Every once in a while comes a film that uses the conventions of a particular genre, not necessarily to subvert it but to put it to use for a concern that deeply affects the director and has got something to say. Three-film-old African-American director Jordan Peele proclaimed his arrival with GET OUT (2017), a horror film, and uses the genre to examine deep-rooted racial prejudice that still exists in the US. A young black is driven by her white girlfriend to meet her parents at their mansion in the countryside; the parents are liberal and express no awkwardness, but gradually things begin to take an ugly turn that morphs into a quasi science fiction-horror territory.
GET OUT (2017) strikes a fine balance between popular storytelling format and social concern, and since its release has achieved cult status; it also fetched the debutant director an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and is counted amongst ‘study films’ for screenplay writing.
Check it out on Amazon Prime Video.
Ranjan Das is a Mumbai based filmmaker & faculty.