Review of Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) by Seancriswell — 27 Nov 2012

This is a film that is very hard to unwrap in a short, written review. There is a lot to engage you and ponder after, and in that regard I think this is a film that I will revisit and talk about many years down the road.

I was surprised at how little of the fantasy that I have heard so much about made up very little of this film. I do think this is probably a good thing, this movie at its heart is about poverty. It paints a very painful picture of the people who live in this area called The Bathtub.

There are many layers to both the characters in this film and their story arcs. I believe the performances to a person were solid if not spectacular. I am reluctant to say that this film looks amazing, because the world that the director builds is so dreary and depressing.

However he conveys this perfectly and to me that means this film looks amazing. As with a lot of movies it seems that in the last half hour the director is unsure of how to end his story, so some things end up going on that may make you shrug a bit.

The scene with our protagonist on a boat is probably my favorite in the entire film and since this is very close to the end I think the story did a decent job of giving us something to hold on to. This is a must see and it will be interesting to see where this film maker goes from here.