#but the second its a non horror film I'm like 'well I've heard of it?'

[lesbianwithchainsaws]

Talking to other people about movies is so embarrassing. No, I haven't seen any of those critically acclaimed movies you've mentioned. Yes, I've seen every obscure and bad horror movie you can think of

[firespirited]

NOPE 2022. Review with spoilers under the read more

Nope didn't quite work as horror for me but was a decent action flick, I'd have enjoyed the experience better if it wasn't under "sci fi" and "horror": spent the time expecting something else instead of properly being in the moment - I was tired, had specific ideas about what might happen, then immediately wanted a rewatch because I'd missed the good stuff looking for other stuff (will do that rewatch as soon as possible)

It didn't work (as sci fi horror) partly because I'm a know-it-all/super nerd who gets all the sci-fi references and knows all the tropes and partly because Peele really doesn't do subtle.

Entertainment chimp chaos + ufo + horse wranglers = space chimp chaos, it was clearly a people and horse eating creature from jump so no build up there. I'm totally used to aliens being either creature based or beyond our understanding.

// or that wonderful balance in between that films like Arrival and Annihilation (or Evangelion) found where there's a logic but it's larger than we are, we're space dogs compared to their space humans.

That's my jam. The existential horror/wonder of encountering something advanced enough we can interact but to understand it? That's beyond us: might blow our minds or change us forever or leave us without answers because we're just not good enough. Yeah. Tangeant over lol //

- The second very specific thing is the sound of screams. I have trouble telling the difference between good and bad ones, I have had dissociative freezes at fairs and theme parks looking at people clearly enjoying themselves. For some reason that I cannot rewire or logic away, my brain assumes 1 of the people on the ride must be in genuine distress. Occasionally it happens with playground screams too. It's something I've had to work on as I lived close enough to hear fairgrounds every summer from age 15 - 30. I've heard them on the wind in july here for ten years. I cope well nowadays, a brief shudder then it's fine.

Anyway, Nope also didn't work as horror for me for two very specific personal reasons:

-the first that I won't really expand on here is trauma turned into a good story: dealing with something bad (and also very much NOT dealing with it) by having a good story to tell. The fact that this story dropped that into the narrative then didn't follow up meant that I briefly thought there might be something to break my heart in two... but that wasn't the point being made, the point clearly was a childhood exploitation turning into a pattern of exploiting everything.

// If you know of stories about trauma turned into a story to avoid confronting it directly or giving a good end send me reccs I'm ready to pick at that wound (okay okay maybe not 'I May Destroy You' final episode levels of ready, Michaela Coel is too powerful). //

So I was looking for that and it didn't happen.

So I knew exactly what the opening sound was, what the faint sound in the wind was. So the only reveal was that it wasn't mimicry or psychological tactics by the alien (i was still in the mode of thinking of various sci fi beings who used/enjoyed fear instead of just a wild creature. I was primed to puzzle solve and there's no puzzle just layers of meaning).

But I did love OJ the cowboy hero and his sister Em on the motorbike. They had very believable sibling energy despite one of them being in a deep funk at the start. And yeah the Akira bike slide was awesome. I really liked the alien design, starting with something we think we know but actually more of a sand dollar then popping into the jellyfish form but with the non-organic, not quite working within our physics square.

If it's an action film, it takes its time to really start which is why I was stuck on slowburn dread sci-fi mode for so long but that could be western film pacing. I honestly have no understanding or knowledge whatsoever of westerns: the whole genre stank as ahistorical attempts at myth making.

// It's one of the reasons I don't watch war films, often about myth making, post hoc justifications, glamorising a life of 95% boredom 5% hell. //

But yeah my expectations were a little too high: it hit me way too late that it was a 1:1 chimp metaphor not a more vague tampering with something we can't control and really thought the creature would be playing with fear or have somehow been formed by fear (like the boar in Annihilation having taken on its victims traits).

Also suffered from way too dark syndrome. I loved the well lit final action, if it'd been well lit during the creature choking over the house scene that would have been so much cooler. I have a low tolerance for ooh it goes bump in the dark for half the movie, I'm just squinting and cursing you for padding the film with anything but character moments in the aftermath or in dread that would make the human impact feel more real.

Solid action flick: We need dashing Daniel Kaluuya on a horse in more films. Keke Palmer is a scene stealer I look forward to seeing more of her. I liked the emo tech guy. Film dude was wack without being funny. Why did they give him so much screen time? Steven Yeun does what he can with what little he had. I would have liked to have lingered a little longer on his conflicting relationship to fame.

My review? No yet rated. Gonna rewatch it as an action flick in the dark and enjoy it for what it is. Something tells me it's very rewatchable! And... I need to stop making assumptions based on genre expectations.