Jordan Peele’s latest follow-up to the films Get Out and Us will be released on July 22nd. Nope stars Keke Palmer and Academy Award winner Daniel Kaluuya (who previously worked with Peele on Get Out). The film will be a blend of science fiction and horror along with a healthy dose of Peele’s comedic sensibility. Although not much has been revealed about Nope outside of the trailers, fans of Jordan Peele can use the remaining time before the film’s release to binge the following films, all of which similarly deal with extraterrestrial life.
Signs (2002)
Available to Rent on Amazon Prime Video & AppleTV
Writer/director M. Night Shyamalan has built a career out of his specific take on the horror genre. After the success of the films The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, Shyamalan continued to explore the genre further with his 2002 film Signs.
Signs tells the story of a farmer (Mel Gibson), who discovers a mysterious pattern in his crops that could be traced to extraterrestrial life. Signs also explores themes of family and faith, featuring a suspenseful buildup of tension throughout the film. In addition to Gibson, the film also features strong supporting performances from Joaquin Phoenix, Rory Culkin, and Abigail Breslin.
Under the Skin (2013)
Stream on Showtime, Kanopy, & PlutoTV
Jonathan Glazer’s third feature explores the supernatural through a dark and erotic vision that re-established the director as a true auteur almost a decade after his last film, Birth. Under the Skin stars Scarlett Johansson in a role unlike any of her previous films.
Unlike the classic films about extraterrestrial life, Under the Skin tackles the genre from the perspective of an alien species in a human form whose method of entrapment is seduction. Just like Jordan Peele, Glazer uses the horror genre to ask larger questions about society and humanity.
Independence Day (1996)
Stream on Amazon Prime Video & Hulu
Roland Emmerich’s Independence Day approaches the alien genre by way of an epic action-adventure saga. In this film, throughout most of the world’s major cities, extraterrestrial forces encroach upon human soil and begin a full-scale attack. The film features an ensemble cast that includes Will Smith, Bill Pullman, and Jeff Goldblum.
Independence Day was a blockbuster and brought about a trend of Hollywood disaster films. Although the film received mixed reviews (via Rotten Tomatoes), its commercial success has made its imprint on popular culture endure. Memorable sequences in the film include the destruction of the White House at the hands of the mysterious alien race.
10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)
Available to Rent on Amazon Prime Video & AppleTV
Dan Trachtenberg’s unique sequel to the found-footage alien film Cloverfield leans just as much into a psychological thriller genre as it does into traditional horror. The story follows Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), who wakes up after a car accident in a bunker with the menacing Howard (John Goodman). Eventually, as she tries to escape, she comes to learn why she cannot go outside.
10 Cloverfield Lane is the second installment in an upcoming series of Cloverfield films produced by J.J. Abrams and serves as an excellent example of a science fiction horror film that finds a unique way to make a story about extraterrestrial attacks feel disturbingly real and immediate. This combination of genres resembles the ways in which Jordan Peele combines elements of comedy, social commentary, and thrills in his films.
Contact (1997)
Stream on Hoopla
Robert Zemeckis’s adaptation of Carl Sagan’s novel finds Dr. Ellie Arroway (Jodie Foster) making contact with extraterrestrial life and decoding its messaging through mathematics and symbols in order to decipher what their true intent is.
Zemeckis opts for a more cerebral and thematic exploration about life beyond Earth rather than hoping to achieve cheaper thrills. Contact asks larger questions about the nature of communication and the conflicts between science and religion. It is likely that Jordan Peele’s Nope will aim for a combination of thrills and thought-provoking subject matter based on the trailers.
Arrival (2016)
Stream on Amazon Prime Video & Paramount+
Another more psychological take on the alien genre and the most recent entry on this list is Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival. Adapted from the short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang, Arrival centers on the recruiting of linguist Dr. Louise Banks (Amy Adams) to help initiate contact and communication with mysterious alien forces.
This film may have a similar premise to Contact, though Villeneuve takes audiences in unexpected directions that build to a shocking twist that makes Arrival highly rewatchable. With a career-best performance by Adams, Arrival is as much an alien film as it is a meditation on themes of the cyclical nature of time and the power of human choice.
District 9 (2009)
Stream on Freevee
This Peter Jackson-produced feature film adaptation of the short film Alive in Joburg follows the detainment and segregation of an alien species in South Africa. District 9 is shot like a documentary and although the alien species certainly do not resemble anything human, there is a hyper-realistic approach to the filmmaking style here.
District 9 surprisingly can draw several comparisons to Jordan Peele’s films in that the director, Neill Blomkamp, uses a supernatural premise to tell a story that reflects human issues. In this case, the themes of District 9 resembles themes of racial segregation and marginalization, with sequences that particularly resemble South African apartheid.
Men in Black (1997)
Stream on DIRECTV, TNT, & TruTV
Barry Sonnenfeld’s action-comedy pairs Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones together as secret agents of a mysterious organization that tracks down and hunts extraterrestrial life in disguise on Earth. The success of Men in Black spawned three more films, including the most recent installment Men in Black: International with Tessa Thompson and Chris Hemsworth.
What sets Men in Black apart from other sci-fi films is its cohesive mixture of action and comedy. In fact, that is precisely what connects it to Jordan Peele’s aesthetic the most. There is always a consistent balance between science fiction sequences and humor. Furthermore, the on-screen chemistry between Smith and Jones is endlessly entertaining.
Close Encounters Of The Third Kind (1977)
Available to Rent on Amazon Prime Video & AppleTV
One of the classic alien films of all time is Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The landmark movie starred Richard Dreyfus as Roy Neary, an Indiana native who forms an obsession with unidentified flying objects after encountering one on his own.
Not only do the cinematography and visual effects of Close Encounters of the Third Kind still hold up today, but the film also explores universal themes of belief in what one witnesses. This is a common recurring theme in alien movies. Although Close Encounters was released the same year as another science fiction epic (Star Wars), it did manage to win two Academy Awards.
Alien (1979)
Stream on Starz & DIRECTV
There is no doubt that when Jordan Peele set out to make a horror film about aliens, he sought out this iconic franchise. The first film in the series follows a space crew awakening in the middle of its trip home to find a nest of eggs containing a mysterious organism on their ship.
Alien launched a successful franchise as well as Sigourney Weaver’s acting career (she would later receive an Oscar nomination for her work in the sequel, Aliens). Whereas other films on extraterrestrial life tend to veer into tangential genres like comedy or psychological thriller, Alien takes its science-fiction premise and leans fully into all the essential elements of the horror genre.
