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Beasts of the Southern Wild is now out on DVD and BluRay; I did not have a chance to see it in theaters (because life) but was able to screen it in a quasi-theatrical environment last night. I recommend it. It's a well-realized piece of near-future science fiction; I think some reviewers were blinded to this by a gloss of magic realism, but those fantasy elements are a product of the seven-year-old narrator, who has not yet learned the difference between figurative and literal language and therefore takes statements like "she's so hot she makes water boil" as fact (in ways reminiscent of Tarsem's The Fall). As science fiction, it takes a refreshingly local viewpoint rather than trying to give you a planetary perspective (which Ciro has noted places it in the incredibly small category of post-colonial SF).
If the subject line didn't clue you in, what follows is not going to be a movie review; it's going to be a critical literary analysis that assumes you've seen the film and are aware of trends in SF publishing. (This is the only way to examine SF in film, because most "science fiction" films are to science fiction what sword-and-sandals epics are to Roman history.) It will also compare the film with sometimes unpublished writing by me, Ciro, and Val, because we have a particular philosophical and stylistic orientation that is unusual but is also (obviously, I would think) the way I believe things ought to be written, for reasons that will be explored below. As such, I apologize if it's impenetrable in some places to all but a few people (who conveniently make up the majority of known readers of this blog).
For everybody else, the capsule movie review: Worth seeing. Good visual sense. Nice use of 35mm. Excellent practical effects. Compelling setting. Sympathetic and well-drawn characters with strong performances across the board, especially Dwight Henry's deep, complex, and egoless performance as the father. I have seen acting I could set beside his performance as equal, but I have not seen acting that is better. Humbling.
( Onward! )
If the subject line didn't clue you in, what follows is not going to be a movie review; it's going to be a critical literary analysis that assumes you've seen the film and are aware of trends in SF publishing. (This is the only way to examine SF in film, because most "science fiction" films are to science fiction what sword-and-sandals epics are to Roman history.) It will also compare the film with sometimes unpublished writing by me, Ciro, and Val, because we have a particular philosophical and stylistic orientation that is unusual but is also (obviously, I would think) the way I believe things ought to be written, for reasons that will be explored below. As such, I apologize if it's impenetrable in some places to all but a few people (who conveniently make up the majority of known readers of this blog).
For everybody else, the capsule movie review: Worth seeing. Good visual sense. Nice use of 35mm. Excellent practical effects. Compelling setting. Sympathetic and well-drawn characters with strong performances across the board, especially Dwight Henry's deep, complex, and egoless performance as the father. I have seen acting I could set beside his performance as equal, but I have not seen acting that is better. Humbling.
( Onward! )
