I think the best kind of horror films, particularly those with a supernatural edge, are the ones that don’t try to explain everything to you. They just present a confounding mystery, and let it hang there.
One of my favorite of recent years was “It Follows,” in which people are inexplicably pursued by relentless doppelgangers. I would add “Us” to the list.
Writer/director Jordan Peele’s sophomore effort is superior, in my opinion, to his previous venture, the smash hit “Get Out.” Lupita Nyong’o stars as a seemingly normal woman with darkness in her past that will catch up to her and her family.
Thirty years ago as a child, Adelaide had a chilling experience inside a carnival funhouse, where the image in the mirror turned out to be a real live reflection. Now that person, who has grown up just as she did, returns to the “real” world to exact a blood-soaked revenge.
I don’t want to give away too much, since the very appeal of “Us” lies in its teasing out information and surprises. Suffice it to say, Adelaide isn’t the only one with a nefarious shade following her around.
Winston Duke plays her husband, Gabe, a good-natured guy; Evan Alex plays their son, Jason, who has a few disturbing aspects to his own personality; and Shahadi Wright Joseph is teen daughter, Zora, who makes a show of her independence until it’s time to fall back on her family.
The big twist of the movie wasn’t a surprise for me, but I watch a lot of films and there’s only so many tricks in the bag. But it’s still a very satisfying ending to a terrific movie fraught with frights.
Bonus features are quite expansive and include six deleted scenes, funny outtakes and an extended version of the dance sequence. There’s also an in-depth exploration of the making of three pivotal scenes and five documentary shorts.
“Us” is top-drawer horror, a creepily convincing modern fable that haunts our hearts without getting caught up in the busy semantics of explaining everything. Like “It Follows” from a few years ago, there is a weird, existential threat and all you really need to know about it is that it’s coming for you.
Being of the horror genre its effectiveness is somewhat attenuated by obedience to tried-and-true tropes. The story moves quickly from brutal house-to-house disturbances to systemic society-wide chaos in a hurried way that feels like a reach. And because you know there’s going to be a big twist, it turns out to be not nearly twisty enough.
Seriously, I had it figured out halfway through. So would anyone who’s watched movies, I think.
That quibble aside, this is a much more interesting and better picture than Jordan Peele’s “Get Out,” which I thought solid but overpraised. “Us” has a tactile feel to it, and it’s almost as if we can sense the scrape of scissors against skin or the globby drops of sticky blood.
Lupito Nyong’o plays Adelaide, a 40ish wife and mother of a prosperous, happy family. They are heading to their summer home near the beach: her husband, Gabe (Winston Duke), is big, goofy and loveable; their daughter, Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph), is a typical teen girl, plugged into her phone and tuned out of her family; and son, Jason (Evan Alex), is pleasant if a bit odd, prone to occasional epithets and wearing a monster mask wherever he goes.
This same beach town, though, holds tragic memories for Adelaide. In the flashback prologue, we witness her being separated from her parents as a little girl in 1986, wandering away from the carnival into the “Vision Quest” funhouse, which for some reason has been built facing the beach rather than the boardwalk.
There she encounters her own reflection -- except it’s not a simple refraction in a mirror.
Without giving too much away, it turns out that this twin is not just a figment of her imagination, but a very real figure. It seems she has been living in shadow ever since their childhood encounter, nurturing a growing resentment that has turned into a murderous rage.
There are others who come along with her and act as her companions, an inverted version of the family. They all wear red denim jumpsuits and carry large golden shears.
Nyong’o uses an eerie breathless voice while playing the “other mother,” which at first may tempt you to laugh but quietly burrows under your skin like a seeking insect. Her followers are even less verbal, confined to beastly growls and howls.
“Us” starts out like a standard horror thriller, as the marginal hunted are quickly sliced up, though more pivotal characters escape their tormentors, fight back and eventually become the hunters. Then the story gets bigger and bigger, losing the intimacy of close-bodied assaults and strangled threats. By going meta, it loses the wonderfully uncanny minutiae that made it sing.
It wraps up in a satisfying way, though as I said one that won’t come as much of a shock to horror veterans. Sometimes, though, knowing the blade will sink deep doesn’t make it bite any less.
Erica is 17 years old and a certifiable “wild child.” Played in “Flower” with verve and confidence by Zoey Deutsch, her M.O. is to party all the time and manipulate everyone she encounters. Her favorite scam is enticing older men into sexual encounters, having her friends film it and then blackmail them by threatening to release the video.
Director Max Winkler, who co-write the script with Alex McAuley and Matt Spicer, manages to present us with some great characters, but then isn’t sure what to do with them.
Kathryn Hahn plays Erica’s mom, a bawdy woman bitter about her own misspent youth. She’s now taken up with a nice guy, Bob (Tim Heidecker), who mortifies Erica on a daily basis with his hopeless normalcy. Even worse, as the story opens his 18-year-old son, Luke (Joey Morgan), is returning home after spending time in rehab.
Relishing the chance to have a torrid liaison with her stepbrother and shock everyone, Erica is miffed when Luke turns out to be a painfully shy, overweight lad who is completely resistant to her sexual overtures. Things start out rough between them, but eventually an unexpected friendship starts to blossom.
Arriving late in the game is Adam Scott as Will, an older man (to Erica) that she and her friends play around with lusting after when they encounter him at the bowling alley. It turns out Will and Luke have an unexpected shared past, one filled with pain and misery for the both of them, which will get explored with some grim developments.
The best reason to watch this movie is to enjoy Deutsch’s performance as a young woman who has many deplorable qualities, but is one some level admirable -- or, at least, enviable -- for the way she attacks life like an opponent that must be defeated.
“Flower” is an uneven but bracing portrait of an American original.
Bonus features aren’t extensive, being limited to a feature-length commentary track featuring Winkler and Deutch. I think the best commentaries include both members of the creative team and crew, so it’s nice to see director and star collaborating.
Zoey Deutsch gives a colorful, vibrant and ultimately wasted performance in "Flower," a movie that keeps steering into thematic dead ends.
She plays Erica, a 17-year-old wasting her life in a nonstop party with her closest buds (Maya Eshet and Dylan Gelula) doing the usual teen stuff -- roaming malls, taking selfies, imbibing chemicals they oughtn't to. Typical acting out, you might say, except they finance their exploits by enticing men into receiving oral sex from Erica, documenting it and then blackmailing them for dough.
Erica certainly doesn't lack gumption; as the story opens, they are executing their latest scam on no less than a deputy sheriff (Eric Edelstein) in his patrol vehicle. The man's abject humiliation as he hands over the cash from the ATM and begs them not to put the video online almost makes us feel genuinely sorry for him.
Almost.
Does luring their targets into scuzzy/criminal behavior absolve Erica and company from their own scuzzy/criminal behavior? That would be an interesting subject to explore, but unfortunately director Max Winkler and his co-screenwriters, Matt Spicer and Alex McAuley, always seem to turn away from the harder questions, preferring to focus on the vagaries of Erica's moods and outbursts.
Erica and her mom (Kathryn Hahn) think they have a good relationship -- one of those "we're just two semi-crazy girls trying to get by!" kinda things. But Erica is a taker, treating every interaction as a transaction in which she must come out ahead. She's upset because mom has taken up with a monstrously "uncool" guy, Bob (Tim Heidecker), moving into their physical and emotional space.
Her own dad is currently incarcerated for some kind of casino business, and we sense she's more her father's daughter than her mother's.
Things grow worse when Bob's 18-year-old son, Luke (Joey Morgan), is released after a year in rehab. Erica, who uses her sexuality as the coin of the realm, is hoping for a hot future stepbrother she can carry on a shocking affair with. But she's miffed when Luke turns out to be timid, socially paralyzed and, worst of all, fat.
Erica's idea of comforting Luke after a panic attack is to offer -- to insist, actually -- on giving him a blowjob. When he refuses, she insults him as being either gay or under-endowed. A real winner, this one.
Part of the film's failing is never providing us a wide enough opening into Erica's vulnerabilities, assuming she has any cracks at all.
Eventually, Erica and Luke warm up to each other a bit more, and Luke opens up about his harrowing journey. I don't want to give away too much, but suffice it to say that it involves Will (Adam Scott), the "old hot guy" -- he appears to be in this 30s -- who Erica and her friends have been crushing on while hanging out at the bowling alley where he plays in a league.
At least, we think they like him. In Erica's world, where nothing is taken at face value, you can never tell if something that falls out of her mouth is meant the way it seems. Often not even by Erica herself.
Things go from there. This movie is billed as a comedy/drama, but it's neither particularly funny or momentous. Even at a brisk 93 minutes, it often drags.
I enjoyed Deutsch's energy and Morgan's genuineness. I'd love to watch their two characters in almost any other story, to see how they'd fare.
It was also a bit interesting to see Scott, who's made his career playing earnest dweebs, get a meatier role. We're never quite certain about Will, whether he's really a disturbed individual or an unfairly maligned one. Erica vacillates between trying to entrap him and being authentically attracted to him.
The final act goes on a bit of a bender, which felt more like where the screenwriters wanted to take their story rather than where it organically would go. "Flower" is a story about a wild teen sexpot blowing past boundaries -- the sort of thing an all-male creative team dreams up and then doesn't know what to do with.
