Beast Beast

It's a regular American high school. Krista is fun-loving theater student. Adam loves guns and wants to do a YouTube channel. Nito is a nice skateboarder who is befriended by some petty delinquents.

The young cast grows on me. I really like Krista and Nito as characters. There is a simple reality and sweet charm to their relationship. Adam reminds me of Gus Van Sant's Elephant (2003) and that is a mixed blessing. In a way, his life is a matter of the audience's opinion. Ultimately, this movie may have a message but it's not for everyone. The last section with Krista is a little contrived. All in all, I do love Krista and Nito. I understand the idea of Adam. I love the reality of this world and it's never not compelling.

Beast Beast is a visceral experience from an exciting new voice in cinema. It's a gem of a film that grabs your attention from the exiting first shot to the cathartic last. Every few years a film comes along that speaks to the youth of today, Beast Beast is not just an exhilarating movie about high school but a deeper look into the American psyche.

It's at times deeply unnerving and other times exhilarating. Danny Madden has made a film that is atmospherically superb. The cast is all around excellent. You feel for these characters. Your emotions are earned. Don't miss it!

I am "old school" where content was about what was actually in it, not the quality of the message surrounding it. The buzz here is that Shirley Chen's natural exuberance highlights an authentic film about authentic teenagers, yada, yada. No, not really. Chen is hi-energy, but the director has her spending most of her time scrunching up her face. Not exactly Oscar material. The real giveaway however is the sound track which, for most of the film, plays ominous "clanging" noises in the background, the kind of noise you might expect in a horror film, not a teen drama. That's the key. All in all, just a big setup for a woke film on gun control, everything else is just window dressing.

A teen story with two subplots; a skater w/exceptional parkour skills is used by his friends to do some petty theft crimes. He also has a love interest in a drama student. This fills, often boringly, most of the movie. In the other main character we have a socially isolated, social-media, internet-posting, gun loving teen w/some family issues. His weapons & hunting prowess leads us to the climax.

Not a good flow to our storyline & ended up ff through a lot of it.

This is a first-time feature for the writer-director who had done 'shorts'. For a first-timer it is an excellent effort. When compared to more accomplished filmmakers it is certainly at least one notch down, maybe a couple of notches.

Generally about the Gen Z kids and their struggles coping with school and growing up, the most interesting character is a 24-yr old who has decided on a career making videos available online and getting revenue from the numbers of hits, 'likes', and advertising revenue. His subject is guns and calls his channel "Prime Shooter."

My wife and I watched it at home on DVD from our public library. It has a raw realism to it and we often puzzled why some characters behaved the way they did. Overall a suitably interesting 85 minutes. Filmed mostly in Georgia, outside Atlanta.