Fiction

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Benh Zeitlin
USA 2011
92 min
V'12

Benh Zeitlin’s short film, GLORY AT SEA, rendered post-Katrina grief with an overwhelming sense of magic realism. BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD, his feature-length debut, contains much of the same thing. Zeitlin’s lavish setting is an imaginary community called “The Bathtub” off the coast of Southern Louisiana, where a six-year-old African-American girl named Hushpuppy (a stunningly committed performance from newcomer Quvenzhané Wallis) lives on the swampier side of a levee with her strict father Wink, who relishes his daughter with hyperbolic tales of her absent mother. As Wink suffers from a terminal illness, Hushpuppy's reality gradually dissolves, a transition Zeitlin renders with a fantastic eye for natural wonder. The whole movie inhabits Hushpuppy’s outlook, as she listens to those around her and draws colorful conclusions. (Eric Kohn) 

Credits
  • Quvenzhané Wallis - Hushpuppy
  • Dwight Henry - Wink
  • Lowell Landes - Walrus
  • Levy Easterly - Jean-Battiste
  • Lucy Alibar
  • Benh Zeitlin
  • Ben Richardson
  • Steve Boeddeker
  • Affonso Gonçalves
  • Crockett Doob
  • Dan Romer
  • Benh Zeitlin
  • Alex DiGerlando
  • Stephani Lewis
Cinereach, Journey Man Pictures, Court 13

Entertainment One Films International

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