REVIEW: Beasts of the Southern Wild

There are no spoilers in this review.

PLOT: Faced with her father's fading health and environmental changes that release an army of prehistoric creatures called aurochs, six-year-old Hushpuppy leaves her Delta-community home in search of her mother.


THE GOOD: Story. Beasts of the Southern Wild was the most talked about film at Sundance this year. It's co-writer and director Benh Zeitlin's first feature film and its success has been outstanding. It snagged the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, as well as the Golden Space Needle Award at SIFF, the Audience Award at L.A. Film Festival, and four other important awards at Cannes. After the immediate positive reaction, Beasts shot straight up to the top of my most anticipated list. I can safely tell you that the movie is indeed most excellent and it is largely due to its completely unique and compelling story. I say this every time, but if you have an original and fresh story, I will like your film. Beasts of the Southern Wild's story is so much more than its simple premise. A little girl named Hushpuppy lives with her dad in what looks and feels like another world, called "the Bathtub." Picture Where the Wild Things Are, but more trashy and desolate. The movie transports you into this place and you quickly feel like you are actually there. Hushpuppy's father is all about strengthening her so that she will be able to take care of herself when he is no longer there to protect her. It's an absolutely touching story that you can't really share with younger kids, but they'll probably appreciate it later in life.

lol... that's not how you drive truck!

Acting. For a cast of no-namers, there are so strong performances in this movie. Quvenzhané Wallis was only five years old when they cast this film and she looks like she has been doing this for years. Dwight Henry, who has never been in a film before, masterfully plays her dad, Wink. In fact, he owns and runs a bakery and cafe in New Orleans and had to audition in the evenings after work. The supporting cast is also fascinating as they feel like real people who would live in the Bathtub.

Music. Zeitlin worked with Dan Romer on the music for Beasts. While I will give some critics credit in claiming that the music steers your emotions a tad too much, I think that it's very well-written and performed.

Themes and symbolism. Beasts of the Southern Wild is mostly about loss and how we deal with it. Loss of home, loss of loved ones, loss of a life that once was... it's all in there. In the movie, the characters are aware of a storm coming and you can see the parallels to some of the events from our world. Thankfully, the movie is never descriptive enough to pinpoint what exactly it's trying to convey, but you can easily make all sort of comparisons from global warming to Hurricane Katrina. The movie is not afraid to attempt to ask the big questions in life. Much like religion, it tackles these subjects and tries to give us a good idea on how we should live our lives.

Location and camera work. Filming of the movie took place in the Katrina-ravaged bayous of Louisiana. It really lends itself to the otherworldly qualities of the movie. Another quality that brought realism to the film was the cinéma vérité style of shooting. This is an example of when this style works; not The Hunger Games! Cinematographer Ben Richardson won the Cinematography Award at Sundance for this. I'm not sure how much I can agree on that though. Richardson and the producers of Beasts chose to shoot with film rather than go digital. Sometimes this worked to their advantage like in the darker shots, but for the most part, I thought it was super grainy in many instances. If this was an artistic choice, I would have totally gone along with it, but I think it's simply a lack of experience on Richardson's part.

lol... that's not how you eat shrimp.

THE BAD: Nothing.


THE END: I might have pumped up my anticipation for Beasts of the Southern Wild too much before seeing it. I loved it and it'll likely be a strong contender in my top movies of the year, but I feel like there's one thing missing. Obviously I don't know what it is and I'm completely open to discussion on this. Maybe the message isn't quite as moving as I wanted it to be. No matter what though, Beasts is a movie that you must see if you like indie films. It's a great first film by Zeitlin and I'm curious to see what else he might have up his sleeve.


DISCUSS: What did you think of Beasts of the Southern Wild? When did you first hear about it? What did you think of the acting, music, and camera work? What other parallels and messages did you find in the movie?

 lol... that's not how you look at pigs.