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It’s surprising how little information about writer/director Jordan Peele ’s “Nope” has leaked since it was first announced. There have been a few trailers that show what may or may not be the film’s primary threat, and the marketing team has done a very good job with posters of its main cast members looking up at the sky and uttering the film’s title. All that thirst for capitalistic box office gain comes with a price, namely that it builds hype and an audience expectation that may not be met once the finished product is unveiled. This invariably leads to whiny complaints on Twitter and a plethora of think pieces I have no desire to read, even if I didn’t like the movie.

I’ve always had begrudging respect for a filmmaker who refuses to cater to a viewer’s pre-ordained expectations, even if said viewer is yours truly. It’s why I attend David Lynch movies despite never being a fan of the director’s work. So, I’ve been replaying a throwaway line of dialogue in my head as a potential explanation for how “Nope” is constructed and executed. In response to a pitch for his services, cinematographer Antlers Holst ( Michael Wincott ) tells Emerald Haywood ( Keke Palmer ) that he “makes one movie for them, and one for me.” This is a callback to John Cassavetes ’ philosophy/excuse for appearing in trash—the pay allowed him to finance the movies he wanted to create.

After the massively entertaining, Oscar-winning calling card of “ Get Out ,” Jordan Peele moved toward a hybrid of audience pleaser and filmmaker’s jones with “ Us .” That film was less blatant and required more work on the audience’s part, which made it fascinating for some and frustrating for others. It was also powered by a career-best performance by Lupita Nyong’o, whose dual role was unshakably strange and multilayered. There is no equivalent performance in “Nope” to anchor viewers, and it’s about three times as messy, but I got the feeling that Holst is Peele’s stand-in, that is, the director is revealing to us through a character that he made this film to amuse and please himself. If that is true, then Holst’s final scene says a lot about his creator; it’s a moment of self-sacrifice in lieu of the perfect camera shot.

Prior to the pitch for work scene, Holst and Emerald met on the set of a commercial he was shooting. She arrived late to assist her horse-wrangler brother Otis Jr. ( Daniel Kaluuya ) with the animal hired for the ad. That shoot goes awry, but not before Peele drops some breadcrumbs that will lead viewers through the forest he’s built for us to get lost inside. He also includes a nice cameo from nighttime soap opera legend Donna Mills . Speaking of cameos, the opening scene of “Nope” features Keith David as Otis Sr., head of Haywood Hollywood Horses, the family business. The Haywood’s ancestors were the first Black stuntpeople and animal wranglers in Hollywood, going back to the earliest days of movie making. That seems like an extraneous detail, but nothing is truly extra in a Jordan Peele movie.

The rest of the cast features Steven Yuen as Jupe, a barker who runs an alien-based carnival of sorts out in the same middle of nowhere the Haywoods have their ranch, and Angel ( Brandon Perea ), a techie specializing in surveillance equipment he sells out of a Best Buy clone called Fry’s. Jupe is the survivor of a horrific freak accident on a television show that had the first use of a certain type of animal. Angel is hired to install fancy cameras on the Haywood ranch so that Otis and Emerald can be the first to capture “the Oprah shot” of a specific event I won’t reveal. All this focus on being the first to do something! Again, no detail is completely extra in a Jordan Peele movie.

With “Nope,” Peele continues to explore and repeat certain elements of his prior works. Like “Us,” there’s a Bible quote that may be another breadcrumb to follow. This time it’s Nahum 3:6, which says “I will pelt you with filth, I will treat you with contempt and make you a spectacle.” There’s also a focus on animals, with horses playing a major role here. Unlike the deer in “Get Out” and the rabbits in “Us,” symbols of creatures being preyed upon, Peele reverses the power dynamic by turning into prey the most dangerous predator of all. There’s also the unusual use of an inanimate object; in “Us” it was scissors, in “Nope” it’s a fake horse and those weird, swaying air-filled things every used car dealer seems to have.

“Nope” is not as good as “Get Out” or “Us,” but it’s definitely Peele’s creepiest movie. He’s always been more Rod Serling than Rob Zombie , and that’s most evident here. There’s humor to be had in the minority characters’ reactions to horror (yes, they say “nope” the way most people would say “oh HELL NAW!”), but the director really leans into Hitchcock’s tenet about suspense vs. surprise. The wait for something awful to happen is always worse than when it does. Additionally, Peele remains a master of misdirection, offering fleeting glimpses of something that’s amiss or keeping the most brutal violence just beyond our view. The sound mix on this is aces, and I’ll never tire of horror movies that center on Black protagonists who are more than just fodder for whatever’s killing everybody.

Peele also gets good performances out of Kaluuya and Palmer, who believably work the sibling angle with all its longstanding grudges, in-jokes and patterns based on who’s older. Wincott wields his wonderful voice as a force of nature. Yuen seems to be off-kilter and the movie’s weak link, but the more I thought about his plotline, the more his performance made sense. I think he’s the film’s biggest breadcrumb in terms of figuring it all out. As for the special effects, they’re interesting, to say the least.

Truth be told, “Nope” reaches a conventional end point that would probably be more satisfying to most audiences had the journey been more tuned to the usual ways these stories are told. After my IMAX screening, there was a smattering of audience applause but I heard lots of grumbling. Call me a sadist if you must, but this is my favorite type of audience reaction. One particularly angry guy behind me on the escalator said “I can’t wait for the critics reviews calling this ‘splendid’!” “Nope” isn’t splendid, but it is pretty damn good. I had a lot of fun trying to figure it out. It’s a puzzle with a few pieces missing; standing back from it, you can still see the picture. But does it give the viewer exactly what they want? See the title.

Available in theaters on July 22nd.

Odie Henderson

Odie "Odienator" Henderson has spent over 33 years working in Information Technology. He runs the blogs Big Media Vandalism and Tales of Odienary Madness. Read his answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire here .

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Nope (2022)

Rated R for language throughout and some violence/bloody images.

135 minutes

Daniel Kaluuya as OJ Haywood

Keke Palmer as Emerald 'Em' Haywood

Steven Yeun as Ricky 'Jupe' Park

Brandon Perea as Angel Torres

Michael Wincott as Craig

Barbie Ferreira as Nessie

Donna Mills as Bonnie Clayton

Terry Notary as Gordy

Jennifer Lafleur as Phyllis

Keith David as Otis Haywood Sr.

Jordan Peele

Cinematographer

Hoyte van Hoytema
Nicholas Monsour
Michael Abels

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<i>Nope</i> Is a Resplendent Spectacle Packed With Way Too Many Ideas

Nope Is a Resplendent Spectacle Packed With Way Too Many Ideas

T he best part of writer-director Jordan Peele ’s atmospheric science-fiction extravaganza Nope is the beginning, an introduction—after a brief prologue—to a world unlike any most of us have ever seen, and a character rich with possibility. In that early sequence, we meet Daniel Kaluuya’s OJ Haywood, part of a family who has run a working ranch for generations. We’ll later learn that the business, Haywood’s Hollywood Horses, provides beautiful, well-trained horses for movies and television, and for years it’s been a lucrative operation for OJ’s father, Otis (Keith David), as it was for his father and grandfather before him. But very early in the film, as Otis sits astride a white steed named Ghost, disaster strikes. Just before it does, OJ notes the gathering of some strange clouds, and he hears a weird howling in the sky—given Peele’s penchant for biblical references and imagery, it could be the sound of apocalyptic horses freed from their riders and out for vengeance.

The next thing OJ knows, his father has been struck by an invisible something. A minute ago Otis had been crowing over how well the business had been doing, and now he’s slumped in the saddle. OJ rushes him to the hospital, to no avail. Later he stares in disbelief at the small projectile that killed, or helped kill, his father, cleaned up and housed in a baggie. This scene shows, beautifully, how a life can change in a minute, and sets up a challenge rich with dramatic possibilities: OJ now has to take the reins of a successful family business—a Black-owned one at that, with a reputation to uphold—and as Kaluuya plays him, dutiful and sensitive but a bit reticent about facing the world, we can see he’s not sure he’s up to the task.

Nope could have been all about that, or about that but also layered with elements of sci-fi horror. But the early promise of Nope doesn’t lead where you expect. Instead, it leads to dozens of unexpected places, which is oddly less gratifying. What OJ sees in the sky, and what it wants with humans, becomes a little clearer with each passing scene. There are other players in this drama: OJ’s outgoing and magnetic sister Emerald ( Keke Palmer ), is better at facing the public than he is, but she wants nothing to do with the business. (OJ’s work demands that he know how to handle animals and deal with the human egos of show business, and it’s the latter that throws him.)

Ricky “Jupe” Park ( Steven Yeun ) is a former child star who runs a schlocky Old-West tourist attraction near the Haywood ranch, but who has designs on an even bigger enterprise. He’s also scarred, it appears, from a childhood run-in with a murderous chimpanzee, a story Peele hints at in Nope ’s prologue and fleshes out later in a terrifying flashback. The other characters hovering around the vast, fringey margins of Nope include the employee of a local Best Buy-type store, Angel (Brandon Perea), and a cocky weirdo cinematographer with the assertively eccentric name Antlers Holst (Michael Wincott). At one point we’re treated to some grainy footage he’s obsessed with, which appears to show a boa constrictor getting ready to devour a tiger. This is the movie’s way of proving he’s a man of sick tastes, but it’s also an image we can’t unsee.

Steven Yeun as Ricky gestures up toward the sky

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And then there’s the mysterious thing in the sky that no one is supposed to talk about until after they’ve seen the movie. It’s a thing with a hole. There are certain things it doesn’t like. It follows no rules but its own, until Otis learns that maybe it will follow some rules, and how much you think those rules make sense—even in the highly subjective world of science fiction—will dictate how much pleasure you get out of Nope.

Because Nope , enjoyable as a spectacle but conceptually barely thought through, is all over the place. Peele can’t take just one or two interesting ideas and follow their trail of complexity. He likes to layer ideas into lofty multitextured quilts—the problem is that his most compelling perceptions are often dropped only to be obscured by murkier ones. He has an eye for dazzling visuals, but it seems he comes up with the visuals first and tries to hook ideas to them later. In this case, he decides those inflatable tube dancers you see outside used-car lots might be cool to use somehow, but their effectiveness, visually or in terms of moving the plot forward, is debatable.

Contrary to popular opinion, horror movies don’t necessarily have to be about anything: we’ve all read enough treatises on how 1950s horror films were really all about fear of the Communist threat to last a lifetime. Sometimes great horror films are about nothing more than our own shadowy inner lives, playing on fears that seem silly in the daylight but become much more overwhelming at night. Peele’s movies don’t have to be about anything—it could be enough that their imagery is often haunting, and inventive, by itself. One thing’s for sure: he’s comfortable with grand orchestrations, and he enjoys filling the expanse of a movie screen. There are plenty of gorgeous images in Nope, including one that Peele makes us wait for: the sight of Kaluuya, a regal actor, on the back of a horse, a glorious Elmer Bernstein-inflected score swirling around him, as sizzling and dramatic as a setting desert sun. Peele loves movies, all sorts of movies. It seems he loves making movies, too.

Jordan Peele in an orange hoodie, on horseback, rides toward the camera

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Nope reviews are in — here’s what critics say about Jordan Peele’s new movie

Some critics say yes, and others say nope!

Steven Yeun as Ricky Park, looking up while performing for a crowd in Jordan Peele's Nope

With all the love for Get Out and Us, Jordan Peele's Nope reviews arrive with plenty of excitement and expectation. And, so far, it seems like it's a mixed bag. But since we at Tom's Guide are curious what they think — and also extremely spoiler-averse, as we're not seeing Nope until next week — we're delivering a spoiler-free Nope review roundup.

The good news is simple: critics are praising Jordan Peele as one of the best filmmakers of his era. Star Keke Palmer, it seems, may be the real star of the movie, at least based on the reviews we've seen so far.

On the downside, it seems like one of the biggest problems here is that Nope may not be as good as either Get Out or Us. The most common complaint about the film seems to be that the plot at the core of the movie isn't quite there.

In fact, some are already saying it's going to be Peele's most divisive film yet. So, without further ado, here's what the critics say about Nope (which is exclusively in theaters starting Friday, July 22):

Nope reviews roundup: What critics like

A.O. Scott at the New York Times writes that "there are some fascinating internal tensions within the movie, along with impeccably managed suspense, sharp jokes and a beguiling, unnerving atmosphere of all-around weirdness." Scott also praises the rest of the team, giving verbal flowers to "Guillaume Rocheron’s haunting, eye-popping special effects, Hoyte van Hoytema’s lucid-dream cinematography and Nicholas Monsour’s sharp editing."

Leah Greenblatt, for Entertainment Weekly , praises the cast by stating "The casting, as always, is on point: Palmer's Emerald is loose and funny and kinetically alive, the kind of final-girl hero most scary movies only feint at creating, and Kaluuya remains one of the most fascinatingly interior actors to watch on screen."

At The Verge , Charles Pulliam-Moore exclaims "there’s a majesty to Nope’s sweeping shots of the California desert that feels reflective of [Peele's] evolution as a filmmaker and of cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema’s artistic sensibilities. Nope’s striking, almost portrait-like shots of its heroes immediately call to mind Western classics like Sidney Poitier’s Buck and the Preacher." He also notes that "Nope leaves itself far less open to interpretation than Peele’s previous films, and it’s better for it as the movie shifts gears in order to give itself ample time to show off its VFX budget."

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Nope review roundup: What critics didn't like

Robert Daniels at Polygon points out a "running lack of impact" that may have "to do with Peele’s unwillingness to let Nope tell a story beyond winking references." More frustratingly, Daniels argues Peele is "uninterested in exploring the inner lives of his characters, who largely coast on repetitive punchlines and cloying sentimentality." The biggest slap is that "the biggest surprise of the tight-lipped Nope is that it’s Jordan Peele’s weakest film."

(L to R) A horse, Daniel Kaluuya as OJ and Keke Palmer as Emerald stand in front of a green screen in Jordan Peele's Nope

At Variety , Owen Gleiberman wrote a very spoiler-heavy review that you really should stay away from if you're trying to go in clean. That said, he warns us of a bad taste at the end of Nope, arguing "the anticipation works better than the payoff."

Peter Bradshaw at The Guardian gave Nope a 2 out of 5 star review, which he ends by stating "There are plenty of bold and riveting images in Nope; bizarre dreamlike iterations. Kaluuya and Palmer have, singly, a cool self-possession and address to the camera, but no really compelling chemistry as siblings or anything else. There is something clotted and heavy about this film, with sadly not enough of the humour for which Peele justly became celebrated in his double-act days with Keegan-Michael Key. It’s not the positive response I wanted to have."

Nope review roundup outlook

We will now go into the theaters to see Nope with a re-calibrated set of expectations. It appears that Peele is still the powerful filmmaker we know, but it sounds like Nope is a bit undercooked at its core.

Know to expect fun, thrills and brilliant visuals, but don't expect a movie that stands up to Peele's first two hits. As someone who was amazed at the SXSW premiere of Us, I hope that Peele's next film manages to find the magic.

Next: Our streaming editor thinks you should go watch Nope in theatres .

Henry is a managing editor at Tom’s Guide covering streaming media, laptops and all things Apple, reviewing devices and services for the past seven years. Prior to joining Tom's Guide, he reviewed software and hardware for TechRadar Pro, and interviewed artists for Patek Philippe International Magazine. He's also covered the wild world of professional wrestling for Cageside Seats, interviewing athletes and other industry veterans.

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Jordan Peele subverts expectations (again) with 'Nope'

Aisha Harris

Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, and Brandon Perea in Nope. Universal Studios hide caption

Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, and Brandon Perea in Nope.

When the first trailer for Nope dropped, viewers almost immediately swarmed social media trying to interpret the opaque montage of shots – shots which revealed virtually nothing about the plot of the movie. This is partially of Jordan Peele's own doing, because his first two feature films as a writer-director, Get Out and Us , set up high expectations for twisty, multilayered social commentary by way of popcorn thrills. Even more so it's a product of the current cultural landscape, where seemingly every big movie or TV series is laden with twists and Easter eggs and spoiler-y cameos, lending itself to fervent Reddit threads breaking down the creator's underlying meaning.

Movie Interviews

Jordan peele looked into the mirror and saw the evil inside 'us'.

Code Switch

The horror, the horror: "get out" and the place of race in scary movies.

Peele surely knows by now what audiences anticipate from him and other filmmakers like him, which is probably why – once again – he's managed to subvert our expectations. Nope isn't so much a plot-twisty experience to be meticulously deconstructed as it is a consistently surprising one. It's a journey that's less social commentary-forward than its predecessors, yet still stacked with plenty of meaning to tease out after you've left the theater.

First and foremost, he wants us to be in awe. And on that front, he doesn't disappoint.

The film opens by quoting a Bible verse from the book of Nahum: "I will cast abominable filth at you, make you vile, and make you a spectacle," followed by a quiet, eerie scene involving an animal that's best left unsaid for first-time viewers; the better to creep you out in the moment. Eventually, Nope drops us into the world of OJ and Emerald Haywood (Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer), a pair of siblings dealing with the loss of their father Otis, Sr. (Keith David) while trying to maintain the family business. Haywood Hollywood Horses is their company, a horse wrangling outfit that's worked with TV and film productions for years and is based in the small California desert valley town of Agua Dulce.

Mysterious events and sightings from above begin to occur on the family's ranch, and the hard-hustling Emerald sees an opportunity to make some extra cash by getting the perfect shot of a UFO to sell online. Soon, she and OJ have tricked their land out with camera gear with the help of Angel (Brandon Perea), a tech salesman and quirky supernatural enthusiast who has a plethora of time on his hands. (His actress girlfriend just broke up with him, much to his dismay.) But the UFO poses more of a threat than they initially realize, and soon the three find themselves on the offensive and enlist the help of an old-school filmmaker – the kind who still shoots on actual film – played by Michael Wincott.

Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me!

Not my job: jordan peele gets quizzed on the teletubbies.

True to Peele's sensibilities, Nope seems to be borrowing from a plethora of cinematic references: Spielberg (particularly Jaws and E.T. ), M. Night Shyamalan ( Signs ), and Alien , just to name a few. Kaluuya plays OJ almost like the strong, silent cowboy heroes of Old Hollywood westerns, a man of few words unless the occasion truly calls for it, and the kind of guy who keeps his feelings close to the vest. This contrasts nicely with Palmer's fast-talking, looser Emerald; she's the firecracker in this powder keg, injecting energy, wit, and comedic relief into a character whose ideas on how to keep the family's legacy alive run up against her brother's intentions.

As the movie trots along, the plot is always a couple steps ahead of where the mind may go, and – at least upon first viewing – not all of the threads necessarily hold together if you think about them for too long. (For instance, a storyline involving Steven Yeun as an amusement park owner and former child star is very effective in echoing the movie's themes, but could also have been more developed.) I also suspect that, like Us , this will stir up a lot of debate about what message Peele might be trying to impart to his audiences, though I'd argue there's less there there to debate over in this case. (On the other hand, maybe that in itself is something to ponder.)

This is not to say Nope is slight; with this movie, he's contributing a new entry to the rich history of Black westerns (the Sidney Poitier-directed Buck and the Preacher is visually referenced, for one) and tapping into themes about a cultural obsession with taming nature and profiting off of pageantry. It's also significant to note how Peele playfully speaks to Black audiences and their frequent responses to horror movies through the clever title and OJ and Emerald's actions – like Regina Hall's ever-skeptical Brenda in the Scary Movie franchise, these characters are wary and smart about situations that are obviously ominous. "Nope" isn't just a phrase, it's a way of survival.

But the aims strongly prioritize thrills and mood-setting. Aesthetically, this is his most ambitious feature yet, with intensely crafted action sequences, breathtaking visuals courtesy of cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema, and a superbly immersive sound design by Johnnie Burn. Peele seems to be having more fun with his audience than ever before as a feature filmmaker, and in turn, it makes for a fun watch.

In an era of sequels, prequels, reboots, and franchises-within-franchises, it's refreshing to see a filmmaker working in this mode, evoking familiarity while keeping viewers on their toes. Nope has only solidified my anticipation for anything and everything Peele does next.

Jordan Peele
Daniel Kaluuya
Keke Palmer

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Critics call Jordan Peele's Nope both 'frustratingly perplexing' and 'unquestionable genius'

Either way, you'll probably be squealing "nope!" in the theater.

Whether Nope scratches your itch for quality cinema or simply leaves you scratching your head, critics agree on one thing: Get Out and Us helmer Jordan Peele 's terrifying third feature will likely have you screaming its title out loud in the theater.

Universal largely kept the mysterious project's plot under wraps, but new reviews for the blockbuster horror film shed light on the film's story, which stars Keke Palmer and Daniel Kaluuya as siblings who run a horse-wrangling business that provides livestock to Hollywood productions. Their lives are interrupted by the arrival of an otherworldly presence in the skies above their rural mountain town, with many journalists likening the sense or terror (and awe) to early works by Steven Spielberg.

"Peele has never leaned this close to early Spielberg (or if you're feeling less charitable, mid-period M. Night Shyamalan). His screenplay — threaded through with flashbacks and unhurried character moments — is for a long time a tease, both elliptical and explicit when it comes to the central mystery, though it's clear he's absorbed a lifetime of Close Encounters lore, and much darker visitations too," writes EW's Leah Greenblatt , who concludes that, while the "prevailing mood is a looming, sun-drenched tension," the film's ending "will likely prove less satisfying to a plot-hungry public."

Greenblatt's sentiment is echoed throughout many other mainstream publications, including in Variety writer Owen Gleiberman's take that labels the film a "tantalizingly creepy mixed bag of a sci-fi thriller" that "holds us in a shivery spell," but, in the same vein as Close Encounters , Signs , and Arrival , unspools when it begins revealing its own inner-workings, proving that "anticipation works better than the payoff."

Writing for The Hollywood Reporter , Lovia Gyarkye says that the film "avoids the comfort of tidy conclusions" as an "elusive" project as it indulges "in narrative tangents and detours" that might confuse casual audiences: "It is sprawling and vigorous," she continues. "Depending on your appetite for the heady and sonorous, it will either feel frustratingly perplexing or strike you as a work of unquestionable genius."

In a glowing review, IndieWire 's David Ehrlich heralds the film as a "smart, muscular, and massively entertaining flying saucer freak-out." He says that the film comes fully alive via Hoyte van Hoytema's 65mm cinematography, which lends "the carnage an intergalactic scale that makes even the film's most familiar tropes feel bracingly new, and inspire a degree of holy terror that allows the grand finale to alternate between heart-in-your-throat horror and fistpump-worthy Akira references as cinematography assumes a hands-on roll in the action (Peele keeps the film's self-reflexive streak to a low boil, but cranks it up to a delirious high in the dying minutes.)"

Nope touches down in theaters on Friday. Read on for more critical review excerpts about the film.

Leah Greenblatt ( EW ) "For all of the film's escalating supernatural events, though, what's less clearly drawn, and will likely prove less satisfying to a plot-hungry public, are the whys and hows of its conclusion. Peele's scripts have always felt like meta-text; this one toggles between classic genre stuff and a deliberately fragmented play on certain all-American tropes — flying saucers, sitcoms, jump-scare terror — filtered through a fresh, keenly self-aware lens. As a sci-fi fable, Nope feels both more slippery and less viscerally satisfying than the relatively straightforward horror of Get Out or even 2019's Us , but it still sticks. The truth is out there, or up there, in that curiously immovable cloud that looms like a cotton-ball anvil above the Haywood ranch; it's Peele's prerogative to build his world below it, and leave the rest."

Kambole Campbell ( Empire )

"It's often said that showbiz can eat you alive. Jordan Peele's third film runs with that metaphor further than anyone might have expected. For his latest sci-fi horror, Peele characterizes the film industry as a ruthless beast, and wonders about who gets led into its jaws, and for whose benefit. In Nope , the audience itself becomes a vast monster, demanding to be entertained by personal and historical trauma, commodified for their viewing pleasure. The film makes visceral horror of the nightmare of being consumed by something unfathomably larger than you — whether that's by a national audience or a flying Lovecraftian terror. But it's also a celebration of film crew — those in the less glamorous roles fundamental to creating cinematic spectacle."

Siddhant Adlakha ( IGN )

"Equal parts comedic knee-slapper and white-knuckle thriller, Jordan Peele's Nope is a farcical love letter to Hollywood, and to the American dream. It is, at once, a no-frills version of exactly what its trailers are selling — a film about objects falling from the sky, and characters catching glimpses of something sinister in the clouds — and yet, it's entirely unlike its straightforward marketing, which provides hints of plot, but skillfully disguises its tone. It's wonderfully spoiler-proof (though you won't find major details here that haven't already been revealed), in part because it's completely unlike Peele's previous work, both thematically, and in the evolution of his craft."

Owen Gleiberman ( Variety )

"Jordan Peele's Nope is a tantalizingly creepy mixed bag of a sci-fi thriller. It's a movie that taps into our fear and awe of UFOs, and for a while it holds us in a shivery spell. It picks the audience up and carries it along, feeding off spectral hints of the otherworldly. Yet watching the movie, you can just about taste the DNA of Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind , and Nope mirrors the trajectory of other films that have been made in the shadow of Close Encounters , like M. Night Shyamalan's Signs and Denis Villeneuve's Arrival . Here, as in those films, the anticipation works better than the payoff."

Lovia Gyarkye ( The Hollywood Reporter )

" Nope , Jordan Peele's latest offering, slinks and slithers from the clutches of snap judgement. It avoids the comfort of tidy conclusions, too. This elusive third feature from the director of Get Out and Us peacocks its ambitions (and budget) while indulging in narrative tangents and detours. It is sprawling and vigorous. Depending on your appetite for the heady and sonorous, it will either feel frustratingly perplexing or strike you as a work of unquestionable genius."

K. Austin Collins ( Rolling Stone )

"This is a movie that knows the power of images. It has learned, from the greats of the genre, that what we fear most is what can't be seen, what's merely implied. All the camera has to do is trace an arc across the sky and you'll believe something is there. (Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema, who shot Dunkirk — an IMAX movie, like this one — was a perfect choice for this project, able to carve daring, evocative shapes onto the screen through what feel like the simplest means.)"

David Ehrlich ( IndieWire )

"With great patience and tremendous craft, Peele steers these characters (and a handful of others) from one masterful set piece to the next, all of them flecked with popcorn-spilling jolts but more fundamentally driven by a profound sense of big-screen, body-rattling awe. On some level, Nope is Peele's smallest film so far; almost the entire story takes place on the Haywood ranch and its surrounding areas. At the same time, however, it also feels like his largest. Sometimes literally: Hoyte van Hoytema's 65mm compositions lend the carnage an intergalactic scale that makes even the film's most familiar tropes feel bracingly new, and inspire a degree of holy terror that allows the grand finale to alternate between heart-in-your-throat horror and fistpump-worthy Akira references as cinematography assumes a hands-on roll in the action (Peele keeps the film's self-reflexive streak to a low boil, but cranks it up to a delirious high in the dying minutes)."

Ross Bonaime ( Collider )

"Watching Jordan Peele evolve as a director over the course of just three films has been fascinating to watch. While his first film, Get Out , was a precise knockout that blended horror and social commentary, while Us was a bit shaggier, yet even more terrifying, as Peele told a story that left haunting open-ended questions in its wake. With his third film, Nope , Peele is at his most expansive, his most adventurous as a filmmaker, and having more fun than we've seen from him in his already impressive filmography. With Nope, Peele once again proves that he's not just one of the most interesting filmmakers working in horror today, he's one of the most interesting filmmakers working, period."

Stephanie Zacharek ( TIME )

"Because Nope , enjoyable as a spectacle but conceptually barely thought through, is all over the place. Peele can't take just one or two interesting ideas and follow their trail of complexity. He likes to layer ideas into lofty multitextured quilts — the problem is that his most compelling perceptions are often dropped only to be obscured by murkier ones. He has an eye for dazzling visuals, but it seems he comes up with the visuals first and tries to hook ideas to them later. In this case, he decides those inflatable tube dancers you see outside used-car lots might be cool to use somehow, but their effectiveness, visually or in terms of moving the plot forward, is debatable."

Peter Bradshaw ( The Guardian )

"Jordan Peele's strange, muddled, indigestible new UFO mystery looks like it had a good fairy and a dodgy fairy present at the birth. The good fairy is Steven Spielberg, to whose Close Encounters and Jaws the film pays an overt tribute. The dodgy fairy is M. Night Shyamalan, of Signs and The Happening : the sometimes brilliant, sometimes exasperating high-concept showman whose influence is also present – but unacknowledged, un-homaged. It feels like an event movie in the Shyamalan style, all about the prerelease conjecture and trailer buzz: what on earth can it be about?"

Hear more on all of today's must-see picks on EW's What to Watch podcast, hosted by Gerrad Hall.

‘Nope’: Every moment matters in Jordan Peele’s exhilarating new horror fable

The darkly beautiful sci-fi film manages to feel bold and original while paying homage to countless great movies..

Emerald (Keke Palmer) thinks an unidentified flying object could be the family’s ticket to fame and riches in “Nope.”

Universal Pictures

“What did you see?”

“Something above the clouds that’s big.”

“Big.” – Exchange between sister and brother in “Nope.”

Jordan Peele’s masterfully audacious, wickedly funny and utterly outlandish sci-fi horror fable “Nope” is a classic example of a bold and original film that pays homage to a seemingly endless stream of great movies and yet is more than the sum of its parts.

When two siblings on a remote swath of land band together and come up with an ingenious and definitely crazy plan to defend themselves from an invading force, it’s reminiscent of “Signs.” When a mad genius with a singular mission is willing to sacrifice everything in the pursuit of the catch of his life, he reminds us of Quint from “Jaws.” When a supporting character spins a cringe-inducing, horrific story from the past that has you wincing and laughing at the same time, it’s vaguely reminiscent of the Santa story in “Gremlins” and the infamous “gold watch” story in “Pulp Fiction.”

There are other moments that conjure up memories of “The Shining,” “Ghostbusters,” “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Poltergeist” and at least a half-dozen other films, and yet writer-director-co-producer Peele has once again delivered a work that feels fresh and darkly beautiful. Every slice of dialogue, every dramatic beat, every breathtakingly glorious shot, even the smallest detail in the production design — it all feels integral, it all adds up, it all means something. This is the kind of movie where your bathroom breaks should happen just before the film starts and just after it’s over, because if you miss even three minutes, you’re missing a lot.

Daniel Kaluuya has an incredible knack for playing characters who convey so much in the lowest of keys and can then explode in an instant, and he’s perfectly cast here as OJ Haywood (yes, he’s called OJ, and it does raise eyebrows when folks first meet him), who runs the only Black-owned horse ranch in Hollywood, a generational enterprise dating all the way back to the origin of motion pictures. OJ is a 21st century cowboy who’s more comfortable around his beloved horses than other people, but he’s determined to keep the ranch running even as it faces financial difficulties.

Not that he’s getting much help from his funny, flighty, enormously likable but not particularly motivated younger sister Emerald (Keke Palmer in one of her best performances), who has a penchant for showing up late for film or TV shoots and would rather get her drink on and play some old vinyl records than help out on the ranch.

Daniel Kaluuya plays the proprietor of a Hollywood horse ranch.

When OJ spots a mysterious object in the clouds above the ranch — something that appears to be alien in nature and capable of great destruction — Em says this can be their “Oprah moment.” They’ll capture whatever this thing is on video as definitive proof of life beyond Earth, sell it for zillions of dollars and become rich and famous.

Suffice to say whatever that is in the clouds has other ideas.

With the esteemed cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema (a Christopher Nolan regular who shot “Interstellar,” “Dunkirk” and “Tenet”) providing some of the most spectacular location visuals of the year, “Nope” alternates between exquisitely crafted set pieces with little dialogue and loads of genuine scares, and some fantastic interior scenes crackling with great lines.

Steven Yeun gives a slyly effective performance as one Ricky “Jupe” Park, a former child star who now runs a California Gold Rush theme park just down the road from the Heywood Ranch. Ricky’s experiences as a child actor on a wacky 1990s sitcom, including a moment that was immortalized on a (fictional) “Saturday Night Live” skit, make for some of the most memorably twisted scenes in recent memory. Brandon Perea has a Dave Franco vibe as Angel, who works at a big-box electronics store, helps OJ and Emerald install an elaborate camera system on the ranch and just sort of becomes their ally without really being invited. He is key comic relief.

Then there’s the great character actor Michael Wincott (“Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves,” “The Crow,” “Strange Days’), whose angular features and gravelly voice have been put to great use in many a villainous role, turning in a bizarrely endearing performance as one Antlers Horst, a renowned lensmen who agrees to join the ad hoc filmmaking squad because why the hell not, he might achieve the crowning moment of his career with one immortal “Magic Hour” shot.

We don’t want to say much more here, other than to commend Peele for creating an exhilarating piece of cinema filled with memorable characters. (Even the smaller roles are played to perfection by the likes of Keith David as OJ’s and Emerald’s father; the one and only Donna Mills as a Hollywood diva, and Barbie Ferreira from “Euphoria,” who plays Angel’s co-worker and spins gold out of maybe six lines.) Whether Peele is invoking Corey Hart’s “Sunglasses at Night” or using those ridiculous inflatable tube men figures in a most creative way, we are in pop culture heaven. With “Get Out” and “Us” and now “Nope,” Peele is firmly established as one of the most exciting and innovative filmmakers of his generation. His movies are now officially “events,” a la the early works of Steven Spielberg, M. Night Shyamalan and Quentin Tarantino. We can’t wait to see what he does next.

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Is Nope a Yup? Critics Can’t Decide

The first reactions to Jordan Peele’s latest horror flick are in, and so far not one of them is a thirsty ode to stars Daniel Kaluuya and Steven Yeun? Okay, okay, let’s get serious for a second. Nope is Peele’s highly anticipated third feature — his first 2017 social thriller, Get Out , was a runaway hit, while the horror movie Us , though more divisive, managed to avoid a sophomore slump two years later — and critics are divided. Based on the first reviews, Nope delves into the scams of representation, the dangers of Hollywood’s glimmer, and our country’s increasing numbness to violence. While critics overwhelmingly praise the film’s eerie and expansive cinematography from IMAX master Hoyte van Hoytema, some reviews find the plotting oversaturated yet thinly sketched. Others find the sibling dynamic between Kaluuya and Keke Palmer’s characters lacking chemistry, while Yeun’s Ricky “Jupe” Park deserves a separate movie to carefully explore his psyche. It’s either Peele’s Jaws or an enjoyable entry to an otherwise brilliant career. Here are the early takeaways.

“ Nope is a work of sly devastation from writer-director Jordan Peele that, like his previous films Get Out and Us , is a horror comedy with a speculative premise — in this case, by way of the saucer-shaped UFO lurking in the clouds about the Haywood Ranch in Agua Dulce. Unlike in Get Out , where Kaluuya’s character Chris discovers he’s been lured into a trap by a cabal of body-snatching white liberals, or Us , where malevolent doppelgängers swarm out of the earth like collectors coming for a long-overdue bill, in Nope , the danger is, to a certain degree, opt-in. The title is a slasher-movie joke, a sentiment to be howled at characters who traipse obliviously to their doom by venturing into unlit basements or following mysterious sounds into the woods.” — Alison Willmore, Vulture

“Even when parts of it don’t gel, Nope is a rapturous watch. This film, about a pair of sibling horse wranglers who encounter an uncanny force on their ranch, covers a wide range of themes: Hollywood’s obsession with and addiction to spectacle, the United States’ inurement to violence, the siren call of capitalism, the legacy of the Black cowboy, and the myth of the American West. Aided by a strong cast, led impressively by Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Steven Yeun, and Brandon Perea, Peele plunges us into a cavernous, twisted reality.” — Lovia Gyarkye, The Hollywood Reporter

“This weird and wild Californian expanse is the thrillingly charged setting of Nope , a film that does for open skies what Jaws did for the beach, and The Wicker Man for Hebridean getaways. The third feature from Jordan Peele, the director of Get Out and Us , it repeats the winning recipe of those superb earlier works: a hugely entertaining surface with rich and troubling substance bubbling underneath. It’s a summer blockbuster which hauls the genre right back to its 1970s New Hollywood roots — a Close Encounters of the Third Kind with the Spielbergian warmth and wonder swapped for skin-prickling disquiet and mordant satirical wit.” — Robbie Collin, the Telegraph

“There are plenty of bold and riveting images in Nope ; bizarre dreamlike iterations. Kaluuya and Palmer have, singly, a cool self-possession and address to the camera, but no really compelling chemistry as siblings or anything else. There is something clotted and heavy about this film, with sadly not enough of the humour for which Peele justly became celebrated in his double-act days with Keegan-Michael Key. It’s not the positive response I wanted to have.” — Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian

“ Nope seems to want to call out the failures of modern media while also reveling in its capacity. At least Peele’s version is not empty maximalism, unlike so much other entertainment and manipulated reality rushing at us at all times. There are real ideas in Nope , albeit ones that frequently circle back on themselves, that exist in confusing contradiction to one another. Such confusion is certainly the prerogative of — and even welcomed in — a film as dense as this one. But Nope ’s concluding minutes don’t bring the film to any satisfying place; it hurries to an ending in a way that suggests many minutes, if not hours, of movie left on the cutting-room floor.” — Richard Lawson, Vanity Fair

“While Jordan Peele has fast become one of the most relevant and profitable of modern American filmmakers, Nope is the first time that he’s been afforded a budget fit for a true blockbuster spectacle, and that’s exactly what he’s created with it. But if this smart, muscular, and massively entertaining flying saucer freak-out is such an old-school delight that it starts with a shout-out to early cinema pioneer Eadweard Muybridge (before paying homage to more direct influences like Close Encounters of the Third Kind ), it’s also a thoroughly modern popcorn movie for and about viewers who’ve been inundated with — and addicted to — 21st-century visions of real-life terror.” — David Ehrlich, IndieWire

“ Nope itself starts flying off in different directions. It’s part of the film’s design — and, in a way, its racial consciousness — that OJ and Emerald are too mistrustful of mainstream white society to get any authorities involved. So we’re spared the sort of meddlesome-U.S.-government boilerplate plot that weighed down a movie like Arrival . Yet Nope doesn’t have a plot so much as a series of happenings that spill out in an impressionistic and arbitrary way. Logic often takes a back seat, and that has the unfortunate effect of lessening our involvement.” — Owen Gleiberman, Variety

“In Jordan Peele’s Nope , a UFO sighting provides an exploration of the predatory side of the entertainment industry, while becoming something else entirely in Peele’s hands. Nope is Peele at his most imaginative, a story of two characters who refuse to be pinned down from a director who refuses the same. It’s a big, surprising evolution of the classic Hollywood UFO story in properly cosmic dimensions. It’s great, and whatever you’re expecting, you’ll likely be wrong.” — Jeff Ewing, Forbes

“ Nope isn’t a particularly scary UFO film but is effectively unnerving. Peele plays with his audience in devilish ways before going big and bold with the visuals (particularly Hoyte van Hoytema’s dazzling cinematography) as well as the white-knuckle tension. Just don’t go in expecting Get Out or Us : Peele’s first two standouts are focused in human explorations, whereas Nope is more scattershot with its storytelling. The filmmaker touches on an array of subplots and intriguing ideas (the dangerous indifference of show business, mankind’s disparate reactions to a life-altering situation) but attempts too many between a visceral, gripping first half and the more conventional and rousing second.” — Brain Truitt, USA Today

“While Nope might not be as overt in its messaging as Get Out or Us , Peele explores ideas about the beauty of filmmaking and practical effects, trauma, and how Hollywood can easily dispose of its artists. But Peele does all this with a subtlety that he’s never shown at this level before, making these elements essential to the story, but without being too overt with the point he’s trying to make. While this might be his most bombastic film in terms of what he’s attempting, it’s also may be his most understated in its messaging.” — Ross Bonaime, Collider

“Peele has rarely been so blunt in his social commentary.” — Caryn James, BBC

“ Nope is not concerned with explaining much. Instead, the focus is on spectacle and the herculean emotional and physical tolls that come from witnessing it, or, even worse, trying to capture it on-camera. The central object of fascination for Nope ’s ensemble is a saucer-shaped unidentified flying object that’s tooling around the hills outside Los Angeles. And yet Peele is not just making an inventive sci-fi thriller. Nope is tinged with the acidic satire that suffused his last two movies, as Peele examines why the easiest way to process horror these days is to turn it into breathtaking entertainment.” — David Sims, The Atlantic

“Through all of this, Nope sees Peele distinguish between the making of entertainment for an audience — a ravenous, uncaring beast, bloodying its teeth with the spectacle of other people’s lives — and the act of filmmaking for yourself, capturing something impossible on-camera, making a dream real. In the exploration of these ideas, the mythmaking of the Haywood ranch dovetails with Peele tearing away classic cinematic imagery from white-supremacist, manifest-destiny roots. The director repurposes it as a spectacle of the more triumphant kind, framing Kaluuya as a cowboy in a bright-orange The Scorpion King crew hoodie. In defining such liberation he wrangles film and television production history as the Haywoods do horses, pulling in all of his favourite cinema and lovingly demolishing and rebuilding it. Nope is as much a celebration of what’s great about film as it is a parody of its monstrous tendencies.” — Kambole Campbell, Empire

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Nope review — aliens, horses and Hollywood in Jordan Peele’s latest brainy thriller

Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer and Brandon Perea in Nope, a new film written, produced and directed by Jordan Peele

Challenge yourself with today’s puzzles.

★★★★☆ Jordan Peele wrote this film in the middle of the pandemic, when “we were a little bit worried about the future of cinema. So the first thing I knew is I wanted to create a spectacle.” Well, the New Yorker behind Get Out and Us has certainly done that. Nope , Peele’s third film as writer-director, is a bracingly ambitious blend of UFO flick, horror, western and black comedy that’s full of marquee moments and bound together by a thrilling strangeness. It has some of the suspense of early Spielberg, the ominousness of M Night Shyamalan and the lurid world-building of Quentin Tarantino but an off-kilter atmosphere that’s all Peele’s own.

Daniel Kaluuya is typically compelling as OJ Haywood, whose silent dolefulness is counterpointed

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‘Nope’ Review: Jordan Peele’s UFO Drama Has a Mood of Exciting Unease but an Arbitrary Story

Daniel Kaluuya and Keke Palmer play horse-ranch siblings who try to photograph a close encounter in a movie that, for all its skillfully ominous atmosphere, begins to fly in all directions.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

‘Humane’ Review: Caitlin Cronenberg’s First Feature Is a Searing Domestic Thriller About Crimes of the Not-So-Distant Future 2 days ago
‘Boy Kills World’ Review: Bill Skarsgård Is a Deaf-Mute Avenger in an Action Film So Ultraviolent It’s Like ‘John Wick’ Gone ‘Clockwork Orange’ 4 days ago
‘Uncropped’ Review: An Enticing Portrait of James Hamilton Makes You Wonder: Is He the Greatest New York Photographer Ever? 6 days ago

NOPE, Keke Palmer, 2022. © Universal Pictures /Courtesy Everett Collection

Jordan Peele ’s “ Nope ” is a tantalizingly creepy mixed bag of a sci-fi thriller. It’s a movie that taps into our fear and awe of UFOs, and for a while it holds us in a shivery spell. It picks the audience up and carries it along, feeding off spectral hints of the otherworldly. Yet watching the movie, you can just about taste the DNA of Steven Spielberg’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” and “Nope” mirrors the trajectory of other films that have been made in the shadow of “Close Encounters,” like M. Night Shyamalan’s “Signs” and Denis Villeneuve’s “Arrival.” Here, as in those films, the anticipation works better than the payoff.

Daniel Kaluuya , an actor so skillful he seems to overhaul his spirit with every role, plays the central character, Otis Haywood Jr., a sweet-souled but recessive and taciturn country fellow who goes by the nickname of OJ. Early on, he reunites with his feisty chatterbox sister, Emerald ( Keke Palmer ), on the California horse ranch the two have inherited from their father, Otis Sr. (Keith David), who in one of the film’s first scenes dies during a mysterious shower of inanimate debris. For several generations, the ranch has rented out horses to the entertainment industry, with the Haywoods serving as on-set wranglers and horse whisperers. But OJ is looking to sell the business and cash in.

Before he gets the chance, he walks out of the Haywoods’ beautiful farmhouse, stepping into the bright starlit night to chase a horse that has leapt the fence of its training arena. What he sees and hears in the distance is freaky in the extreme: a crowd, lit by floodlights, that seems to have assembled like some outer-space cult. Before long, the signs grow weirder: a cloud that doesn’t move (and hasn’t for weeks). Wind that funnels down into a small tornado. And, finally, a dark svelte object that glides through the air like nothing of this earth. The film’s title plays, amusingly, off that most casual of contempo buzz phrases ( nope! ), and how it perfectly expresses our incredulity in the face of the otherworldly.

Popular on Variety

Of all the fanciful phenomena that rational people claim not to believe in (ghosts, demons, monsters, the theory that Joe Biden stole the election), UFOs hold a special place. Simply put, there’s a lot of evidence for them. I don’t mean the kind of evidence cited by the folks who think that Ed and Lorraine Warren, of the “Conjuring” films, are paranormal documentarians. I’m talking about the mountains of filmed footage of UFOs, a lot of which is fake but not all of it. Of course, just because a flying object is unidentified doesn’t mean that it came from outer space. Yet the best UFO footage, which is available by the clipload on YouTube, exerts an uncanniness that can’t be explained away. You look at caught-on-the-fly images of gliding spacecraft, or lights dancing in the sky, and think, “Wow, what is that? What if ?” Those thoughts have only been encouraged by recent reports leaked by the U.S. government that acknowledge just how many flying objects there are that even military experts can’t identify, some zipping through the air with a technology no one recognizes.

“Nope” has a seductive mood of unease that makes the film feel, for a while, like something new: the first UFO thriller of the cellphone-ready, I-saw-it-online, how-can-you-not-believe-your-own-eyes? era. This is Peele’s third feature, after the landmark racial-paranoia nightmare “Get Out” and the ambitious but muddled doppelgänger fantasy “Us,” and for a while he draws on his skill at leading us down detours that become hypnotic lost highways.

In a way, the whole setup is a bait-and-switch, as Peele lures us into the quirky lives of OJ and Emerald, taking note of the fact that their business, Haywood’s Hollywood Horses, has deep roots in racial pride. It seems that the Black jockey who appeared for a few seconds in one of history’s earliest film clips was the great-great-grandfather of Otis Sr. (That’s part of their spiel to potential clients.) Kaluuya, so sly, communicating mostly through his sharp gaze, and Palmer, whose fast-break aggro style acquires more heart as the movie goes on, make the Haywoods adult siblings we feel invested in, and the film introduces a couple of other key characters: Ricky “Jupe” Park (Steven Yeun), a former child star who now runs a Wild West theme park called Jupiter’s Claim (that’s where the space-cult show was), and Angel Torres (Brandon Perea), a techie salesman at Fry’s Electronics who helps the Haywoods set up a surveillance system to record the alien spaceship that appears to have settled in over their property.

It’s a flying saucer that resembles a giant undulating sand dollar, and if you had to use one word to describe it that word would be “hungry.” OJ and Emerald decide to photograph it; if they can land the perfect shot and sell it to the right media source (they have Oprah in mind), it could make them rich. But how do you catch a phantom spaceship on film? You call the jaded analog cinematographer Antlers Holst, played by the veteran croaky-voiced hipster actor Michael Wincott.

As they launch the plan, “Nope” itself starts flying off in different directions. It’s part of the film’s design — and, in a way, its racial consciousness — that OJ and Emerald are too mistrustful of mainstream white society to get any authorities involved. So we’re spared the sort of meddlesome-U.S.-government boilerplate plot that weighed down a movie like “Arrival.” Yet “Nope” doesn’t have a plot so much as a series of happenings that spill out in an impressionistic and arbitrary fashion. There are memorable touches along the way, like the monster image of a praying mantis on a surveillance camera or, as the electricity goes out, the way Peele slows down Corey Hart’s ’80s kitsch classic “Sunglasses at Night” to evoke the dread of a world stopping in its tracks. Yet for all these suspenseful felicities, logic often takes a back seat, which has the effect of lessening our involvement.

The spaceship, for instance, will suck you into its membrane hole if you look right at it…and sometimes if you don’t. The details of the Haywoods’ strategy to film the thing are never fully sketched in. When Emerald dots the property with inflatable tube men, it makes for a grabby image, but the point of these super-fake decoys is barely established. What’s more, the most disturbing scene in the movie — a flashback to Ricky’s ’90s cable sitcom, which turned into an impromptu horror set when the chimp who played the lovable Gordy went on a bloody rampage — turns out to have nothing to do with…anything. When the spaceship finally unfurls its freak flag, it looks like a pirate galleon made out of a giant ripped bedsheet, which is a little spooky and a little innocuous. “Nope,” like “Signs” and “Arrival,” will probably be a major hit, and it confirms the power of the Jordan Peele brand. But it also confirms that making movies with too much chaos and sprawl is threatening to become part of that brand.

Reviewed at AMC Empire, July 19, 2022. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 135 MIN.

Production: A Universal Pictures release of a Monkeypaw Productions production. Producers: Jordan Peele, Ian Cooper. Executive producer: Robert Graf.
Crew: Director, screenplay: Jordan Peele. Camera: Hoyte Van Hoytema. Editor: Nicholas Monsour. Music: Michael Abels.
With: Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Steven Yeun, Brandon Perea, Michael Wincott, Keith David, Wrenn Schmidt.

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Watch Nope with a subscription on Peacock, rent on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV, or buy on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV.

What to Know

Admirable for its originality and ambition even when its reach exceeds its grasp, Nope adds Spielbergian spectacle to Jordan Peele's growing arsenal.

It may not be the movie you think you're going to get -- or even the one you want -- but either way, Nope leaves a strong impression as a true Jordan Peele original.

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O’Connor plays tennis pro Patrick, one-third of a love triangle with Tashi (Zendaya), a tennis pro poised for greatness before an injury relegates her to coaching, and Art (Faist), another well-to-do tennis pro. Tashi eventually marries Art, and Patrick comes back into their lives years later, kicking off tensions and connections, including a racy threesome.

Reviews have described “Challengers” as sexy and steamy , something O’Connor is still surprised he was chosen for.

“If you were making the movie, you wouldn’t cast me,” O’Connor recalled telling screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes in an interview for The Wall Street Journal. “You would cast anyone but me.”

Zendaya not only co-starred in but produced the film, and she handpicked O’Connor for the role after a discussion with director Luca Guadagnino.

“Literally, that was the first person I thought of,” the “Euphoria” star told the outlet of O’Connor.

Actors Mike Faist, Zendaya, and Josh O'Connor in a scene from the movie 'CHALLENGERS', 2024

She explained she liked the actor’s intensity in “The Crown,” and remembered thinking, “After meeting him, I was like, ‘Oh, my God, you’re nothing like this person.’”

O’Connor admitted when it comes to his casting, “I still think it’s a reach.”

Filming the steamy scenes raised its own set of challenges, including Zendaya’s family viewing the finished product.

“It was hilarious,” she told Entertainment Tonight recently, noting her family was aware of the film’s scandalous content.

The 27-year-old revealed her family is used to seeing her in racier scenes, thanks to her role on “Euphoria,” for which she won two Emmys.

“They’ve all seen ‘Euphoria,’ you know, so it’s not like our first rodeo or anything,” she said.

Still, at a recent screening, Zendaya told ET she observed her family’s reactions with amusement.

“It was funny ’cause, you know, obviously I’ve seen the movie many times, so I know what’s coming, and they were all sitting behind me, and I got to, like, watch them watch and slowly just be like, ‘Oh god,'” she said.

Zendaya posing at the Amazon MGM Studios' 'Challengers' photo call in Beverly Hills, California on April 20, 2024

For Zendaya, playing Tashi was a chance to play a mature role she actually related to in some ways, while exploring other elements.

“I’ve been playing 16-year-olds since I was 16,” she told Variety. “So, it was nice to play a character that was not a child anymore. It was also interesting playing parts of my life that I haven’t experienced yet. I’ve not gotten married. I’ve not had a child. Those milestones I don’t necessarily have a direct reference point for. That was different to feel. Ultimately, it felt like the right time for a character like this.”

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While the scenes aren’t explicit, Zendaya did tell ET, “It’s still enough to not want to watch with your aunt.”

O’Connor highlighted in the ET interview that the intensity of some scenes will keep viewers “on the edge of your seat.”

But when it came to filming, particularly the three-way kiss scene, he added, “In reality, you know, we laughed.”

Josh O'Connor and Zendaya in the 2023 film 'CHALLENGERS', looking at each other

Zendaya described the intricacy of filming the scene as “a dance” and ultimately not very romantic or intimate.

“It’s not just the three of us,” she said. “It’s a whole crew also who’s a part of the scenes.”

In the cast’s interview with Variety, the “Spider-Man: No Way Home” star admitted she let herself get distracted during the edgy scene.

“The only reason I really remember is because Beyoncé came out with ‘Break My Soul’ that day,” she told the outlet. “I was having a great day, like, ‘Y’all. Beyoncé’s single just dropped.’ That’s what I was focused on, to be honest.”

“We lost Zendaya for like a week,” O’Connor added. “She was on set, normal, chatting with us. Then one day, Beyoncé released something. They called ‘cut,’ and she immediately had headphones in. She was completely lost to the world.”

The cast also bonded through rehearsals and training to portray tennis stars.

In an interview with Variety, the stars discussed their intense workout regimen, with O’Connor admitting he’s not much of a gym rat.

“I find gyms incredibly tedious,” he told the outlet. “I get bored very quickly. I always catch myself in the mirror, and I’m like, ‘You look so pathetic. You look rubbish holding your weights. And out of your depth.’ So, I just never really lasted.

“There’s a piece of equipment that measures how strong your abdominals are. And Zendaya had the best abs of the three of us by a long way. I remember me and Mike laughing, but we were also furious and desperately trying to improve our strength.”

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Jerry seinfeld brings back classic ‘seinfeld’ characters, takes jab at ‘friends’ in promo for his pop-tarts movie.

'Unfrosted,' which tells the (fictional) origin story of Pop-Tarts, hits Netflix on May 3.

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Pop-Tarts is getting back at Jerry Seinfeld .

It all started when Seinfeld directed and co-wrote a movie, Unfrosted , about the origin of Pop-Tarts. He also stars in the film, which hits Netflix on May 3.

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‘Nowhere Special’ Review: Old Bonds, New Family

This understated tear-jerker sees a dying single father making future family plans for his toddler son.

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A young boy places candles on a birthday cake while a man smiles and looks at him.

By Glenn Kenny

“Nowhere Special” is an unusual, and unusually understated, parental tear-jerker in which a father prepares for the loss of his young son. The son isn’t going anywhere. But the father, a single dad, is dying, of an unspecified disease, and he’s at first eager, then later a little desperate, to get his boy placed with the right adoptive family.

The picture was written and directed by Uberto Pasolini, the Italian-born filmmaker who was the producer of the 1997 crowd-pleaser “The Full Monty.” Although he shares a surname with the acclaimed director Pier Paolo Pasolini, Uberto is in fact a nephew of the neorealist cinema giant Luchino Visconti. Pasolini doesn’t seem directly influenced by his actual relative or his namesake. But his movie does have a style: slow, quiet, measured. It takes its time before bringing the emotional hammer down.

Set and shot in Northern Ireland, the film focuses on a window cleaner, John (James Norton), the loving father to a very cute but often sulky 4-year-old, Michael (Daniel Lamont). We never see John at a doctor’s office, but we get a look at his packed medicine cabinet and we see him getting more ashen as the picture goes on. One location he does spend a lot of time in is a child placement agency, whose staffers escort him to speak with approved-to-adopt candidates. There are childless couples, intimidatingly big families and single aspiring parents to consider. John resists putting a “memory box” together for his boy. “I don’t want him to understand death,” he says.

After being admonished by a snotty rich client because of slow work, John, taking the adage “you only live once” to heart, eggs the fellow’s house. It’s one of the few moments when the movie deigns to deliver a conventional satisfaction. But the mostly low-key mode of “Nowhere Special” is the right one. Norton is spectacular, but little Lamont delivers one of those uncanny performances that doesn’t seem like acting, and makes you feel for the kid almost as much as his onscreen parent does.

Nowhere Special Not Rated. Running time: 1 hour 36 minutes. In theaters.

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Love Means Nothing in Tennis but Everything in “Challengers”

By Justin Chang

Zendaya holding two tennis balls with a tennis court in the background

A meal is never just a meal in a Luca Guadagnino movie; each bite is a prelude to a kiss, every feast a form of foreplay. In his shimmering melodrama “I Am Love” (2009), whose beauties range from the churches of Sanremo to the alabaster countenance of Tilda Swinton, the most ravishing image is a plate of prawns, passionately prepared and breathlessly consumed. Food is even more boldly eroticized in “Call Me by Your Name” (2017), which features suggestively oozing egg yolk and a memorably despoiled peach. And what of “Bones and All” (2022), which, being a cannibal romance, brings Guadagnino’s fixations with food and flesh to a gristly point of convergence? Let’s just say it’s his one picture that’s ideally viewed on an empty stomach.

“Challengers,” Guadagnino’s irrepressibly entertaining new movie, serves up a lighter repast—a post-horror palate cleanser, seasoned with generous sprinklings of sweat. It unfolds in the low-fat, high-energy world of competitive tennis, but even here the characters are very much what they eat (or don’t). Early on, Art Donaldson (Mike Faist), a blond tennis champ mired in an early-thirties slump, passes through a kitchen stocked with fitness drinks, to be ingested on a schedule enforced by his wife and coach, Tashi Duncan (Zendaya). Art is disciplined to a fault, and his regimen hints at a joyless caution that, in the eyes of a cinematic voluptuary like Guadagnino, already seems like defeat. By contrast, another player, the rakishly handsome Patrick Zweig (Josh O’Connor), is dieting only because he’s flat broke. As he drifts from tournament to tournament, he looks so pitiably hungry that, at one point, a stranger kindly offers him half of her breakfast sandwich. But, as Patrick tears into his first meal in a while, his sheer gusto is its own sign of triumph; it warns us not to count him out.

The year is 2019, and Art and Patrick, both in need of a boost, are preparing to face each other in a Challenger tournament, the second tier of competitive tennis, in New Rochelle. The professional implications are minor, but the emotional stakes couldn’t be higher. Thirteen years ago, in happier times, Art and Patrick were best friends and doubles partners; then along came Tashi, a tennis prodigy with her own dreams of stardom. Both boys were smitten; Patrick wooed her first, but it was Art she married, pouring her talent and ambition into his career after injury derailed her own. “Challengers,” in other words, comes at you like an amped-up, Adidas-sponsored “Jules and Jim”—a funny, tempestuous, and exuberantly lusty story about how three athletic demigods see their destinies upended. And Guadagnino tells it the way he knows best, with a sometimes exasperating but ultimately irresistible surfeit of style.

We begin and end at that Challenger tournament, where the sun beats down on a spectacle of unrivalled hotness. The camera, commanded by the cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom, seems to be everywhere at once, exulting in the glory of bared chests and sweat-matted leg hair. A thunderous techno score, composed by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, pulses and surges hypnotically beneath the action, never quite drowning out the men’s grunts of effort and release. In the stands, the spectators jerk their heads dutifully left and right, but the camera keeps finding Tashi’s gaze, fixed straight ahead. She alone sees past the individual strokes, and the over-all score, to perceive the deeper psychological game her boys are playing.

From this narrative baseline, the backstory tumbles out in all directions, sustaining a dizzying rally of flashbacks and flash-forwards across a decade-plus narrative span. The screenwriter, Justin Kuritzkes, ingeniously employs the structure of a tennis match, elastic yet compartmentalized, to track the fluctuations of his characters’ fortunes. He pulls us back to game days at Stanford, then lobs us forward several years to a competition in Atlanta, with a number of battery-recharging stopovers at the New Rochelle match in between. It doesn’t entirely work; the ball-smashing cuts between time frames get repetitive, and the net effect, so to speak, is of weighty accumulation when a nimbler acceleration is called for. Still, like any skilled opponent, the movie keeps us off balance, revealing what happened beforehand with sharp narrative backhands.

In a flash, then, Art and Patrick are eighteen again, inseparable buddies with insatiable appetites. In one scene, they stuff their faces with hot dogs; later, one naughtily bites off the end of the other’s churro. If your innuendo alarm is going off, “Challengers” is just getting warmed up. So is Tashi, who bursts onto the scene as a Stanford-bound player, and whose brilliance on the court sets the boys’ hearts aflutter. Yet, as eager as they are to wield the racquets in their pockets, the triangle comes together slowly. A hotel-room flirtation seems headed in the promising direction of a three-way, but Tashi, a master of the tease, backs away at the moment of peak arousal. “I’m not a home-wrecker,” she declares, and we know instinctively what she means. In toying with Art’s and Patrick’s affections, she exposes a soft spot, even a hint of unspoken desire, in their rambunctious camaraderie.

That failed seduction isn’t the only instance of coitus interruptus. So effortlessly does Guadagnino establish a vibe of free-floating horndoggery that it takes a moment to realize how little actual intercourse there is in the movie. It scarcely matters. It would be hard to overstate what a glorious, no-fucks-given rebuke “Challengers” represents to the regrettably puritanical ethos that governs most mainstream Hollywood releases. If the movie makes little distinction between sex scenes and non-sex scenes, it’s because Guadagnino knows that people can’t be readily separated into minds and bodies. He sees his characters whole, libidos and all, and their every expression and gesture throws off a coruscating erotic energy. The effect isn’t titillating; it’s clarifying.

In sex, as in tennis, anticipation is everything. Watch how the director pokes his camera, with unconcealed thirst, into a men’s locker room, or plops Art and Patrick down in a sauna, as though cruising around for gay-porn scenarios that never materialize. But with anticipation can also come deflation; Guadagnino treats sex as a conversation, and any conversation can go south. In the movie’s most exquisitely modulated and carnally forthright scene, Patrick and Tashi begin to make love, only to discover, in the heat of an ill-timed argument, that their limbs and loins are far more in synch than their egos and athletic aspirations. The encounter ends abruptly, and the relationship soon follows suit. Not even love can trump their love of the game.

It is Tashi’s career-ending injury that spurs her second act, personal and professional, with Art. Somewhere along the way they have a daughter, but she’s a narrative afterthought; “Challengers,” like its characters, turns tennis into tunnel vision. As Art’s coach, Tashi is hellbent on his success, and he needs all her drive and smarts to direct him. Faist has as much live-wire physicality here as he did, as Riff, in Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story” (2021), but his rascally impulses have given way to an elfin sweetness, a melancholy grasp of his own limitations. For Tashi, Art is the boringly safe bet, the player and spouse who will never fall below or rise above a certain threshold. Patrick is the more gifted but far more volatile wild card, and O’Connor’s devilishly charming grin keeps finding ways to woo us—not that we’re the ones who need persuading.

This isn’t the first time that Zendaya has been stuck on the sidelines watching two men go at it. Scarcely two months have passed since the arrival of “Dune: Part Two,” which made her stand watch, in helpless horror, over a climactic and unsubtly homoerotic spectacle of male violence. The hand-to-hand combat in “Challengers” is juicier still, if markedly less bloody; no one gets stabbed, and the fate of planetary civilizations does not hang in the balance. Even so, Tashi’s tense gaze seems to contain a small cosmos of anguished possibilities. Is she wryly envisioning herself as the ball that Art and Patrick keep slamming over the net? Or perhaps she’s the trophy that one of them will hoist aloft—and, if so, does that make her the inevitable winner or the ultimate loser?

These are intriguing if somewhat dispiriting questions, and I doubt I’m alone in wishing that Tashi’s own athletic dreams hadn’t come to a premature end. My mind flashed back to the wanly likable “Wimbledon” (2004), which benched its female star, Kirsten Dunst, while ushering her male beau into the winner’s circle. Guadagnino has two men to usher, and the final stretch of “Challengers” smacks of both desperation and bravura as it pulls out stop after stop: suddenly, this sports movie becomes a gale-force disaster flick and a buddy comedy of remarriage. If the wrap-up feels overextended—right down to a closing twist that you’ll see coming several tennis courts away—you can hardly blame Guadagnino for falling so hard for his players, or for getting so entangled in the geometry of their desires. He lives to serve, and he wants the game to go on forever. ♦

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‘Nowhere Special’ Review: James Norton Is Superb In Father-And-Son Drama That Won’t Leave A Dry Eye In The House

By Pete Hammond

Pete Hammond

Awards Columnist/Chief Film Critic

'Nowhere Special' Director Uberto Pasolini On James Norton's Star Turn In Father-Son Drama - Specialty Box Office

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Joanna Arnow, As Her Feature Debuts, Knocks Oft-Used Words "Describing Films Women Make About Sexuality" - Specialty Preview

This is not to say director-writer-producer Uberto Pasolini has made some sort of cloying and maudlin attempt to win our sympathy. This is actually a movie refreshingly void of piled-on pathos and sentimentality, instead using a deliberate pace to tell what is said to be inspired by a true story about a 35-year-old window washer, John ( James Norton ) , in Northern Ireland who is a single dad to a 4-year-old toddler named Michael ( Daniel Lamont ), both abandoned by the Russian mother who left her boyfriend and new son at birth to return to her home country and go completely out of their lives. If that wasn’t a cruel enough blow to have life throw at you, John has also learned he has just months to live (although we never do find out the cause of his impending death), and so, as the film begins, he has set out on a mission with an adoption agency to try to find a forever home for Michael, rather than put him through the series of foster homes he had to endure growing up.

Fortunately, Pasolini has a splendid cast to help tell this sad but oddly hopeful story starting with Norton ( Bob Marley: One Love, Little Women ), who was nominated for a British Independent Film Award as Best Actor for the role and delivers a poignant and heartbreaking performance as a good father whose last act is to find a happy place for his son, and then to simply let go. No easy task. Norton is brilliant in letting us see it all unfold without saying much at all. Lamont is a real find, enormously photogenic and never less than believable as a 4-year-old who is wise beyond his years. The last time I saw this kind of relationship work this well on screen was Dustin Hoffman and Justin Henry in 1979’s Kramer vs. Kramer. The supporting cast is very fine, particularly veteran Stella McCusker, even if most just get one scene to rise above stereotyping in what is essentially a two-hander between father and son.

Andrew Simon McAllister’s lovely score fits the mood perfectly here. Now that Nowhere Special has found its way to America, the pandemic and industry strikes behind its delays, let’s hope it finds the audience it deserves. It will stay with you long afterwards.

Title: Nowhere Special Distributor: Cohen Media Group Release date: April 26, 2024 (limited) Director-screenwriter: Uberto Pasolini Cast: James Norton, Daniel Lamont, Carol Moore, Valerie Kane, Eileen O’Higgins, Laura Hughes, Stella McCusker, Roisin Gallagher, Keith McErlean, Chris Corrigan, Niamh McGrady, Siobhan McSweeney, Caolan Byrne, Rhoda Ofori-Attah Running time: 1 hr 36 min

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