view (or god’s-eye, given the movie’s metaphysical reach) evokes the opener of Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining,” a film Peele references throughout. A true cinephile, Peele scatters “Us” with nods and allusions to old-school 1970s and ’80s movies including “Goonies,” “Jaws,” “A Nightmare on Elm Street.” (One disturbing scene suggests that he’s also a fan of Michael Haneke.) But “The Shining” — another story of a grotesquely haunted family — serves as his most obvious guiding star, narratively and visually.

[Read about Lupita Nyong’o and her work on the movie.]

Peele likes to mix tones and moods, and as he did in “Get Out,” he uses broad humor both for delay and deflection. There’s a cryptic opener and an equally enigmatic credit sequence, but soon the Wilsons are laughing at their vacation home. It’s a breather that Peele uses for light jokes and intimacy (Duke’s amiable performance provides levity and warmth) while he scatters narrative bread crumbs. There’s a beach trip with another family, this one headed by Kitty (a fantastic Elisabeth Moss) and Josh (Tim Heidecker), who have teenage twin girls (cue “The Shining”). At last, the movie jumps to kinetic life with the appearance of the Wilsons’ doubles, who descend in a brutal home invasion.

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .

Jordan Peele’s ‘Us’ Will Haunt You

By Peter Travers

Peter Travers

It’s scary as hell, and that’s just for starters. But Us , the new mesmerizing mindbender from writer-director-producer Jordan Peele , also carries the weight of expectation. Get Out , Peele’s smashing debut from 2017, was a brilliantly caustic satire of race division in America that won Peele an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay (he’s the first African-American to triumph in that category) and became a phenom with critics and audiences. How can Peele top that? Short answer: he can’t and doesn’t. In interviews , Peele insists that Us is a straight-up horror show. Not really. Leave it to Peele to blaze a trail by putting a black family smack in the middle of a commercial thriller-diller. That’s more than a novelty, it’s a quiet revolution. And Peele’s hints at the larger conspiracies of race, class and social violence festering inside the American dream resonate darkly. Ding Peele all you want for taking on more than he can comfortably handle, but this 40-year-old from New York who started as one half of the sketch-comedy team of Key & Peele is now shaping up as a world-class filmmaker. Flaws and all, Us has the power to haunt your waking dreams. You won’t be able to stop talking about it.

Related: Jordan Peele on the Cover of Rolling Stone

Critics, in mortal fear of the spoiler police, need to shut the fuck up. Or at least tread carefully as Peele introduces the Wilson family of sunny California. Mom Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o), dad Gabe (Winston Duke) and their two kids — Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph) and Jason (Evan Alex) — are on vacation in Santa Cruz. Gabe has an unspoken competition with his friends the Tylers (Elisabeth Moss and Tim Heidecker), a white couple with twin daughters given to conspicuous consumption. Everyone is up for a fun time, especially dad (the excellent Duke — looking much like Peele — gets laughs in the unlikeliest places). But Adelaide is not feeling it. In a chilling prologue, set in 1986, we see Adelaide as a child getting majorly freaked out by a trip to a beachside funhouse containing a hall of mirrors. Now the grown Adelaide is back on the same beach where she was traumatized as a child, and she’s taking her own children along. You can cut the foreboding with a knife — or a pair of gold scissors.

Editor’s picks

The 100 best tv episodes of all time, the 250 greatest guitarists of all time, the 500 greatest albums of all time, 25 most influential creators of 2024.

Scissors figure prominently when the Wilsons are confronted in their driveway by unexpected visitors. Since the scene is included in the film’s trailer, I’m not giving away anything to note that these home invaders — clad in red — are exact doubles of the four Wilsons. And the scissors these zombie-like doppelgängers carry are meant to slit throats. “What the hell are you?” asks Gabe. The answer is croaked out by Adelaide’s evil twin (the only double who speaks) in a voice that induces shudders: “We’re Americans.”

The political implications of that genuinely creepy setup are tantalizing, as are the film’s allusions to Hands Across America — the 1986 event in which a human chain of millions was formed to help alleviate poverty and hunger — and the thousands of miles of empty tunnels that run under the continental United States, including the Underground Railroad that symbolizes African enslavement. Is Peele referencing the Sunken Place of the Trump era in which the new gospel preaches fear of the other? If so, the theme remains frustratingly undeveloped. Yet Peele, the supreme cinema stylist, is on a roll. The violence is unnerving as the doubles set out to untether themselves from their human counterparts. By necessity,the Wilsons become a family that kills together. Even the Tylers get invaded. Kudos to Moss, who takes a small role and runs with it. The scene in which her character’s wild-eyed double smears on lip gloss is an unforgettable blend of mirth and menace.

Still, the acting honors in Us go to Nyong’o, who is actually playing two roles, one as protective mother and another as predator. She is superb as both. And what she does with her voice as Adelaide’s double is impossible to shake. Nyong’o, already an Oscar winner for Twelve Years a Slave , should be in the running again for delivering one of the great performances in horror movie history, right up there with Sissy Spacek in Carrie and Jack Nicholson in The Shining .

Peele, an unapologetic horror fanatic, nods to those films and dozens more in Us , including Invasion of the Body Snatchers , Jaws and Michael Jackson’s Thriller . Yet his style is completely his own, as assured as it is ambitious. With the help of cinematographer Mike Gioulakis, up to his It Follows mischief, and a score by Get Out composer Michael Abels that is built to shatter your nerves, the action never lets up. The Beach Boys anthem “Good Vibrations” is featured in the mix, as is “I Got 5 On It” by the hip-hop duo Luniz. You’ll never be able to hear those songs again in the same way.

SXSW 2019: Jordan Peele's 'Us' Is Terrifying

The first time: jordan peele, how 'strange darling' became the demented little thriller that could.

There are times when Us plays like an extended and exceptional episode of The Twilight Zone , the 1950’s TV series revived next month on CBS All Access and hosted by Peele in Rod Serling mode. But Peele can’t stop himself from reaching higher and cutting deeper. The twisty road he takes us on opens itself to many interpretations. There are times when the film grips us with such hallucinatory terror that you may think it’s another of Adelaide’s PTSD-induced nightmares. Maybe it is. Or maybe it’s a ghastly reflection of the way we live now. Peele uses a Biblical quote from Jeremiah 11:11 that suggests even God has turned his back on us. What is never in doubt is that Peele is using the scare genre to show us a world tragically untethered to its own humanity, its empathy, its soul. If that’s not a horror film for its time, I don’t know what is.

Marisa Abela’s Yasmin Is the Broken Heart and Spoiled Soul of ‘Industry’

• first impression
• By CT Jones

‘Uglies’ Proves the Future of YA Adaptations Should Be Animation

• Picture Imperfect

James McAvoy Nearly Played a Young Voldemort in 'Harry Potter'

• Riddle Me That
• By Ethan Millman

'Wicked Part Two' Announces New 2025 Release Date

• Wanna Be Popular?
• By Tomás Mier

'Dancing With the Stars' Showrunner Defends Anna Delvey Casting: 'She Served Her Time'

• 'Valid' Delvey

Most Popular

Jane's addiction concert ends abruptly after perry farrell throws a punch at dave navarro, is forced offstage by crew, "it's a cult, and walt's the messiah": meet the couple who sued disney over secretive club 33, prince harry & meghan markle made this announcement mere hours after kate middleton’s cancer update video, jay-z explains why kendrick lamar was chosen to perform at super bowl halftime show, you might also like, box office: ‘beetlejuice beetlejuice’ no. 1 again with $51 million as ‘speak no evil’ opens to $11 million, mary mcfadden dies at 85, the best yoga mats for any practice, according to instructors, ‘the life of chuck’ wins tiff people’s choice award: full winners list, ufc 306 at sphere pulls in record $22m for ufc, sphere.

Rolling Stone is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2024 Rolling Stone, LLC. All rights reserved.

The Definitive Voice of Entertainment News

Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter

site categories

‘us’: film review | sxsw 2019.

Jordan Peele follows 'Get Out' with 'Us,' a horror film starring Lupita Nyong'o in which the monsters look just like the heroes.

By John DeFore

John DeFore

• Share on Facebook
• Share to Flipboard
• Send an Email
• Show additional share options
• Share on LinkedIn
• Share on Pinterest
• Share on Reddit
• Share on Tumblr
• Share on Whats App
• Print the Article
• Post a Comment

“We’re Americans.”

That single line will be the portal through which Jordan Peele ‘s fans might seek sociopolitical meaning in Us , an often terrifying thriller whose fantastical premise isn’t nearly as easy to read allegorically as that of his shockingly good debut, Get Out . Clearly the work of an ambitious writer-director who can see himself inheriting the mantle of Rod Serling (the Peele-hosted Twilight Zone reboot launches in less than a month), it offers twists and ironies and false endings galore — along with more laughs than the comedian-turned-auteur dared to include in his debut film. Though probably more commercially limited by its genre than its hard-to-pigeonhole predecessor, it packs a punch.

Related Stories

Max minghella sees a lot of 'look who's talking' in 'shell,' his second feature as a director, 'the wild robot' review: lupita nyong'o and pedro pascal make unlikely co-parents in poignant dreamworks animated feature.

Release date: Mar 22, 2019

Opening with a shot of a television surrounded by VHS tapes that tease at some of the film’s possible inspirations ( C.H.U.D. , The Goonies , The Right Stuff ; which of these does not belong?), Us introduces Adelaide (Madison Curry), a young girl in 1986 Santa Cruz who’s about to have a traumatic experience at a beachside amusement park.

Cut to the present day, when Adelaide Wilson (Lupita Nyong’o) is a mother of two, heading out with husband Gabe (Winston Duke) for a vacation at her childhood home. Though she recoils at Gabe’s suggestion that they take young Jason (Evan Alex) and Zora (Shahadi Wright-Joseph) to the beach — the idea triggers memories she hasn’t told Gabe about — she relents; once there, mysterious forces seem to be pushing her toward whatever once harmed her.

A general air of icky dread builds toward the scenes that, having been spilled all over the film’s trailers, can’t be spoiled here: Back home that night, four mysterious assailants trap the Wilsons in their house. Each one is the near-identical twin of a family member, though only Adelaide’s twin speaks. In a gasping croak, she identifies herself as Adelaide’s “shadow,” who has lived a life of misery “tethered” to her but far away. She and the others have come to do some un-tethering, and it’s going to hurt.

To this point, Duke (previously the fearsome clan leader M’Baku in Black Panther ) has been a surprisingly winning source of comic relief, stealing scenes as most dads only wish they could. Now, those laughs are rationed out stingily, used to cut the tension between two very intense, very fine performances by Nyong’o. While her Adelaide is nearly paralyzed by a combination of maternal panic and childhood memories, her Shadow is an old-school bringer of violent justice, settling scores the Wilsons didn’t even know existed.

As home invasion standoffs go, Us would be a thrill ride even if its villains weren’t horrifying grotesques of the characters they seek to destroy. It ends with satisfying violence, but of course this is not the end: The doppelganger vision expands, taking in the neighbors ( Elisabeth Moss and Tim Heidecker, 2018’s version of Me Generation vapidity) and making escape much harder than the Wilsons imagined. And then things get weirder still.

I’ll save you the trouble of googling the Bible verse cited by a madman here: Jeremiah 11:11 reads, “Therefore this is what the Lord says: ‘I will bring on them a disaster they cannot escape. Although they cry out to me, I will not listen to them.'” But nobody cries out to God in the apocalypse Us winds up conjuring. They fight and fight, while viewers cower and pray that the answer to Peele’s mystery will be worthy of the bloody road leading to it. We’ll leave that question for viewers to hash out over a post-viewing drink. What isn’t up for debate is the obvious pleasure Peele takes in crafting a film whose many references to pop-culture history — you’ll be too tense to giggle when a boy in a Chewbacca mask yells, “It’s a trap!” — are sometimes transmogrified into an iconography all their own. Monstrous beings wearing red jumpsuits and a single fingerless glove, carrying giant gold scissors while howling wordlessly to their partners lurking in the shadows — that’s an image that will provoke nightmares, even before we can explore where its components come from.

Perhaps Us is making the obvious point that, whether we’re black or white, it’s people who look just like us who’ve made our world a disaster we cannot escape. Maybe we’re doing the same, both of us creating a living hell for someone, likely without even knowing it. Maybe we’re Them and they’re Us. Maybe every happy ending is somebody else’s catastrophe, and therefore, no horror film is ever really over.

Production company: Monkeypaw Productions Distributor: Universal Cast: Lupita Nyong’o, Winston Duke, Evan Alex, Shahadi Wright-Joseph, Elisabeth Moss, Tim Heidecker, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Anna Diop, Madison Curry, Cali Sheldon Director-screenwriter: Jordan Peele Producers: Jordan Peele, Sean McKittrick, Jason Blum, Ian Cooper Executive producers: Daniel Lupi, Bea Sequeira Director of photography: Mike Gioulakis Production designer: Ruth De Jong Costume designer: Kym Barrett Editor: Nicholas Monsour Composer: Michael Abels Casting director: Terri Taylor Venue: SXSW Film Festival (Headliners)

Rated R, 116 minutes

THR Newsletters

Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day

More from The Hollywood Reporter

Box office: ‘beetlejuice beetlejuice’ stays no. 1 as ‘speak no evil’ impresses and ‘killer’s game’ bombs, toronto: mike flanagan’s ‘the life of chuck’ wins audience award, toronto: why rebel wilson will only direct musicals, ‘the deb’ review: rebel wilson’s directorial debut is a campy, mixed-bag teen musical, ‘speak no evil’ filmmaker james watkins says his 2008 debut was a reference for the 2022 danish film he’s now remade, ‘traumnovelle’ review: german adaptation of novella that inspired ‘eyes wide shut’ leans hard into the lurid.

Jordan Peele's 'Us' Is a Terrifying Look at the Horror Beneath the Surface

With his follow-up to Get Out , Peele is proving he's becoming our generation's great horror auteur.

There's a lot of talk lately about "elevated horror," a new term to describe a genre that is often critically maligned for its use of the macabre, the grotesque, a shameless penchant for blood and guts and jump-scares. This sort of thing happens to every genre of film, from musicals to westerns to the hardboiled detective tale—what begins as a cheap and sometimes emotionally exploitative kind of film typically evolves, once the powers that be figure out the average moviegoer likes entertaining trash, into a genre that includes more ambitious, auteur-driven work. Great horror films have been around for decades—even the most schlocky ones have their merits—but thanks in large part to Jordan Peele's Oscar-winning Get Out (often referred to as a "social thriller" rather than a horror film), it certainly feels like we're in a Golden Age of Horror.

I don't necessarily buy that (if anything, we're in a Golden Age of Calling Everything Right Now the Golden Age of Its Kind), but I will admit that Peele himself is becoming our generation's great horror auteur. Following the critical and commercial success of Get Out , the writer-director is back with another disturbing (and quite funny) horror film in Us —a full-on thrill-ride that works precisely because of its director's vision, not just in how he points the camera but also how he selects his players, who should be commended as much as their director for how they make this supernatural-tinged slasher pic work so well.

The film stars Lupita Nyong'o as Adelaide Wilson, wife to Winston Duke's Gabe and mother to Shahadi Wright Joseph's Zora and Evan Alex's Jason. The Wilsons are a typical middle-class American family, gathered together on a vacation at a family lake house in Santa Cruz, California. It's a house that's been in Adelaide's family for years; in fact, the film opens in 1986, with a young Adelaide (Madison Curry) visiting the Santa Cruz boardwalk with her parents and wandering off to take a self-guided tour of a creepy house of mirrors—which is where she has a traumatic encounter with what appears to be her double. Years pass. The young Adelaide goes through therapy to deal with the trauma, and while she doesn't necessarily forget it, she appears to be in control of the emotions triggered by the memory.

That is, until this particular vacation takes place. Peele sets up the typical sense of dread that every horror film delivers— we know something bad is about to happen, that's why we're here—by having Adelaide herself vocalize it to her husband. On the first day, she keeps noticing things: weird coincidences, doubled numbers, an unmistakable (but inexplicable) sense of doom. When she confesses this paranoia to Gabe, he writes it off as just that. Then the power goes out in the house, and Jason announces that a family of strangers is standing at the end of their driveway.

That's when all hell breaks loose. The mysterious foursome, all dressed in identical red jumpsuits, lay an assault on the Wilsons' home, breaking in and ushering them into the living room where the Wilsons realize that these home invaders seem familiar: they are their doppelgängers, led by a matriarch of their own in the unnamed Red (Nyong'o's double role is listed as such in the end credits). Forcing Adelaide to handcuff herself to the coffee table, Red then enlists her family members to pair off with their doppelgängers with the intent to murder them. And she explains, as she does once more in the film, what on earth is going on.

This is not some random home invasion à la The Strangers , and it's not simply a coincidence that they all happen to be the Wilsons' doubles. Red refers to themselves as shadows, the Tethered, copies of the humans that live on the surface of the earth. The Tethered lived below ground, in a giant underground tunnel system, their lives mimicking their doppelgängers' on the surface—only much more disturbed. But they've had enough, and they've come to take what they believe is their rightful place after years of neglect.

Just like Get Out 's body-swapping premise required a certain suspension of disbelief when it comes to the logistics, Us deliberately leaves holes in Peele's world-building efforts. Ultimately, this helps the film's script achieve the utmost creepiness by maintaining a level of Twilight Zone -style uncertainty. While the third act is the weakest simply because it includes an exposition dump in the form of a monologue from Red, Us works best when it relies on its unsettling motifs.

Peele's a whiz at pulling off a set piece, and he does so many times over in this film in stark and grand ways. And he doesn't let you forget that he's also a comedian; even the most horrific moments in the film are tinged with comedy, possibly because laughing at the idea of being scared is a defense mechanism in itself. (During my screening, a burst of laughter would immediately follow a scream.)

Peele is also brilliant at framing his actors' faces. Much like the iconic shot from Get Out of Daniel Kaluuya's wide-eyed and slack-jawed face, full of terror, Peele frames his actors making the best of their double roles. Nyong'o is the star here, and she gets the juiciest material with her character's double, who speaks as if the wind has been knocked out of her and moves across the frame with a creepy, robotic rhythm. But the supporting players get as much to work with, particularly an unsurprisingly great Elisabeth Moss.

Slasher films aren't always known for their great acting, mostly because the characters are usually flimsy and one-note. Peele devotes more time to making his characters—and their doubles—real and recognizable people who are so humane in all of their emotional and physical extremities. Us , Peele has claimed , is simply a horror film (contrasting with how he described Get Out as "a documentary"). But the horror genre often examines what it means to be human, and how we either falter or thrive in the face of danger and terror.

The title of Peele's latest film is a perfect one, a brief and succinct nod to what the film examines: the horror that lives beneath the surface, the dangers and traumas that we bury away in order to live the lives we think we've earned. Peele is not elevating horror, but rather digging deep into its roots to turn our own notion of ourselves on its head.

The 41 Best Horror Comedies Ever Made

The 100 Scariest Movies of All Time

The Ultimate Guide to the ‘Saw’ Universe

How to Watch the ‘Friday the 13th’ Movies in Order

The Best Thrillers of 2024 (So Far)

‘Happy Gilmore 2’ Is More Chaotic by the Day

The 21 Best Movies on Apple TV+

I Really Hope ‘The Apprentice’ Doesn’t Backfire

What’s Going On with Kevin Costner’s “Horizon 2”?

24 Great Thrillers to Stream on Netflix

Halloween Movies for People Who Hate Horror

I Liked It Better When Beetlejuice Was a Dick

Screen Rant

Us review: jordan peele returns with another terrific horror movie.

Your changes have been saved

Email is sent

Email has already been sent

Please verify your email address.

You’ve reached your account maximum for followed topics.

Joey King's Netflix YA Movie Continues Star's Dismal Rotten Tomatoes Streak

Dave bautista’s new action movie debuts on rotten tomatoes, continuing his mixed 2024, box office: beetlejuice beetlejuice sets a 5-year record, james mcavoy's thriller dominates new releases [full chart update], us manages to be funny, freaky, and thrilling all at once, and marks another step forward in peele's evolving sense of storytelling and craftsmanship..

Jordan Peele caught many people off-guard with his directorial debut on 2017's Get Out . The acclaimed horror-thriller was a big hit that went on to snag an Oscar for Peele's screenplay and firmly established the former Key & Peele comedian as a filmmaker on the rise. As such, moviegoers are a little more prepared for Peele's second movie Us , knowing now that the writer-director is a horror aficinado with someting to say (even if he's not necessarily commenting on racism in America, this time around). Still, even his biggest supporters may not be entirely ready for the twisted concoction that Peele's asssembled for his sophomore feature.  Us manages to be funny, freaky, and thrilling all at once, and marks another step forward in Peele's evolving sense of storytelling and craftsmanship.

Naturally, there are parallels between Get Out and Us , like the way that they both start out with characters going on what promises to be a fairly normal trip - even after a foreboding prologue that lets us know that all is not right in this world. In Us ' case, that means a summer vacation to the Wilson family beach house, with husband Gabe and wife Adelaide ( Black Panther costars Winston Duke and Lupita Nyong'o) leading their children Jason (Evan Alex) and Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph) along the way. The movie's first act does an excellent job of building up tension in the process, while at the same time laying the foundation for the story developments to come in ways both subtle and overtly threatening. And that's alll before the trouble really hits the fan and the Wilsons look out in their driveway one night to see (bizarre as it seems) doppelgängers of themselves... ones that definitely do not come in peace.

From the very beginning, Us serves to showcase Peele's improvements as a director since his debut on Get Out . The sound editing in the film's prologue alone is richly detailed and specific, as are the subjective camera angles that Peele and his DP Mike Gioulakis ( It Follows , Split ) use to make something as inocuous as a boardwalk carnival appear ominous and dangerous onscreen. These early scenes in particular further illustrate how much better Peele has gotten at using silence and a lack of music to create suspense since he began directing, as does his later usage of Get Out composer Michael Abels' score (which, like his prior work, is fueled by spooky chorus singing and unsettling orchestral compositions). Peele doesn't drop the ball when the movie becomes more action-driven either and succeeds in crafting some genuinely exciting set pieces here, while at the same time carrying over the visual motifs introduced in Us ' first third (reflections, mirror images, doubles, and so on).

Meanwhile, Peele's script here is as carefully structured as his screenplay for Get Out and finds ways to organically weave humor into the mix throughout the story, in ways that befit the movie's generally off-kilter tone. It helps that the main cast is strong across the board and make their characters feel like fully-rounded individuals, both before and after their doubles (aka. The Tethered) show up. Speaking of which: Nyong'o is the standout here in the dual roles of Adelaide and her doppelgänger "Red", which allow the Oscar-winner to flex her acting muscles in surprising and engaging ways. At the same time, she's able to generate real sympathy for both characters and give them distinct personalities, despite the fact that (obviously) they are dark reflections of one another. Duke is also pretty great in the film, especially since his role as the loveably adorkable dad Gabe is worlds apart from his breakout performance as the Wakandan warrior M'Baku.

The one element of Us that might prove to be relatively divisive is the film's central metaphor - or, more specifically, whether it has one. Peele, in another move that signals his continuing maturation as a storyteller, ultimately ties everything together here in a way that makes it clear that there's a deeper parable behind the larger narrative, but leaves room for audiences to interpret it as they will. As such, there are certainly different yet equally valid ways to read into Us , based on the film's themes about trauma, privilege, fractured social identities, and, of course, what it even means to battle your "other self". In that regard, the movie really works as a spiritual descendant of the original Twilight Zone (a series that, fittingly, Peele will revive in April) and skips over spoon-feeding its messages to audiences, in an effort to encourage them to consider the darkness that simmers beneath the surface of our society (quite literally, in the Us universe).

While Peele could've easily rested on his laurels with his sophomore feature and tried to simply recreate what he did so well on Get Out , he instead chose to challenge himself as a filmmaker and tackle a thought-provoking horror allegory that might be even more layered than his breakout effort. Suffice it to say, Us is a must-see for cinephiles and is sure to generate lots of interesting post-screenings discussions about what the film's saying and the symbolism baked into the narrative (not to mention, its clever use of '90s pop songs). For everyone else, Us is just like Get Out in the way that it wants to entertain and make audiences laugh and scream (sometimes within the same scene), while also serving up social commentary without feeling like a sermon. In short: Jordan Peele the director is not only here to stay, he's also just getting started.

Us  is now playing in U.S. theaters nationwide. It is 116 minutes long and is rated R for violence/terror, and language.

Let us know what you thought of the film in the comments section!

Written and directed by Jordan Peele, Us follows the Wilson family; Adelaide (Lupita Nyong'o) and her husband Gabe (Winston Duke), and their children, Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph) and Jason (Evan Alex). When visiting a remote lakeside cabin, the Wilson family is beset by exact doppelgangers of themselves, who quickly disclose that they mean their counterparts harm. The Wilson family is forced to fight for their lives against twisted mirror images of themselves, not realizing that there are more doppelgangers out there.

Key Release Dates

• Movie Reviews
• 4.5 star movies

Common Sense Media

Movie & TV reviews for parents

• For Parents
• For Educators
• Our Work and Impact

Or browse by category:

• Movie Reviews
• Best Movie Lists
• Best Movies on Netflix, Disney+, and More

Common Sense Selections for Movies

50 Modern Movies All Kids Should Watch Before They're 12

• Best TV Lists
• Best TV Shows on Netflix, Disney+, and More
• Common Sense Selections for TV
• Video Reviews of TV Shows

Best Kids' Shows on Disney+

Best Kids' TV Shows on Netflix

• Book Reviews
• Best Book Lists
• Common Sense Selections for Books

8 Tips for Getting Kids Hooked on Books

50 Books All Kids Should Read Before They're 12

• Game Reviews
• Best Game Lists

Common Sense Selections for Games

• Video Reviews of Games

Nintendo Switch Games for Family Fun

• Podcast Reviews
• Best Podcast Lists

Common Sense Selections for Podcasts

Parents' Guide to Podcasts

• App Reviews
• Best App Lists

Social Networking for Teens

Gun-Free Action Game Apps

Reviews for AI Apps and Tools

• YouTube Channel Reviews
• YouTube Kids Channels by Topic

Parents' Ultimate Guide to YouTube Kids

YouTube Kids Channels for Gamers

• Preschoolers (2-4)
• Little Kids (5-7)
• Big Kids (8-9)
• Pre-Teens (10-12)
• Teens (13+)
• Screen Time
• Social Media
• Online Safety
• Identity and Community

How to Help Kids Build Character Strengths with Quality Media

• Family Tech Planners
• Digital Skills
• All Articles
• Latino Culture
• Black Voices
• Asian Stories
• Native Narratives
• LGBTQ+ Pride
• Best of Diverse Representation List

Multicultural Books

YouTube Channels with Diverse Representations

Podcasts with Diverse Characters and Stories

• Common Sense Says
• Parents Say 47 Reviews
• Kids Say 143 Reviews

Common Sense Media Review

Peele's bloody, startling, inventive horror movie.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Us -- a shocking, inventive, often funny horror movie about doppelgangers starring Lupita Nyong'o -- is writer/director Jordan Peele's follow-up to his enormously popular Get Out . While this film isn't likely to have the same cultural impact, it's still quite good. It's also…

Why Age 16+?

Very scary (jump scares, etc.); also lots of blood and gore. Blood splatters, po

Several uses of "f--k," "s--t," "a--hole," "ass," "anus," "goddamn," and "Jesus

Secondary characters drink a lot (wine, whiskey, beer, etc.) to comic effect; no

A man is affectionate toward his wife, kissing her, hinting that he's going to h

Michael Jackson "Thriller" T-shirt.

Any Positive Content?

Raises interesting questions about idea of doppelgangers. But real message here

The family members (including kids) do what they have to do to survive, includin

Violence & Scariness

Very scary (jump scares, etc.); also lots of blood and gore. Blood splatters, pools of blood, dead bodies. Characters bash doppelgangers with blunt instruments (baseball bat, fireplace poker, golf club, etc.). Doppelgangers killing humans by slicing or stabbing them with sharp scissors. A character is ground up by a boat motor. Character hit by car. Choking with chains. Character's leg injured by baseball bat. Female character handcuffed. Boy with burn scars on his face. Boy on fire. Children in peril.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Several uses of "f--k," "s--t," "a--hole," "ass," "anus," "goddamn," and "Jesus Christ" (as an exclamation). In one scene, song "F--k tha Police" by N.W.A. plays, with brief, incessant language, including the "N" word. "Bulls--tty" spoken by a young boy.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Secondary characters drink a lot (wine, whiskey, beer, etc.) to comic effect; no hangovers or consequences. Character says he's "going for a smoke."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

A man is affectionate toward his wife, kissing her, hinting that he's going to have sex with her, and arranging himself on the bed to try to seduce her.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Positive messages.

Raises interesting questions about idea of doppelgangers. But real message here is that movie portrays a rather ordinary, interesting, likable African American family with no strings attached -- which is very welcome. Also promotes idea of the depth of a family's love.

Positive Role Models

The family members (including kids) do what they have to do to survive, including killing doppelgangers in very bloody ways. They rise above an unexpected challenge, but their survival is largely about luck and brute force. A villain's voice is based on the disability known as spasmodic dysphonia, which has caused some controversy.

Parents need to know that Us -- a shocking, inventive, often funny horror movie about doppelgangers starring Lupita Nyong'o -- is writer/director Jordan Peele 's follow-up to his enormously popular Get Out . While this film isn't likely to have the same cultural impact, it's still quite good. It's also very scary and violent. There are jump scares, plus many attacks and killings with blood and gore. Characters use blunt objects on doppelgangers, and doppelgangers slice and stab people with sharp scissors. A woman is handcuffed, and children are sometimes in peril. Language is also strong, with many uses of "f--k" and "s--t." The "N" word is heard in a song ("F--k tha Police" by N.W.A.), and a boy uses the word "bulls--t." A man kisses his wife and makes silly comments and gestures to indicate that he'd like to have sex, but it doesn't go any further. Secondary characters are seen drinking heavily in a comic way, without consequences. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

Videos and photos.

Parent and Kid Reviews

• Parents say (47)
• Kids say (143)

Based on 47 parent reviews

some violence, a song plays the "N-word"

What's the story.

US begins with young Adelaide enjoying the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk with her parents in 1986. While her father is distracted, she wanders off and winds up in a house of mirrors. The power winks off, and she finds herself standing next to what looks like her own reflection ... except that it's not a reflection. Flash forward to the present: Grown-up Adelaide ( Lupita Nyong'o ) is now married to Gabe (Winston Duke), with a teen daughter, Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph), and a young son, Jason (Evan Alex). While the family vacations at their summer home, Gabe suggests going back to Santa Cruz; though the idea terrifies Adelaide, she reluctantly agrees. Jason is briefly missing, but otherwise the day goes well. But when they get home, they discover a strange family of four standing in their driveway. And they look a lot like the Wilsons ... except that they don't seem friendly.

Is It Any Good?

Jordan Peele 's horror shocker can't compete with its sensational predecessor Get Out , but it doesn't have to. Made with precision, intelligence, and humor, Us is inventive and wildly entertaining in its own right. It can be said that Us has something to do with doppelgangers, but just how far the story goes and what it all means is best left to individual discussion. It's like a carnival ride of crazy ideas -- it's startling and also actually sometimes funny. While Get Out had little pockets of comic relief inserted into strategic places, the laughs in Us , based both on ironic jokes and on the happy feel of relief and release, are scattered throughout. Any character in this film can earn a laugh.

Since Peele -- well known as part of the comedy team Key & Peele -- understands the primal, bodily sensations of both laughter and fear, he approaches the filmmaking in Us with supreme confidence. His camera never shakes but rather moves in such a way to hide or reveal information for maximum impact. He's as precise here as Hitchcock or Kubrick. He also understands the use of music and sound, merging back and forth between a chilling, chanting orchestral score and pop songs, each adjusted at just the right volume or tone. It's an undeniably well-crafted and brutally effective movie, but where Get Out created a sharp, satirical commentary on race relations, this one very simply presents a positive portrayal of an African American family.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the violence in Us . Do the blood and gore seem over the top? Do the violent scenes help tell the story in an effective way? Is it shocking or thrilling? Why? Does exposure to violent media desensitize kids to violence?

Is the movie scary? What's the appeal of scary movies ?

What is a doppelganger? Do you think they exist in real life? Could there be a "good" and "evil" version of a person? Why or why not?

How many movies have you seen that portray an average/regular African American family? How did this one compare? Why is the family's ordinariness notable?

Movie Details

• In theaters : March 22, 2019
• On DVD or streaming : June 18, 2019
• Cast : Lupita Nyong'o , Wilson Duke , Elisabeth Moss
• Director : Jordan Peele
• Inclusion Information : Black directors, Female actors, Black actors, Latino actors
• Studio : Universal Pictures
• Genre : Horror
• Run time : 116 minutes
• MPAA rating : R
• MPAA explanation : violence/terror, and language
• Award : NAACP Image Award - NAACP Image Award Nominee
• Last updated : August 21, 2024

Did we miss something on diversity?

Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

Suggest an Update

What to watch next.

Sorry to Bother You

The Invitation

It Comes at Night

Best horror movies, scary movies for kids.

Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.

Us (United States, 2019)

Following a creepy prologue set in a Santa Cruz amusement park circa 1986, Us jumps forward in time to “today.” A family of four – father Gabe (Winston Duke), mother Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o), daughter Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph), and son Jason (Evan Alex) – are about to embark on the annual ritual of a summer vacation at the lake. Most of Us ’ first half-hour is devoted to establishing how normal the Wilsons are. When they arrive at the lake house, Zora complains that she can’t get on-line. Gabe buys a cheap boat. Us gets the family-bonding details right; however, this being a horror film, as night follows day, so unpleasantness trails normalcy.

As was the case with Get Out , Peele has stayed away from Big Name Actors in casting Us. Instead, he has reached into the MCU and plucked out Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o and Winston Duke, both of whom appeared in Black Panther . They’re very good here with Nyong’o focused on her character’s emotional turmoil and Duke providing a portion of the film’s comedic relief (along with a few one-liners that come out of the Schwarzenegger school of instant quotables). Shahadi Wright Joseph and Evan Alex, who represent the next generation, get their opportunities to wreak havoc.

If there’s one thing that saves Us , it’s that, even as the movie descends into a narrative morass from which it never escapes, there are many individual scenes that, taken in isolation, pack a punch. The problem is that, once assembled into the larger whole, it doesn’t all work. One would have to be forgiving in the extreme to give Peele a pass by using the justification that all horror films are preposterous. Yes, many are, but not this nonsensical. Us is audacious, to be sure, but audacity isn’t always a good thing.

Comments Add Comment

• It Comes at Night (2017)
• Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, The (1921)
• Strangers, The (2008)
• Feardotcom (2002)
• Spiral (2021)
• Hitcher, The (2007)
• Black Panther (2018)
• Jungle Book, The (2016)
• Quiet Place, A: Day One (2024)
• Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
• 355, The (2022)
• (There are no more worst movies of Lupita Nyong’o)
• Fall Guy, The (2024)
• (There are no more better movies of Winston Duke)
• Spenser Confidential (2020)
• Nine Days (2021)
• (There are no more better movies of Shahadi Wright Joseph)
• (There are no more worst movies of Shahadi Wright Joseph)

• Become a Critical Movie Critic
• Movie Review Archives

Movie Review: Us (2019)

• Floyd Smith III
• Movie Reviews
• --> March 22, 2019

Fans of Jordan Peele’s incomparable societal critique “ Get Out ” can rejoice as the horror-auteur swings for the fences in his newest horror-thriller Us , and for the most part, hits it straight out of the park. Piggybacking off of the inquisitive, yet cynical, tone of his directorial debut, Us follows the Wilson family as they attempt to blow off some steam with a family road trip following the death of the children’s grandmother.

Heading this family is the ideally cast Winston Duke (“ Black Panther ”) as the father Gabriel, who not only handles a great deal of the films comedic relief but serves as the most easily relatable protagonist of the film considering the quirks of the rest of the family. Next to him is the timid, yet strict wife and mother Adelaide (Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong’o, “ 12 Years a Slave ”). Adelaide acts as the driving force for the film’s supernatural arc, introduced to viewers when she is a child who experiences a traumatic event that has lasting effects even relatively far into her motherhood. Her children, Zora and Jason (Shahadi Wright Joseph and Evan Alex, respectively), are accustomed to their mother’s outbursts and tenderness, but still question the validity of her concerns.

The first act of Us portrays a thoroughly heartwarming introduction to this modern family, each character of course dons some of not only the horror genre’s typical character tropes but of family films in general such as the daughter being a bit of a smart-ass and the son being labeled “weird” just because he likes to make sandcastles and play hide and seek. Peele offers a decent dose of nuance to the audience, however, most emphatically in the interactions between Adelaide and her son Jason. The two seem to have a lot of the same isolating tendencies along with feelings of being misjudged. Even rolling over into the second act, Peele’s pacing is exacting as we’re given time to feel like a member of this family. This fun and relaxed immersion can easily cause one to forget it’s a horror film they’re watching . . .

But of course this is a misdirection by Peele, who gathers the audience’s comfort and curiosity before laying down a heavy dose of surrealism and twists that would make even “The Twilight Zone” a bit jealous. I use this reference not only because it is a show that Peele is currently resurrecting, but also because it’s what he has labeled an inspiration for the film’s narrative (I’ll let you all discover what episode on your own). Soon a quartet of people who look a lot like the Wilsons invade the home throwing the proceedings into abject tumult. It’s also around the end of this second act, the audience learns of the potential depth of the film’s plot and that there are in fact grander implications than the film’s jokes, jump scares and general creepiness would suggest.

Rather than spoon feed the audience the message like his previous film, in the last act he gives the audience a little more wiggle room to discern and unravel the societal perspective themselves. Beyond the dopplegangers and the apparent chaos they’ve unleashed on the family, lie concerns about introspection and social turmoil, the liabilities of human processing, and the overall lack of reflection and sensitivity in modern culture. Upon reflection, these communal breakdowns are nearly as horrific as the goings-ons at the Wilson’s lake house.

With Us , Jordan Peele has refreshingly delivered not only a bonafide frightener, but also a movie that presses his audience to dig deeper to not only dissect the many layers of a torn societal structure but also the many layers of ourselves. And though Us doesn’t quite reach the heights attained by “Get Out,” its message certainly does and it’s one that may stick around for a much longer time.

Tagged: home invasion , mask , relationships , supernatural , twins

A journalist and alumni of the Film Theory & Criticism graduate program at Central Michigan University; Floyd Smith III is a cinephile whose written for multiple publications including moviepilot and RadioOne and has a background in news writing for the independent publication The North Wind. Studying film since his time as an undergrad, he began officially reviewing films and reporting on entertainment in 2014. Smith joined CMC in January of 2016 and enjoys films of the science fiction, comic book, and horror genres.

Movie Review: Da 5 Bloods (2020) Movie Review: The Lighthouse (2019) Movie Review: Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood (2019) Movie Review: Crawl (2019) Movie Review: Brightburn (2019) Movie Review: Aquaman (2018) Movie Review: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)

Privacy Policy | About Us

 |  Log in

Featured today

Most popular celebrities

What to watch, exclusive videos, imdb originals.

Explore what’s streaming

Explore movies & tv shows, more to explore, recently viewed.

• Skip to main content
• Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

Movie Reviews

• Subscribe to Pop Culture Happy Hour Newsletter

Natasha Lyonne, left, Elizabeth Olsen and Carrie Coon play sisters who come together in the final days of their father's life in His Three Daughters. Sam Levy/Netflix hide caption

A dying father brings 'His Three Daughters' together, in a sharply written film

September 13, 2024 • Natasha Lyonne, Elizabeth Olsen and Carrie Coon play estranged sisters saying farewell to their terminally ill dad. It's a familiar plot, but writer-director Azazel Jacobs manages to sidesteps cliché.

James McAvoy in Speak No Evil . Susie Allnutt/Universal Studios hide caption

Pop Culture Happy Hour

Never visit james mcavoy's house, and other lessons of 'speak no evil'.

September 13, 2024 • Never visit your weird new friends at their enormous isolated country estate. That's a basic rule that an American family fails to follow in the new horror thriller Speak No Evil starring James McAvoy. By the time they figure out they are in way over their heads, it's much much too late.

Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza in My Old Ass . Marni Grossman/Amazon MGM Studios hide caption

A teen meets her middle-aged self in 'My Old Ass' and finds hindsight isn't 20/20

September 11, 2024 • Imagine camping out in the woods, taking mushrooms, and meeting your future self ... played by Aubrey Plaza. That's what happens to 18-year-old Elliott (Maisy Stella) in this charming, quirky comedy.

Aaron Pierre in Rebel Ridge. Allyson Rigg/Netflix hide caption

'Rebel Ridge' serves up revenge with restraint

September 11, 2024 • In Netflix's new film Rebel Ridge , Aaron Pierre plays Terry, a young Black man who enters a small Southern town to post bail for his cousin. But when the local cops seize his money, he faces off against the corrupt chief of police (Don Johnson). Things escalate, and soon he uncovers a sinister conspiracy that threatens his life.

Brandy Norwood in The Front Room . A24 hide caption

Strong performances highlight the scary (and funny) 'The Front Room'

September 10, 2024 • Maybe you think you've seen every scary mother-in-law fiction has to offer — you absolutely haven't. In the new movie The Front Room , a pregnant woman (Brandy Norwood) allows her mother-in-law (Kathryn Hunter) to move in. In a film that's part creepy and part very darkly funny, the two women square off for control of the house and the child on the way.

Turns out Beetlejuice (Michael Keaton) hasn't changed much in 30-odd years — he's less of a villain, but still a pain in the neck. Parisa Taghizadeh/Warner Bros. Pictures hide caption

Beetlejuice is back, in a supernatural screwball sequel

September 6, 2024 • Director Tim Burton seems more interested in updating than duplicating his 1988 hit. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice demonstrates affection for the characters and genuine curiosity in how they’re doing now.

Clockwise from left: Wicked, Here, Emilia Pérez, A Real Pain, Piece by Piece and Blitz. Universal Pictures, Sony Pictures, Shanna Besson/Pathé, Searchlight Pictures and Apple TV+ hide caption

Here are 25 movies we can't wait to watch this fall

September 6, 2024 • Here are the new releases coming your way between now and Thanksgiving — we've got award contenders, goofy comedies, a smattering of romance, plenty of anti-heroes, and a musical documentary in LEGOs.

Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Warner Bros Pictures hide caption

Is there any juice left in 'Beetlejuice Beetlejuice?'

September 6, 2024 • There's a reason Beetlejuic e was a hit back in 1988: it delivered both the spectacle and big stars of a major studio film, and the hilarious, weird vision of director Tim Burton. Now he returns with the sequel, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice — which stars Winona Ryder, Catherine O'Hara, Michael Keaton, and Jenna Ortega. But does Beetlejuice Beetlejuice capture any of the original's silly, surreal, singular magic? Should it even try?

John Cho in Afraid . Glen Wilson/Sony Pictures hide caption

'Afraid': A not-OK computer

August 30, 2024 • The new movie Afraid is latest in the well-established genre of "the computer is alive" stories. John Cho plays a dad who has a chance to try out a very advanced AI system at his home — and it does a lot more than talk back.

Bill Skarsgård in The Crow. Larry Horricks/Lionsgate hide caption

'The Crow' puts the ick in gothic

August 29, 2024 • In the new film The Crow , Bill Skarsgård plays a man who gets brutally murdered alongside his soulmate (FKA twigs). He returns to life as an unstoppable figure of vengeance, hunting down their killers. It's not a remake of the 1994 cult classic; the filmmakers are pitching it as a brand new reimagining of the comic book series that inspired the original film. But how does this new movie stack up?

José Coronado plays film star Julio Arenas in Close Your Eyes. Film Movement hide caption

Quietly transcendent 'Close Your Eyes' may be among the best films you see all year

August 23, 2024 • Over the past 50 years or so, Spanish filmmaker Víctor Erice has directed just four features. His latest, about a filmmaker who revisits a past project, has the pull of a well-crafted detective story.

Channing Tatum stars as Slater King in Blink Twice. Zachary Greenwood/Amazon MGM Studios hide caption

Zoë Kravitz's 'Blink Twice' is a very weird and ambitious big swing

August 23, 2024 • In the new psychological thriller Blink Twice , Naomi Ackie plays a woman who is invited to the private island of a tech billionaire, played by Channing Tatum. He's recently re-entered public life after a scandal and has gathered his friends for a long party. But as the party stretches on, it's clear that something is seriously amiss. Blink Twice is the directorial debut of Zoë Kravitz, and the vibes are definitely pretty weird.

Alien: Romulus is the latest movie in the long-running Alien sci-fi/horror series. But it actually takes place shortly after the events of the very first film: Ridley Scott’s 1979 classic, Alien . 20th Century Studios hide caption

'Alien: Romulus' is another franchise movie that brings more nostalgia than novelty

August 16, 2024 • The latest installment of the "Alien" series is an efficient and reasonably entertaining thriller. But dwelling too obsessively on the past won't guarantee a franchise's future.

Cailee Spaeny and David Jonsson in Alien: Romulus . Murray Close/20th Century Studios hide caption

'Alien: Romulus' goes deep (space) into the horror

August 16, 2024 • Alien: Romulus is the latest entry in the venerable Alien sci-fi/horror film franchise, and it leans hard into the horror. The new movie stars Cailee Spaeney as one of a young crew of space miners, along with David Jonsson as her android brother. You'll never guess what species of slimy extraterrestrial evil they encounter. Faces get hugged, chests get burst, and acid blood eats through everything.

Izaac Wang stars as Chris Wang in Didi. Focus Features hide caption

'Didi' captures the awkwardness of adolescence almost too well

August 15, 2024 • The movie Didi is a vibrant coming-of-age dramedy and was a Sundance film festival favorite. It stars Izaac Wang as a 13-year-old just trying to survive the awkwardness of puberty as a Taiwanese-American kid living in the Bay Area. He's got a crush to impress, complicated friendships to navigate, and family members who are sooooo embarrassing. Didi was directed by Sean Wang, who earned an Oscar nomination earlier this year for his documentary short Nai Nai & Wai Po .

Hunter Schafer in Cuckoo. Felix Dickinson/Neon hide caption

Hunter Schafer's 'Cuckoo' serves up Alpine horror

August 12, 2024 • In the new, stylishly odd horror film Cuckoo , Hunter Schafer plays an American teenager who reluctantly moves with her family to a mysterious resort in the German Alps. Her rebellious spirit clashes with the resort's creepy proprietor, played by Dan Stevens. When weird stuff starts happening, long-buried family secrets come to light and the resort's true nature stands revealed.

Matt Damon and Casey Affleck become uneasy partners in crime in The Instigators. Apple TV+ hide caption

Matt Damon and Casey Affleck are 'The Instigators' in a classic heist film throwback

August 9, 2024 • After a heist goes bad, two inept Boston crooks (played by Damon and Affleck) become uneasy partners. The Instigators is a reasonably enjoyable film that reflects an earlier cinematic era.

Instigators

Blake Lively in It Ends With Us. Sony Pictures hide caption

'It Ends With Us' is a melodrama with serious undertones

August 9, 2024 • The 2016 Colleen Hoover novel It Ends With Us was a massive bestseller. And now that book is a movie. Blake Lively stars as Lily Bloom, a woman who falls for a hot neurosurgeon played by Justin Baldoni — who also directs the film. But their relationship is complicated by the return of her old flame (Brandon Sklenar). She also has to reckon with her feelings about her abusive father and the mother who stayed with him.

Lily Collias brings a nearly wordless intensity as Sam in Good One. Smudge Films hide caption

In ‘Good One,’ a family camping trip is full of emotional switchbacks

August 8, 2024 • On its surface, Good One is about a teen on a backpacking trip with her dad and his friend. But the film is so sharp and engrossing you might not notice the deeper story taking shape underneath.

(l-r) Colman Domingo and Clarence Maclin in Sing Sing . A24 hide caption

Colman Domingo's 'Sing Sing' is a rare empathetic prison drama

August 5, 2024 • The moving drama Sing Sing stars Colman Domingo as the leader of a tight-knit theatre ensemble within one of the most notorious maximum-security prisons in the United States. Most of the cast are alumni of the actual program who had input on the filmmaking process. The movie showcases the ups and downs of putting on a show without being overly sentimental or cliché.

Josh Hartnett in Trap . Warner Bros. Pictures hide caption

M. Night Shyamalan lays his own parent 'Trap,' and it's truly bonkers

August 2, 2024 • M. Night Shyamalan's new thriller Trap stars Josh Hartnett as a father attending a pop concert with his teenage daughter. But all is not as it appears. It quickly turns out that the entire concert is surrounded by police who are trying to catch a dangerous serial killer in the most difficult way possible. There is a lot going on in this bonkers movie: lots of pop songs, and lots of strange decision-making.

Ryan Reynolds stars as Deadpool and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine in an odd-couple action hero pairing. Jay Maidment/20th Century Studios hide caption

'Deadpool & Wolverine' is a self-cannibalizing slog

July 26, 2024 • Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman have good, thorny chemistry in this odd-couple action hero flick. But brand extension disguised as a satire of brand extension is still just ... brand extension.

'Deadpool & Wolverine' is a self-cannibalizing slog

Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman in Marvel's Deadpool & Wolverine . Jay Maidment/20th Century Studios/Marvel hide caption

'Deadpool & Wolverine' is a feast of inside jokes

July 26, 2024 • In the highly meta Deadpool & Wolverine , Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman finally meet up for their own big movie. Deadpool is still smarmy, Wolverine is still tragic, and they have to get together to save the world. Along the way, Deadpool continues his usual routine of endless wisecracking. The movie is jam-packed with fan service and Easter eggs. But how will casual Marvel fans like the movie?

'Deadpool & Wolverine' is a feast of inside jokes

• Corrections
• Campaign 2024
• Putin's war in Ukraine
• Business & Economy
• Media Spotlight
• Waste, Fraud & Abuse
• Inside the Beltway
• Inside the Ring
• Higher Ground
• Entertainment
• Just the Headlines
• Photo Galleries
• Dive Deeper
• 40 years of The Washington Times

Threat Status

• Energy & Environment
• Banking & Finance
• Health Care Reform
• Second Amendment
• Immigration Reform
• Homeland & Cybersecurity
• Aerospace & Defense
• Taxes & Budget
• Law Enforcement & Intelligence
• Transportation & Infrastructure
• Commentary Main
• Charles Hurt
• Cheryl K. Chumley
• Kelly Sadler
• Jennifer Harper
• Tim Constantine
• Joseph Curl
• Joseph R. DeTrani
• Billy Hallowell
• Daniel N. Hoffman
• David Keene
• Robert Knight
• Clifford D. May
• Michael McKenna
• Stephen Moore
• Tim Murtaugh
• Peter Navarro
• Everett Piper
• Scott Walker
• Black Voices
• To the Republic
• Sports Main
• Washington Commanders
• Thom Loverro
• Horse Racing
• NASCAR & Racing
• District of Sports Podcast
• Sports Photos
• Higher Ed Harassment
• Health Care on the Hill
• Invest in Portugal
• Health Care 2022
• Africa FDI Edition
• Immigration 2022
• Future of Clean Energy
• Invest in Ireland
• ESG Investments
• U.S. & South Korea Alliance
• Invest in Malta
• National Clean Energy Week
• Victorious Family
• Energy 2024
• Infrastructure 2024
• Free Iran 2024
• Transportation 2024
• Reinventing after Globalization
• The Chiefs Forum: The Next 100 Days
• Harm Reduction and Public Health
• Subscriber Only Events
• Higher Ground Events
• All Podcasts
• The Front Page
• Politically Unstable
• History As It Happens
• Bold & Blunt
• The Higher Ground
• Court Watch
• Victory Over Communism
• District of Sports
• Capitol Hill Show
• The Unregulated Podcast
• The Rebellion Podcast
• Play Sudoku
• Crossword Puzzle
• Word Search

LISTEN: Do Trump and Harris both deserve blame for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan?

Latest episode: The war in the West Bank How settlers came to rule

America’s growing separation from God Rob Pacienza on Bold & Blunt

WATCH: American voters were the real losers of the first debate With Tim Constantine and David Bozell

Movie review: in ‘the critic,’ ian mckellen’s theater critic takes his job very seriously.

The arts rarely have anything good to say about critics. That they’re not generally the hero of many stories is, at the very least, understandable. More often they’re portrayed as joyless, cruel and a little pathetic; themselves failed artists who live to take down others, or, worse, sycophants in search of a famous friend.

Without getting into any sort of philosophical, or even factual debate about the nature of the kind of person drawn to criticism (besides perhaps a staunch antipathy to either job security or amassing wealth), it is safe to say that the drama critic of “ The Critic ” takes all the worst stereotypes to hysterical heights.

Set in the 1930s in London, Ian McKellen is Jimmy Erskine, a veteran theater critic whose reviews can make or break a play or a performer. He has a monastic devotion to telling the truth, as entertainingly as he can, and knows what he must sacrifice to do so.

“The drama critic is feared and reviled for the judgement he must bring,” McKellen says in an ominous voiceover. “(He) must be cold and perfectly alone.”

When one woman dares to chat him up after a play, offering her take on the material and performances, he swiftly tries to have her removed from the restaurant claiming he must be protected from the general public. When an actress, Nina Land (Gemma Arterton), confronts him about his wildly inconsistent criticisms of her (how can she be both plump and emaciated, she wonders), he refuses to apologize. And he scoffs when the new boss at the newspaper, David Brooke (Mark Strong), implores him to tone it down: “Be kinder,” he says. “More beauty, less beast.”

But what starts as satire spirals into a wildly messy tragedy with contrivance upon contrivance. This is a film that could have listened to its anti-hero’s advice to the flailing actress: Do less. That someone as great as Lesley Manville, as Nina’s mother, gets a mere handful of scenes and is only minimally consequential to it all is telling. It strives to be an intricate spider-web of compelling, intersecting stories, but few characters are fleshed out enough for us to care.

PHOTOS: Movie Review: In ‘The Critic,’ Ian McKellen's theater critic takes his job very seriously

“ The Critic,” handsomely directed by Anand Tucker (“Hilary and Jackie,” “Leap Year”) and written by Patrick Marber (“Closer,” “Notes on a Scandal”), is very loosely based on Anthony Quinn’s novel “Curtain Call,” itself more a murder mystery than this ever allows itself to be. Instead, the film is about the desperate lengths a man will go to when his job and freedom are threatened. Erskine is the kind of gentleman critic whose power and authority have gone unchallenged for so long, he’s become delusional beyond recognition. His words don’t just destroy, though. They’ve also inspired. Even the actress he obliterates time and time again admits as much: She tells him it was his writing that made her fall in love with the theater.

There are some fun ideas here, and good performances. McKellen is having a wonderful time living inside this charismatic monster who you are with until you’re really not. Erskine is also gay; an open secret that becomes a liability with his new boss and the rise of fascist thought around him. But none of it really adds up to anything poignant or enormously entertaining; its darkness is both lopsided and superficial, as most become casualties of Erskine’s aims. Theater critic as tyrant is a juicy premise; “The Critic” just can’t live up to the promise.

“The Critic,” a Greenwich Entertainment release in select theaters Friday, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association for “some language and sexual content.” Running time: 100 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.

Copyright © 2024 The Washington Times, LLC.

Please read our comment policy before commenting.

Click to Read More and View Comments

Click to Hide

Top of the Times

‘Eden’ Review: Ron Howard’s Historical ‘Thriller’ Strands Us on an Island With Characters Who Grow More Dislikable by the Minute

Jude Law and Ana de Armas lead a crew of showboating misanthropes you just want to get away from.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

• Can the Sundance Film Festival Survive Leaving Park City? 23 hours ago
• Kamala Harris Did What She Needed to Do. She Displayed the Force of a President — and Goaded Trump Into Revealing His Inner Frothing Crackpot 4 days ago
• ‘Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band’ Review: A Soulful Celebration of the Live-in-Concert Bruce, Past and Present 6 days ago

Ron Howard has always taken pride in being an eclectic filmmaker — in the last 40 years, he has made movies about mermaids, cocoons, auto factories, astronauts, firefighters, newspapers, beautiful minds, cave rescuers, the Grinch, the Da Vinci Code, the Beatles, and Pavarotti. But at the Toronto Film Festival premiere of his latest movie, “ Eden ,” he declared that the film stands farther apart from his other work than anything he has ever done. He’s right, though not for the reason he thinks.

Related Stories

Summer Box Office Success Stories Weren’t Just Tentpoles

Trump Campaign Disputes Foo Fighters Over Unauthorized Use of Music at Rally

Popular on variety.

So what’s at stake? That’s what Howard and his screenwriter, Noah Pink, never figured out. Early on, another couple show up, and they’re the opposite of the Ritters. Heinz Wittmer ( Daniel Brühl ) and his wife, Margaret ( Sydney Sweeney ), have come to Floreana because they’ve been following accounts of the Ritters and want to join their movement. They’ve brought along their son, Harry (Jonathan Tittel), because he has tuberculosis and they couldn’t afford to place him in a sanitarium; maybe the island air will cure him. You’d think a communal theorist like Ritter would welcome these disciples, but no — he just wants them to go away. He sets them up in the stone grotto nearby, explaining how hard is to even get fresh water on the island. He doesn’t exactly roll out the welcome shrub, and it’s not as if there’s some dramatic connection between the two couples. The interactions are downbeat and disgruntled.

Howard has said that he based “Eden” on two conflicting accounts of the events it depicts, and that’s how it plays: as a film that never locates a point of identification. We’re held at arm’s length, observing the characters as if they were part of an insect colony. We also get to observe a lot of wildlife: crabs, wild pigs, a full-frontal Jude Law.

Then a mystery player shows up — yet another island visitor, though this one has a very different agenda. Ana de Armas , the charismatic actress from “Knives Out” and “Blonde,” plays Eloise Bosquet de Wagner Wehrhorn, a.k.a. the baroness, a party-girl fatale who arrives with a passel of men, and with her stated intention of building a luxury hotel on the island. Is she serious? Is she really a baroness? De Armas plays her with a ripe smile of amorality and an accent that makes her sound like Madeline Kahn in “Young Frankenstein.” She acts like she’s in a ’30s drawing-room comedy, which is rather absurd, but for a while you can feel the movie come alive when she’s onscreen. The rest of the time, it keeps sinking into its sluggish morass of bad vibes (and even de Armas’s hauteur starts to wear thin).  

“Eden” lopes along, without energy or purpose, but with a great deal of random showboating. Sydney Sweeney gets the film’s radiant-center-of-sanity award. Her Margaret is humble and likable, and though she has to go through a childbirth scene that’s all but designed to make us squirm, you feel something for her.

Yet as the relationships slowly disintegrate, and the film begins to turn into some weirdly madcap version of “Lord of the Flies,” we’re not sure how to take in what we’re seeing. Howard should have worked harder to ensure that the audience was invested in these people from the beginning. He seems to assume that we’ll just go along for the ride. But I can’t imagine that there’ll be much of an audience for “Eden,” a movie that makes you want to get off that island and go back to a place where the people are sane.

Reviewed at Toronto Film Festival (World premiere), Sept. 7, 2024. Running time: 129 MIN.

• Production: An AGC Studios, Imagine Entertainment production. Producers: Ron Howard, Brian Grazer, Karen Lunder, Stuart Ford, Bill Connor, Patrick Newall. Executive producers: Noah Pink.
• Crew: Director: Ron Howard. Screenplay: Noah Pink. Camera: Mathias Herndl. Editor: Matt Villa. Music: Hans Zimmer.
• With: Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Ana de Armas, Daniel Brühl, Sydney Sweeney, Jonathan Tittel, Felix Kammerer, Toby Wallace, Richard Roxburgh.

More from Variety

Michael B. Jordan to Direct and Star in ‘Thomas Crown Affair’ Remake at Amazon MGM Studios

The Postwar Streaming Market: A Special Report

Maybe Quibi Wasn’t Crazy: ‘Vertical Series’ Ventures Draw Small but Growing Audience

More from our brands, see bruce springsteen, noah kahan play all-star sea.hear.now afterparty.

What It’s Like to Watch an America’s Cup Race Right on the Water

UFC 306 at Sphere Pulls in Record $22M for UFC, Sphere

The Best Loofahs and Body Scrubbers, According to Dermatologists

Sunday Night Football: How to Watch the Bears/Texans Game Live Online

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Trouble logging in?

By continuing, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes.

Email not verified

Let's keep in touch.

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

• Upcoming Movies and TV shows
• Rotten Tomatoes Podcast
• Media News + More

By clicking "Sign Me Up," you are agreeing to receive occasional emails and communications from Fandango Media (Fandango, Vudu, and Rotten Tomatoes) and consenting to Fandango's Privacy Policy and Terms and Policies . Please allow 10 business days for your account to reflect your preferences.

OK, got it!

• About Rotten Tomatoes®
• Login/signup

Movies in theaters

• Opening This Week
• Top Box Office
• Coming Soon to Theaters
• Certified Fresh Movies

Movies at Home

• Fandango at Home
• Prime Video
• Most Popular Streaming Movies
• What to Watch New

Certified fresh picks

• 85% Speak No Evil Link to Speak No Evil
• 77% Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Link to Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
• 95% Rebel Ridge Link to Rebel Ridge

New TV Tonight

• -- Emmys: Season 76
• -- American Sports Story: Aaron Hernandez: Season 1
• -- Agatha All Along: Season 1
• 93% The Penguin: Season 1
• -- Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story: Season 2
• -- Twilight of the Gods: Season 1
• -- Tulsa King: Season 2
• -- High Potential: Season 1
• -- Frasier: Season 2
• -- A Very Royal Scandal: Season 1

Most Popular TV on RT

• 61% The Perfect Couple: Season 1
• 85% The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Season 2
• 74% Kaos: Season 1
• 63% The Old Man: Season 2
• 100% Slow Horses: Season 4
• 100% Dark Winds: Season 2
• -- Into the Fire: The Lost Daughter: Season 1
• 93% Bad Monkey: Season 1
• Best TV Shows
• Most Popular TV

Certified fresh pick

• 93% The Penguin: Season 1 Link to The Penguin: Season 1
• All-Time Lists
• Binge Guide
• Comics on TV
• Five Favorite Films
• Video Interviews
• Weekend Box Office
• Weekly Ketchup
• What to Watch

Resident Evil Movies In Order: How To Watch The Series Chronologically

50 Best New Horror Movies of 2024

What to Watch: In Theaters and On Streaming

Awards Tour

Transformers One First Reviews: The Best Transformers Movie Yet

The Penguin First Reviews: Colin Farrell’s Wild Performance Makes the Series a Must-Watch

• Trending on RT
• Hispanic Heritage Month
• Emmy Predictions
• Toronto Film Festival
• Best New Horror Movies

Stand by Me

Where to watch.

Watch Stand by Me with a subscription on Netflix, rent on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV, or buy on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV.

What to Know

Stand By Me is a wise, nostalgic movie with a weird streak that captures both Stephen King's voice and the trials of growing up.

Critics Reviews

Audience reviews, cast & crew.

Wil Wheaton

Gordie Lachance

River Phoenix

Chris Chambers

Corey Feldman

Teddy Duchamp

Jerry O'Connell

Vern Tessio

Kiefer Sutherland

Ace Merrill

Movie Clips

More like this, related movie news.