Us

Published Date: 07/03/2019

Us pits the Wilson family against a terrifying and unknown opponent.

Accompanied by her husband, son and daughter, Adelaide Wilson returns to the beachfront home where she grew up as a child. Haunted by a traumatic experience from the past, Adelaide grows increasingly concerned that something bad is going to happen to her family. Her worst fears soon become a reality when four masked strangers descend upon the house, forcing the Wilsons into a fight for survival.

Writer and director Jordan Peele returns to our screens with Us and the trailer promises another edge of your seat experience. We absolutely loved the dark satire of Get Out here at Showcase and like so many we were thrilled to see a horror film recognised at the Academy Awards with Peele winning an Oscar for Best Screenplay. And now he is back and we have been finding a little more out about one of the most anticipated films of 2019.

It would appear that the cult TV show The Twilight Zone has played a major influence of the conception of Us, in particular an episode titled ‘Mirror Image’. Speaking recently to Rolling Stone Peele said of the show “It’s terrifying, beautiful, really elegant storytelling and it opens up a world. It opens up your imagination.” 

Cast as the Wilson parents Gabe and Adelaide are Winston Duke and Lupita Nyong’o. Duke was last seen in the Oscar winning Black Panther (2018) as the leader of the Jabari Tribe and Lupita Nyong’o famously won a Best Supporting Oscar for her stunning portrayal of Patsey in Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave (2013) and of course also starred in Black Panther.    

In order for his cast and crew to be immersed in the horror genre, Peele gave them ten films to watch, allowing a “shared language”, a shorthand of sorts that exists on set. And the ten films?

Dead Again, The Shining, The Babadook, It Follows, A Tale of Two Sisters, The Birds, Funny Games, Martyrs, Let the Right One In, and The Sixth Sense.

Some absolute classics – and plenty of scares - in that collection!

Another small clue came when Peele revealed to Empire Magazine that the idea for Us came when he began “to follow the thread of ‘we are our own enemy’.” When asked who he was referring to with “we”, Peele was tight lipped for fear of releasing too much information and spoiling the experience for us. But he did explain that the film will reveal and answer that question.

Intriguing! The writer director also spoke about the importance of the horror genre

“Horror films are important. They’re ways that we as a society face our fears. Personally, they serve as a way for me to acknowledge the dark thoughts floating inside of me.”

This for us (excuse the pun!) is why Jordan Peele is enjoying so much success. He is a true fan of the horror genre himself and it is transparent with his films. We cannot wait to enjoy a cinematic nail-biting journey with him again.

Us opens at Showcase Cinemas on March 22