After their father is killed by objects falling from the sky, siblings OJ and Emerald Haywood try to keep the family's Hollywood horse ranch going. They realize something is hiding in a cloud above their valley and decide to get it on camera. Watch it for how Peele makes looking itself the danger.
Nope is a 2022 horror and science fiction film directed by Jordan Peele. This breakdown covers 5 techniques (1 psychology, 1 cinematography, 1 narrative, 1 editing and 1 sound), each with the scene where you can see it. If you like how it is made, Get Out uses several of the same techniques.
Paying attention to who is looking, who is being looked at and whose eyes the camera borrows. Looking becomes a form of power in the story.
How this film uses it
The creature, which the Haywoods name Jean Jacket, attacks whoever looks directly at it. Everyone in the film wants to film, watch or sell a spectacle. The film turns that urge to look into the thing that gets people killed.
Where to see it
The Star Lasso Experience. Former child star Jupe gathers a crowd at his theme park to watch a show in the sky, and the creature swallows the whole audience.
Shooting on very large-format 70mm IMAX film, which gives a much sharper, deeper and taller picture. It captures huge scale and small detail in the same shot.
How this film uses it
Hoyte van Hoytema shot the film on 65mm film, including IMAX cameras. For night scenes, he paired a film camera with a digital camera that captured infrared light, then combined the images. The huge sky over the desert fills the screen, so you keep scanning it for Jean Jacket.
Where to see it
The final sequence. Jean Jacket unfolds into its full shape over the valley while Emerald races to Jupiter's Claim on a motorbike.
Returning to the same physical object again and again until it means more than what it is. It moves the plot and also stands for the film's main ideas.
How this film uses it
During a chimp attack on a 1990s sitcom set, young Jupe hides under a table and fixes on a shoe standing upright on the floor. As an adult, he keeps it on display. Peele has said it is the detail Jupe focuses on to block out what he is seeing.
Where to see it
The Gordy's Home flashback. The chimp playing Gordy attacks the cast, and Jupe stares at a shoe standing on its end.
Dividing the film into named chapters with title cards on screen. Each title tells you what the next section will focus on and shapes how you read it.
How this film uses it
The film is split into chapters named after the animals in it: Ghost, Clover, Gordy, Lucky and Jean Jacket. Naming the creature's chapter like the horses' tells you it is an animal too, something to be handled. It also links the chimp's story to the main plot.
Where to see it
The Gordy chapter. The film breaks into a short chapter about the sitcom chimp before returning to the ranch.
Keeping a threat or character mostly out of view and suggesting it through sound, movement at the edge of the frame and other people's reactions. Your imagination makes it scarier than anything shown.
How this film uses it
For most of the film, you never see the creature clearly. You see a cloud that never moves, horses panicking and the power cutting out. Your imagination fills in the rest.
Where to see it
Angel's camera setup. The Haywoods' new tech installer notices that one cloud over the valley never moves.
Questions
Nope: quick answers
What filmmaking techniques does Nope use?
CineCode breaks down 5 techniques in Nope (2022): The Gaze, IMAX Cinematography, Symbolic Object, Chapter Title Cards and Off-Screen Presence.
Who directed Nope?
Jordan Peele directed Nope, released in 2022. CineCode also covers Get Out (2017), Us (2019).
What films are similar to Nope?
Films that share techniques with Nope include Get Out (2017), The Shawshank Redemption (1994), The Dark Knight (2008), Léon: The Professional (1994).
