I reviewed Jordan Peele’s third feature, Nope, for Sight & Sound.
The review contains spoilers and opens like this:
From the rectal probes of Communion (1989) to the sphincter-like ships of Independence Day (1997), the anal associations of UFO pictures are well established. Nope, however, frames the flying saucer as a different orifice: the iris. Jordan Peele’s third feature is a film about seeing, structured around the understanding that to “make you a spectacle” (as its opening Biblical quotation puts it) is to expose you to violence or destruction. If the film’s title suggests various refusals, the most urgent is the refusal to make yourself available to the gaze of the other. This, the movie suggests, might just save your life.
You can read the full review here and in the October 2022 issue of Sight & Sound.
Nope is released in the UK on 12 August 2022.
