Beasts Of Southern Wild Blu-Ray Review

It's awards season and with all the big-name prestige pics like Lincoln, Zero Dark Thirty and Movie 43 elbowing each other for the spotlight, it's easy to miss this one, despite it being up for Best Picture. Beasts of the Southern Wild (not to be confused with Breasts of the Southern Wild, a DVD that probably already exists) has been nominated for 4 Oscars, including Lead Actress for 9 year old Quvenzhané Wallis, who has become the youngest actress to ever be up for the award. Unfortunately, I don't think BotSW will win much, but then again, it ain't all about awards is it?

Beasts of the Southern Wild is the story of 5 year old Hushpuppy (Quvenzhané Wallis), an imaginative child who acts as our narrator as she relays her life in The Bathtub, a Louisiana bayou community cut off from the mainland by a levee. We see her deal with her temperamental father, Wink (Dwight Henry) and threats that may change life in The Bathtub forever.

On the surface, BotSW is exactly the sort of film you'd expect an Oscar outsider to be. We have an innocent child narrator, a portrayal of a way of life free of modern toss like Facebook notifications, council tax and iPad minis and a fantastical edge to it all,giving everything a dream-like quality. With all those elements in play, you would be forgiven for rolling your eyes and rewatching the first Transformers film. BotSW is better than the sum of its parts though. Firstly, we have an amazing and naturalistic central performance from Quvenzhané Wallis, who carries the film on her small shoulders. I think she may be the best child actor I've ever seen. Hushpuppy is a firecracker, going from daydreaming her way around the farm to scowling like a caged beast. Her relationship with Wink is fantastically done and genuinely touching. Wink is quick to anger and aloof at times, but undeniably cares about Hushpuppy. Dwight Henry keeps the character always teetering on the brink of struggling father and unfeeling arsehole, but never tips over. There's a fantastic scene where Wink runs out into torrential rain, blasting his shotgun and yelling in an effort to pick a fight with the storm to allay Hushpuppy's fears. Wink's a complex man who will have you questioning just how to react to him throughout the course of the film.

The lyrical quality of the language used is the first thing that struck me about the film. As soon as the film opens, we see Hushpuppy listening to various animals' heartbeats, with her voiceover saying: “All the time, everywhere, everything's hearts are beating and squirting, and talking to each other the ways I can't understand. Most of the time they probably be saying: “I'm hungry”, or “I gotta poop”. But sometimes they be talkin' in codes.” There's something about it that makes the dialogue a joy to listen to and gives it the ability to blindside you with some truly affecting bits, especially when Hushpuppy is trying to deal with and explain some big concepts. There's a real sense of impending doom that hangs over Hushpuppy's head and therefore the film.

I suppose if I had to criticise the film, I'd say it's pretty heavy-handed with both the drama and its overall messages at times. There are some moments that are really effective and are guaranteed to make you think. However, there are others that over-egg the drama so much that it broke my immersion. These aren't glaring flaws though. Just little anomalous bits that didn't fit in with the rest of the film. It's worth saying that the cinematography of this film is beautiful. Marvel at some of the images here. Just wow.

I really enjoyed Beasts of the Southern Wild. It's a well told story relayed to us by the most kick-ass kid ever. I'd love for her to win the Oscar. It may even restore my faith in the overblown Academy. Anyway- highly recommended.

Ben Browne

★★★★☆

Rating: 12
DVD/BD Release Date:11th February 2013 (UK)
Director: Benh Zeitlin
Cast: Quvenzhané Wallis, Dwight Henry, Levy Easterly
Buy  Beasts Of The Southern Wild: Blu-ray / DVD

Beasts of the Southern Wild Coming Home This February

Following a theatrical opening to tremendous national and international acclaim, and winner of a multitude of prestigious awards including the coveted Sutherland Award at the London Film Festival for most original and imaginative feature debut, BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD set the world alight with its heart-tugging, emotionally charged magic, and will finally be available to own on DVD/Blu-ray from February 11th, 2013.

In a forgotten but defiant bayou community cut off from the world by a sprawling levee, six-year-old Hushpuppy exists on the brink of orphanhood. Her mother long gone, and her father Wink, a wild-man on a perpetual spree, Hushpuppy is left to her own devices on an isolated compound filled with semi-feral animals. She perceives the natural world to be a fragile web of living, breathing, squirting things, in which the entire universe depends on everything fitting together just right. So when a hundred year storm raises the waters around her town, her daddy is suddenly stricken with illness, and fierce pre-historic creatures awaken from their frozen graves to come charging across the planet, Hushpuppy sees the natural order of everything she holds dear collapsing around her.

Desperate to repair the structure of her world in order to save her ailing father and sinking home, this tiny hero must learn to survive an unstoppable catastrophe of epic proportions.

Including an exciting host of extra bonus features, experience the magic at home with the captivating and charismatic Hushpuppy, who lives with her daddy at the edge of the world.

DVD/ Blu-Ray extras:

• Making Of, 
• Casting, 
• Deleted Scenes with Director’s Commentary, 
• Award-Winning Short Film Glory at Sea, 
• Trailer

DVD Tech specs: Cert: 12 / Feature Running Time: 90 min approx / Region 2 / Feature Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 / Colour PAL / Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1 & Stereo 2.0 / English language /

BLU-RAY Tech specs: Cert: 12 / Feature Running Time: 93 min approx / Region B / Audio: 2.0 LPCM / Feature Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 / Colour / Audio: DTS HD master / English language /



Pre-order/Buy Beasts Of Southern Wild: DVD / Blu-ray

Beast Of Southern Wild Review

Having spent the majority of 2012 hovering up accolades at numerous worldwide festivals, Beasts of the Southern Wild arrives in blighty to compete for yet another award at the London Film Festival (the Sutherland award for first feature) before its general release on Friday. Seen as one of the trending ‘green issue’ films when it premiered at Sundance in January, Benh Zeitlin’s is a startlingly assured debut and one that will mark him out for bigger projects and budgets.

His take on the environmental issue is not littered with numbers or facts choosing instead to go for the emotional jugular, hitting his mark with a near folkloric tale of 6 year-old Hushpuppy and her sick yet strong father Wink…yes the names are a bit much. The two live in ‘the bathtub’; a flood risk plain of the southern delta of America and home to a drinking rabble of idealists, drop-outs and elderly couples all instilled with a joire de vive that allows them to celebrate rather than fear their unusual homeland.

Zeitlin plunges us into the mud, dirt and maggots of the bathtub and all its creatures – human, farmyard and sea, unafraid of getting our fingers dirty. This living, breathing squalor lies alone, cut off from the mainland by a great barrier allowing Zeitlin to create an almost mythical community detached from the worries of ours and fill it instead with a world of magical realism and no little style.

Hushpuppy’s near Buddhist take on the Universe being a finely balanced place dependent on ‘everything fitting together jus right’ creates a heartbeat for the film – one made overt with the throbbing pulses of the many creatures held to Hushpuppy’s ear. It’s when a storm threatens to ruin her homeland for good that the earths impact starts to turn her zen like view into a tale of survival. The weather turns, water rises and Hushpuppy is quickly forced to make the most of the skills her ailing father has taught her. Brought with it are the beasts of the title; pre-historic giant boars set free from their ice-capped tombs and free to plunder all before them.

The inevitable backlash may already be underway – the vague, poetic one-line musing narration, elements of poverty porn and the music video qualities of the pre-credit sequence all feeling the ire of some but there is far too much wonder in the whole to focus on the minute. The sense of community in the bathtub may not ring particularly true but it’s one conjured up with real affection. Beautifully lit and photographed, this rough and ready backdrop becomes a character of its own as, aided by his own score, Zeitlin successfully creates a tone unseen in American cinema away from a Terrence Malick film.

Much of the plaudits are coming the way of 8 year old star Quavenzhane Wallis, with talk already turning to a possible Oscar nod – an understandable if slightly knee-jerk reaction to the capabilities of a minor holding her own in such an inventive film. Surely, however, much of the praise must be attributed to Zeitlin himself. He has crafted a visionary, rich and warm feature that belies his relative novice and, in the shadow of Katrina’s clouds, forced an issue as important as environmental concerns almost subliminally into screens around the globe.

Matthew Walsh

★★★★½

Rating: 12A
Release Date: 19th October 2012 (UK&Ireland)
Directed by: Benh Zeitlin
Cast: Quvenzhané Wallis, Dwight Henry, Levy Easterly