Review of Wildlife (2018) by Belous — 12 Nov 2018

Uncertain. It is the only word that comes to my mind as I try to describe this movie using one word. But it is uncertain not in a bad way, it is uncertain in a very positive way. This flick makes you think deeply about things during its runtime. After moving to the other city not everything for the Brinsons goes smoothly as they would want it. They face the job loss of the head of the family, Jerry, and at the same time his wife, Jannet, finds a new love interest. But the one who suffers most of all is their fourteen year old son Joe. The future of the heroes is very uncertain and this feeling transcends beyond the screen. There is no “black” or “white”, only “grey”. No winners, no losers, only the hurt ones. No wrong, no right, only raw wild humanity.

From a technical point of view I can point out to three things: the acting, the camera work and the soundtrack. Acting of the main actors makes you believe in what you see and feel the emotions of the characters. And here the acting meets the camera work. The movie is full of close ups of characters’ faces, even in the scenes with two or more of them. That gives you a closer look at their eyes and facial expressions which creates tension and depressing atmosphere in some moments. It is one of the camera work methods, another one is the movement of the camera. At first, it doesn’t move at all, there are mainly still shots, but closer to the end the camera starts to shake, letting us know about the unstable situation in the family. I don’t want to say much about the music, it is simply there, creating a very beautiful and sometimes very eloquent background.

It is very difficult to make conclusions about the “uncertainty” of this film. Everything is good about it, you don’t want to nitpick about it, but also you don’t want to talk much about it. It is one of those movies that you recommend to your friends and close ones, and will surely re-watch it yourself one day, but you don’t have any desire to speak up about it. On the other hand, it is the film that you would definitely want to discuss with someone, as the movie doesn’t sort things out by itself, it is left up to the viewer.