I almost always find myself cheering on any independent films that get nominated for best picture. Beasts of the Southern Wild is that dark horse indie film that has come so far. This is the first feature film directed by Behn Zeitlin (nominated for best director!), and it was made on a budget of only 1.3 million dollars and only had a crew of sixty-five people in a coastal town in Louisiana. It has won numerous awards from various film festivals around the world, including Sundance and Cannes. And now it rightly sits forever as one of the best of the year, competing for four awards at the Oscars, including Best Picture
The story takes place in a disappearing bit land at the southernmost part of Louisiana called The Bathtub. There is a quick explanation, all from the perspective of six year old Hushpuppy (Quvenzhané Wallis), that the ice is melting and causing the water to rise up. The land folks up north have built a levy cutting off everyone down in The Bathtub and society seems to have crumbled into one last mardi gras. Alcohol flows as much as the crawfish and the nights are lit up by fireworks. Hushpuppy thinks they’ve got it best, but all that will change when the water rises.
Hushpuppy seems to know she doesn’t have an easy life. Her mother swam away and now she uses an old Michael Jordan jersey to make-believe she is around. Her father, Wink (Dwight Henry), is trying to protect Hushpuppy as their world becomes more threatened, but his poor health is catching up to him. He has a short fused temper that can be startling, but he and Hushpuppy have some good moments together in his makeshift boat made from the bed of a truck. Most of the time, Hushpuppy is on her own, in this dirty, chaotic, unstructured world. Watching her light the stove could give some parents nightmares, but at least she put on that helmet first.
Quvenzhané Wallis’s performance as Hushpuppy made her the youngest person ever nominated for best actress, at only nine years old. I’m not sure exactly how old Wallis was while filming, but in the film, it doesn’t look like she could be any older than six. It’s amazing how this little girl can look so angry, stoic and naturally wild at times. What I believe earned Wallis this nomination was the way her character is the focus of the film and how she carries that focus so well. While I doubt she will win (the Academy seems to favor the more seasoned), I look forward to the amazing possibilities of Wallis’s career.
Beasts seems to have a beautifully existential core. Even at Hushpuppy’s young age, she is thinking about preserving her life’s story for scientists to discover in the future and students will learn about her. Granted, at one point she is recording her story in crayon drawings on the inside of a cardboard box while the house is on fire, but that’s not the point. She has a surprisingly wise understanding that she is just a small piece in a big universe and that all the pieces have to fit together to make everything work. Ask another child about the universe and you might only get a Lego Star Wars commercial.
Beasts is such a beautifully raw, yet strangely magical film. We get a gritty, yet hopeful story of strong, lackluster people willing to stay and die with their disappearing home, with a feeling of fantasy and folklore mixed in. Really, it’s hard to put into words how wonderful and refreshing this film is, you just have to see it. Believe me, it’s like no film you have ever seen before.
“When it all goes quiet behind my eyes, I see everything that made me flying around in invisible pieces.”
“like no film you have ever seen before.”
Absolutely true. And so cool that it got the Oscar nominations. I was prepared to think that Kara Hayward should have been nominated for Moonrise Kingdom, but now I have no complaints, since, as you say, the Academy tends to favor the more seasoned. If there was only one “really young actress” slot available, it went to the right one. As Hushpuppy would put it, she’s the man.
I too enjoyed Hayward in Moonrise Kingdom, but I never expect Oscar nominations to go to the young ones. Wallis was a pleasant surprise.
I really liked the theme of the movie about Hushpuppy wanting to get her story told. And of course Hushpuppy was awesome.
I’m glad that it got so many nominations, but I’m also sad that it didn’t get nominated for it’s music. It wasn’t until this movie that I was really impressed with any of the soundtracks from 2012, but this one is great. The music in that scene in the beginning with the sparklers was perfect.
I’m really excited to see Wallis and Henry in 12 Years a Slave this year. That should be a great movie.
Ooh, now I’m looking forward to it to!
Nice review. This was a fantastic movie and one of the best films of the year. Quvenzhané Wallis was amazing in her role.
Now a dissenting point of view…and you all are gonna hate me for it. Here’s what I wrote to Netflix after seeing the movie last summer: “Sometimes I think that there is an “Emperor’s-New-Clothes” Syndrome at work in some of these Indie Festivals where a couple people proclaim a work to be “profound”; then others, not wanting to appear to be Philistines, chime in to sing the great virtues of what is really just crap. Though “Beasts” started off promisingly, it soon deteriorated into a presentation of the most revolting collection of people that I’ve seen in film…they mumbled, yowled, and shouted in unintelligible dialects and Sound so poorly done that the whole thing might as well have been done in a foreign language. And what was all the nonsensical editing of the polar caps melting?…I expected Al Gore to come out any minute and deliver a speech to make some sense out of this whole mess! What a bunch of nonsense…and, in the end, it was just boring! I couldn’t wait for it to end. One reviewer mentioned this film in connection with “Tree of Life”. I respectfully disagree…I loved “Tree”; but “Beasts” tried so hard to be artsy that it was merely ridiculous.!” Having said that, I was less than happy about the nominations; however, I put it on my Netflix Queue to give it another chance and see if I was just in a foul mood when I initially saw it. Sorry, this is the one film I just couldn’t get in to.
Ken: Hate you? Because you hold a contrary opinion? What do you think this is, the Internet?
Seriously, one of the things I really liked about it was how the people who refused to evacuate the Bathtub were exactly the people who would have stayed, and who would have escaped when they were taken away. They weren’t romanticized or cleaned up. They seemed very familiar to me. I also enjoyed the tempestuous relationship between Hushpuppy and her father for the same reason.
I do take umbrage at the suggestion that I’m influenced by what’s considered hip at the festivals. The Paul Anderson I revere is the one who makes the Resident Evil films.
I guess I was just trying to understand all the raves about it back in the summer…it always bothers me when folks carry on over a film that does nothing for me…and I really just did not get this one. Will give it another try on Netflix, though I recall that the poor sound and the inability to understand almost anything that was being said was my major sticking point at the time and really ticked me off. Maybe I’ll try watching it with subtitles…
No worries, Ken, to each his own. My husband didn’t really care for this one either, he compared it to Tree of Life in a way you probably wouldn’t favor. I kind of laughed at the random clip of the icecap crumbling into the sea too, like it came out of nowhere! Give it another shot sometime.
I saw this one when it first came out, so it’s been a while (love it, by the way. My second favorite film of the year).
Anyway, maybe I’m not remembering correctly, but aren’t the icecaps melting what releases the Aurochs? I think it’s completely symbolic and not something that actually happens.
I guess it could be interpreted as symbolic, but I took it as a bit of fantasy put in the film. By the way, what was your favorite film of the year?
Les Mis
I’m a sucker for good melodrama and musicals though, so it was kind of tailor-made for people like me.
I watched “Beasts” for the first time half-asleep midway through a 10-hour flight, dozing off occasionally. Highly recommended approach! The film’s hypnotic images and voice over carries nicely into very vivid dreams. Upon watching it again and with a clearer mind, the flaws in the script come through a bit better, but I still appreciate the willingness to make an unconventional and heartfelt film. Just checked, seems still to be one of my favourite 2012 releases. My comments: http://thomas4cinema.wordpress.com/2012/11/04/beasts-of-the-southern-wild-benh-zeitlin-2012/
Wow, falling asleep and letting Beasts slip into your subconscious sounds like fun. That happened to me the first time I saw 2001: A Space Odyssey, though not on a plane.
I was about to ask what kind of flight you were on that was showing 2001!
Pingback: » Movie Review – Beasts Of The Southern Wild Fernby Films