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Since Golden Globe and Oscar seasons are just around the corner, I'm sticking to fairly recent films for right now. But because of my rampant ADD and the fact that I just try to see a whole lot of movies, these posts will not really be in any kind of order. I know that's unkind of me to do to my readers, but thankfully Blogger has provided a lovely search bar for your convenience if you are looking for a specific film or year.
Beasts of the Southern Wild centers around a six-year-old girl, Hushpuppy (Quvenzhané Wallis), who lives with her emotionally unstable father Wink (Dwight Henry) in an isolated but stubbornly existent (and supposedly fictitious) bayou community called the Bathtub (a euphemism for something?). Hushpuppy believes strongly that everything in the universe is balanced until a storm hits, shaking both her and her father's reality. Wanting to return some balance to her still small but ironically enormously vast world and save her ailing father, as Rotten Tomatoes puts it, "this tiny hero must learn to survive unstoppable disasters of epic proportions."
OTHER CAST MEMBERS: Lowell Landes, Levy Easterly, Pamela Harper, Gina Montana, Amber Henry
I would have made up something for that last bit myself, but I thought Rotten Tomatoes worded it too well. :)
I'd been hearing a lot about this movie because I am a HUGE awards show junkie, particularly when it comes to movies. I love the Golden Globes and I love the Oscars. I've been scanning the predictions for both rather feverishly of late, and my initial intent for that was to see whether the experts thought Jennifer Lawrence or Jessica Chastain would get the Best Actress Oscar this year (for the record, I want it very badly to be Jennifer. Then again, I'm biased. She's my all-time favorite actress, of course I want her to get it. But I digress). Almost every site I went to spoke of those two most highly, but I also came across many positive responses to this movie, particularly about Quvenzhané Wallis's performance. I was impressed, because the Academy doesn't nominate very young actors too often, and the fact that these experts were seriously talking about her receiving nominations for the film successfully turned my head. So then it got added to my Rotten Tomatoes want-to-see list (fun fact about me: there are about 479 movies on that list I have yet to see. I have a busy few years ahead of me! :)).
I'm never sure what to expect with these kinds of movies (the kind that my parents are disinterested in and the kind that leave my sisters baffled when I say I like them, or "artsy/boring" movies). I had never heard of Benh Zeitlin, never heard of Lucy Alibar's play Juicy and Delicious (which the film was based on), and I had certainly never heard of Wallis before. I climbed into this southern wild having no idea what I was in for.
Needless to say, I was entranced and inspired by Beasts.
It's a very gritty movie, to be sure. There's a certain toughness and relentlessness about it that draws you to it in a weird way. But after the first few minutes, you can't help but be interested.
Hushpuppy sets the scene for us in a colorful and imaginative way as she narrates. For a six-year-old, she is very smart, and her destitute environment suggests that she has had to grow up before her time. But underneath all of her physical and emotional toughness, there is still a child's mind. I just thought that was so beautiful. She listens to heartbeats; of animals, of people. She feels the throbbing yet steady pulse of the universe within her, and it bursts with color and life in her thoughts. It is such a feat to create this character who has an adult's strength but a child's heart and mind. The irony in this is that Wink, who goes from joking around to slapping his daughter in the space of seconds, acts very much the same. Physically he is an adult, but emotionally and mentally he is still very much a child. Hushpuppy and her father pay over and over for this character flaw of his, but it doesn't at any point feel like a burden that Hushpuppy does not feel she can carry. Her character has that much strength. She is not without her flaws, but Hushpuppy has got one wonderful little head on her broad shoulders.
Another irony that I found to be strong is that when Wink is not yelling at Hushpuppy or hitting her, he is teaching her how to survive; showing her how to grab a fish from the water, arm wrestling, beasting a crab (tearing it open with your bare hands instead of using a knife). He tells her she needs to be strong if he is ever gone. In both ways he has toughened her, though the latter is a bit more humane than the former. It is clear that Wink suffers greatly, another burden which Hushpuppy seems to have no trouble carrying most of the time. It's unbelievable that a six-year-old could take on so much, and Wallis makes us believe that she can.
One of the many powerful scenes is when Wink's life is slowly slipping away, he tells Hushpuppy not to cry. And that little powerhouse of a girl keeps her stone face, tears streaming down it as she repeats "Don't cry."
I'm already a bit overemotional when it comes to movies, so I definitely teared up a bit.
Now the "beasts" of the southern wild, called Aurochs, are an enigma, mostly because it is never specified whether or not they are real. Hushpuppy certainly suggests that they are real creatures, but it is confusing once the audience sees their physical form. We are in Hushpuppy's mind, so it is still unclear.
The poverty exhibited in the Bathtub is a very real-feeling kind; it grips and clings to a world that is trying to forget about them, makes itself known when it feels it is not being heard. Such is the personality of many in the community, omit Hushpuppy. Personally I wondered if Wink had some kind of "God complex" where he thought he could control the weather by firing his gun up into storm clouds or yelling at the storm itself.
But I found that the poverty theme was very strong and it moved me more than I thought it was going to. It has the same kind of desperate mood that real-life poverty seems to.
I feel I should explain the reason I found this movie so inspiring, since so far it seems rather bleak. It is, a little, but the pulse of the universe that Hushpuppy feels seems to resonate with us too, in a way. In the middle of all the ugliness of her environment, she finds beauty.
I really like the music of this movie, which was done by Benh Zeitlin and Dan Romer. It fit the tone of it perfectly; loud, present, gritty, desperate, but hopeful and jubilant. And when it plays to bring in the end credits, you can't help but feel an odd sense of joy and wonder. Yes, it's a tiny independent film with a tiny hero, but the imagination and the message are anything but tiny.
Image Source: Wordever
Despite the poverty and weight she carries, Hushpuppy gives the audience a sense of hope in a desperate, grimy world. And you can't help but feel inspired by her strength.
GRADE: A
RATING: PG-13 for thematic material including child imperilment, some disturbing images, language and brief sensuality
Beasts of the Southern Wild (Trailer)
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