Grade: B
Beast of No Nation opens up to an image of innocence living restlessly in the shadow of war. Young Agu (Abraham Atta) and his friends are attempting to sell an old, screenless television frame, pitching it as “imagination tv” and performing for potential buyers so that they may get money or food.
The people are not content to live in a buffer zone, but live on they must. It is a neutral town where government and rebel military forces are not allowed to enter, so it attracts a number of refugees and an incredibly tense atmosphere.
We are later introduced to Agu’s family in a montage of funny moments and intimate scenes that meander on as if the world isn’t about to implode at any moment. When that moment comes, it happens seemingly overnight, and Agu is soon forced to become a child soldier after civil war tears apart his family in West Africa.
Once the National Reformation Council and its government military forces enter the buffer zone, Agu’s village is forced to send all of its women and children away while the men stay and protect their ancestors’ territory.
Agu is meant to go with his mother and little sister to live with his aunt. However, as it often happens in movies, even the best laid plans fall apart. Idris Elba (Thor) adds some star power to a cast full of newcomers and unknown talent. He plays the Commandant of a rebel militia that aspires to be General, and recruits Agu as the boy finds himself lost in the jungle and struggling to survive.
The Commandant is deceptively charming and power hungry, taking advantage of the boys in more ways than one. “A boy have eyes to see, a boy has hands to strangle and fingers to pull triggers,” He preaches when he first comes across Agu.
His philosophy is a brutally honest one:even children have the potential to be molded into monsters, killers. He demonstrates this over the course of Agu’s journey, turning a reluctant and orphaned soul into a sadistic boy soldier through the incentives of empowerment and greed.
For an unrated movie on Netflix, it isn’t as gratuitous with its violence as one would expect. However, that does not necessarily mean that the director, Cary Joji Fukunaga, shies away from it. Be warned, there are depictions of child molestation, children killing children, and general mayhem and war violence.
Fukunaga delivers a colorful, heart pounding, tense, and claustrophobic war drama although often time it feels that both the direction of the film and the characters are unclear. The closing act is one of resolution. Agu must reconcile the things that he has done and confront his future, although it is difficult for him to understand the concept of childhood as it once was.
One of the unique things about this film is that it was distributed under the Netflix Original umbrella, while simultaneously being released in a select number of theaters. Its theater presence hinges partly on Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos’ having award season ambitions.
For a while now, they have been working to produce original content in the hopes that they can be strong awards season contenders. For the most part, their TV shows haven’t had much trouble pulling nominations (see Orange is the New Black and House of Cards) but their films are another beast entirely.
Beasts of No Nation is an experiment of sorts to test whether or not something like that is possible. It started streaming on October 16; I strongly encourage you to watch it while it is still available.
Zhana Johnson
Senior Features Editor
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