Jordan Peele's socially-conscious horror hit Get Out will compete at this year's Golden Globes as a comedy. With its thought-provoking - yet still highly entertaining - approach to racial themes, Get Out is the rare genre film that's considered a legitimate awards season contender.

Get Out stars Daniel Kaluuya as Chris, a black man who's consumed with anxiety as he journeys to the depths of the suburbs to meet his white girlfriend's rich parents. Chris soon learns that liberal white people, even the really nice-seeming ones, are much scarier than he ever imagined. Deftly blending thriller elements with hot-button comedy, Get Out was a surprise hit in early 2017, grossing $175 million at the domestic box office.

EW reports that Get Out will push for hardware at this year's Golden Globes by competing as a comedy. Unlike the Oscars, the Golden Globes split the Best Picture and major acting categories into drama and musical/comedy, a set-up that allows non-Oscar-bait genre films a chance to win. Occasionally, the set-up leads to controversy, like two years ago when the decidedly dramatic (and only sporadically sort-of-funny) sci-fi movie The Martian was allowed to compete in the musical/comedy division, winning Best Picture and Best Actor for Matt Damon.

Jordan Peele Directing Get Out

Unlike The Martian, a good case can be made that Get Out actually belongs in the musical/comedy division. Though the movie is in form a thriller, and contains plenty of legitimate scares, there's also a strong comedy element throughout. Much of the movie's success is owed to the deftness with which director Jordan Peele weaves his observational humor throughout the film while still preserving its horror movie essence.

Being considered as a comedy not only gives Get Out a better chance to win at the Golden Globes, it also gives lead actor Daniel Kaluuya a better shot at scoring a Best Actor nomination. The Best Director category is not split into drama and musical/comedy divisions so Jordan Peele gains no advantage there, though he is still thought to have at least an outside shot at making it into the race. It's been a great year for horror overall at the box office, but realistically, Get Out is probably the only one of 2017's many horror hits to have any shot at being acknowledged by either the Golden Globes or Oscars.

Competition should be fierce in this year's Golden Globes musical/comedy division, with movies like The Big Sick, Lady Bird, I, Tonya, and The Disaster Artist all looking at potential nominations. We'll see if competing in the comedy division helps Get Out snag some awards season attention when the Golden Globe nominations are announced on December 11th, 2017.

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Source: EW