WAY OUT WEST

WATCH THE SKIES! HORROR MASTER JORDAN PEELE RETURNS WITH “THE GREAT AMERICAN UFO FILM” NOPE

- NICK SETCHFIELD

SFX FINDS ITSELF confronted by two Jordan Peeles. They are absolutely identical, from the striking two-tone jackets both men are wearing to their matching silver beards. As they speak, their words emerge in perfect sync even as their facial expressions mirror one another precisely. The original sits top left on our laptop screen while the clone – or could that be the original? – hovers bottom right. We do our best to ignore the presence of this uncanny twin but we can’t resist the occasional peek, just in case we catch him in an unguarded moment with murder in his eyes.

Sure, it’s only a glitch in a Zoom call, doubling up on one of the boxes. But given the sinister doppelgängers in Us, Peele’s last slice of chill-inducing, politically conscious horror, it feels deeply on brand.

Peele’s here in duplicate to promote his latest, Nope. Nope? Yup. “The story behind that title is a little similar to the title of Get Out,” says the writer-director, referencing the 2017 smash that established him as a master of elevated scares. “I wanted to acknowledge my audience’s perspective. In African-American culture there is an innate understanding of what ‘nope’ means. It means that we will not step into a haunted house. We will not do a lot of things we see in horror movies. So with this being the great American UFO film, I wanted to once again acknowledge that there is another ‘nope’ situation for us.”

MAGIC SPECTACLES