Us focuses on the Wilson family and how their vacation in Santa Monica gets turned on its head in the most unexpected way: by their eerie-looking doppelgangers. 

Opening Scenes and Beginning of Movie

The opening scene begins with a close-up of a commercial for the cause of “Hands Across America,” which is a 4,000-mile-long chain of so-called Good Samaritans that are tethered standing hand in hand across the U.S. to fight world hunger. The use of the word tether is an important word choice because this word becomes a center point for the plot of the movie and although the viewer doesn’t know it yet this commercial is foreshadowing some of the main points of the movie. Next in the next scene, we are met with one of the main characters, Adelaide, as a young girl at Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk in 1986. Adelaide begins to wander off by herself and happens upon a funhouse that has an eerie vibe to it. As she’s walking through the funhouse she comes to a hall of mirrors and walks right into another young girl, except there’s one catch: she looks exactly like her, and she is not a reflection

Middle Plot of the Movie

Next, we are introduced to Adelaide in the present day as a grown woman with her husband and two kids. The family goes on vacation in Santa Cruz and they venture to the Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk, and although Adelaide is hesitant to go at first she reluctantly agrees. After the family gets back to their vacation home Adelaide displays an uneasiness about something watching her. She becomes paranoid that she doesn’t feel like herself and that her past trauma of seeing her doppelganger has come back to haunt her. Her son then tells her that there is a family standing hand in hand in their driveway, and it turns out to be the entire family’s doppelgangers. The doppelgangers’ motives are ones of revenge for Adelaide’s doppelganger who has been forced to mimic the real Adelaide’s life. Adelaide’s doppelganger, given the name Red, calls herself a tethered version of the real Adelaide. The doppelganger family continues to terrorize and wreak havoc on the family throughout the movie. The doppelgangers of the family have an eerie and creepy presence as their weapon of choice throughout the movie is a pair of scissors, and their look is disheveled in an unsettling way and this helps the viewer feel what the real family is feeling. The acting in this movie was phenomenal and the element of pure terror that Adelaide had felt leading up to and during her doppelganger’s revenge was portrayed greatly. Red’s motives throughout the movie are pure envy for Adelaide’s life above ground, and this envy spirals out of control and the borderline insanity consumes Red in the creepy way that horror movie fans love.

Plot Twist and Overall Opinion

There is an unexpected and mind-bending plot twist at the end of the movie that I will not reveal, however, there was much subtle foreshadowing that hinted at how the movie was going to end, and looking back on the movie as a whole it was hard to wrap my head around how the ending affected the plot and motives of Red as the movie progressed. The creepy feeling and manic-like envy portrayed in this movie was amazing I love horror movies and this was one of my favorites, so if I had to rate it out of 10 I would give it a 10/10. I would recommend this movie to anyone looking for a psychological thriller with a mysterious dramatic twist or for any horror movie lovers out there.