Story
Get Out is based around Chris and his girlfriend, Rosa of four months. They have been in a serious relationship and are moving to the next stage in their relationship to meet her parents. Chris is not completely comfortable with meeting her parents based on the color of his skin and their possible reactions to it. He wants things to go smoothly. Chris's fear is realized when he goes to Rosa’s parents, and they have a weird atmosphere in combination with their selected help around the house. Which are people of color. He is made to feel like an outsider by her family and their friends as the movie continues by focusing just on his genetics and race.
Cinematography
Jordan Peele’s use of close shots and wide of Chris' face, you can feel the emotion he is feeling. The wide shot of Chris as he walks up to the house shows the uncomfortable feeling he had when he first met Rosa’s parents. The close ups all throughout the film add to the uncanny feeling that something is wrong. For example, the close up of Chris as he is hypnotized. His expression of pure helplessness and the tears well up and fall help the viewer feel the sense of utter horror as he is put in the sunken place. The combination of this and the close-up of Missy as she smiles at the trauma, she is putting Chris in, making him relive the worst of his memories. I find the following scene most powerful as he is put in the sunken place he is put in a photo like lens as he looks out through the window of his own eyes. Unable to do anything. As Missy walks up to him closely we see it as far away as Chris does, it is like looking through the lens of his photographs.
Another scene that is immensely powerful is the last part of the film where he is strapped to his chair unable to move as he is in the final stages of the operation to transfer consciousness. Chris has a history of picking at his bed post, chair, or taping whenever he is stressed as a coping mechanism. In this scene he naturally starts picking at the chair which has cotton underneath the leather. Jordan Peele uses the cotton as symbolism for black history. Because what saves Chris in this scene is him picking the cotton out of the chair and placing it in his ears to avoid being hypnotized. The following scenes follow the same symbolism. With Rosa as well when it cuts to her, she is exceptionally clean, formal, and not a hair out of place. She is sitting very straight as she eats from her cereal and milk. Which is noticeably separated. The colored fruit loops are in a different container as she picks from them to eat and as she does so to finish her shallow she then drinks from the milk with a straw. This symbolism shows her true character gives the feeling of racism throughout history.
Cultural relevance
Get out is culturally relevant because in today's society we still have harmful stereotypes and institutional racism that follows us from our history of slavery. In our culture today there is a lot of progress in the ways of ending racism, but it is still prevalent in how we treat people of color and how we expect them to act. This is shown firsthand when they hit the deer and the officer questions Chris asking for his ID when he wasn't driving. Chris naturally complies because it's an expectation of him to come off as unthreatening to the police officer to avoid further trouble. Additionally, Rosa’s parents in order to comfort Chris about the people of color working for them. They tell Chris that they would vote for President Obama for a 3rd time if possible and other comments that are supposed to be compliments for his race which are just backhanded. Jordan Peele shows the relationship many white people have with people of color as to not seem racist or make it seem like they are on the same side which does not help.
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