The complete cinematic experience
consists of the interaction between the external screen and our internal
emotions. With this spirit, I watched Beasts of the Southern Wild, a visually
enchanting and difficult movie. In it, the apocalyptic photography, the music,
and the sound produce a dreamy dimension. This movie is about being brave,
about desperate love that transcends the boundaries of bodies and spaces. It is
ultimately about the transmission of knowledge from parents to daughter.
The setting is a surreal industrial pre and post Katrina “bathtub.” The leading actor is a child
with the acting skills of Marlon Brando, who carries the audience along the
debris of souls, the shanty and disordered places, and the magic of realism. Hushpuppy
is her name. The movie has few direct dialogues. What we see, hear, and perceive is
through Hushpuppy’s eyes. Some actors are silent throughout the length of the
movie. Some others are the background of a marginal world where children wonder
around and they are always cared as one’s own.
A scene, a joyful break in
the story, reveals a floating world of sex trade, joyful encounters, and
recuperated love. Food, dance, affection surround Hushpuppy and her silent
friends who finally find some peace in the loving harms of “girls girls girls.”
This movie moves at every scene; it embraces the audience. Suddenly the
emotions of impossibility and apparent motionlessness leave the path to
distraction from one's self because stories develop despite and beyond boundaries
and expectations.
