Powerful, Necessary, Distressing, and Cannot be Recommended Under Good Conscience Even Though it's an Amazing Movie

Rating: 10/10 (5 December 2015)

Reviewed by: Dare Devil Kid (DDK)
Rating: 4.9/5 stars
"Beasts of No Nation" finds writer-director Cary Fukunaga working with a talented cast to offer a sobering, uncompromising, yet somehow hopeful picture of war's human cost. It's a heartbreaking drama that's hard, very depressing, touches on a controversial subject, but still manages to reward its audience. Yes, the film is a very hard watch, and there's some shocking brutality, but it's also extremely pertinent in today's times, exploring an eye-opening subject matter with clear thinking and respect for the complexities of the psychological damage done.
In an unnamed West African nation, the life of young Agu (Abraham Attah) is disrupted when his father and brother are slaughtered in a civil war, and he's separated from his mother and infant sister. After barely escaping with his life from the regime's military, Agu is involuntarily inscripted as a child soldier into a militia faction led by the sadistic Commandant (Idris Elba).
Fukunaga gives the film a visual grandeur that makes it feel like it's taking place after the world has ended, and all that's left for Agu, our unwitting protagonist, is this morass of endless, uncaring violence. The story, which is about just one of the 300,000 child solders currently exploited in combat worldwide, is given the necessary emotional heft and demands our undivided attention largely in part to the child actor and newcomer Abraham Attah who's an absolute wonder to behold. But if there's one actor on display who completely steals the show and chews up the scenery of every scene he's in, it's undoubtedly Idris Elba who metes out a high-powered and shockingly charismatic performance (given the circumstances) as the menacing militia warlord that has "Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor" written all over it.
"Beasts of No Nation" is one of the most harrowing, mind-numbing, and emotionally draining war movies I've seen â€“ powerful and devastating to equal effect, showing us the horror humankind can commit through the eyes of a kid that's lost his innocence. Cary Fukunaga's direction and the performances by Idris Elba and the new kid, Abraham Attah, knock it out of the park. Perhaps, the most chilling thing about this child soldiers' eye view of Africa's endless civil wars is how unsurprising it all is amidst the savagery and emotions it engulfs us in.