Directed by:
Baltasar KormákurScreenplay:
Ryan EngleCinematography:
Philippe RousselotComposer:
Steven PriceVOD (4)
Plots(1)
Dr. Nate Samuels is a recently widowed husband who returns to South Africa, where he first met his wife, on a long-planned trip with their daughters to a game reserve. But what begins as a journey of healing jolts into a fearsome fight for survival when a lion, a survivor of blood-thirsty poachers who now sees all humans as the enemy, begins stalking them. (Universal Pictures US)
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Reviews (8)
A stereotypical survival drama that gets plus points for the lion, but otherwise doesn't score that much. The visuals of the predator are not impressive, the suspense didn't work for me, and there's a drastic lack of a strong enough background for the main character to make the viewer care about him at least in part. It doesn't offend, but I was expecting a more polished ride with more genre fun or innovation.
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Kormákur has always struck me as a more or less competent director who doesn't really care what he's making. This time, however, Beast is just a sometimes unbearably silly B-movie, where you might still enjoy the ultra-long shots that the film is composed of and how difficult they must have been to execute, assuming you could tell they were difficult to execute. Instead, virtually any potential technical problem in a scene is solved here with post-production effects or scenes made entirely of CGI, which of course look terrible. Idiotic B-movies can be fun in that you occasionally think "how the hell did they do that?", "how many times did they have to shoot that?", or "I'm surprised that actor didn't get hurt." When the challenges are solved by computer, all that's left is the idiocy.
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A decent survival flick with lions in the Savannah. If you accept the fact that Beast is a horror B-movie with no higher ambitions, serving only as a survival action/thriller with a bloodthirsty lion, it can be reliably enjoyed. If you start addressing the script – is anyone really addressing the script here? really? Only an intellectual brat can expect twists and turns and a compelling plot here. That sometimes someone doesn't act logically? Well, kids don't think, they act, and not everyone is logical, so I find these criticisms completely silly and irrelevant, but back to the film. It starts slower and gradually introduces us to the main characters. I appreciate the fact that there are not a bunch of stupid teenagers, but a family with a father and two daughters, whom the viewer can root for far more than annoying teens, plus Idris Elba is a likeable doctor, so he knows what to do in a situation like this probably more than any of the grumbling viewers, and Sharlto Copley as a zoologist and their guide (his dialogues about nature and animals are informative and fine) hugging with the lions is just great. Once the first encounter with El Diabolo takes, the real survival fun begins. The lion has great CGI, so that's a big plus (no one wants those rubber and plush animals seen in other similar movies), and he plays his role as villain perfectly. His entrance is scary and uncomfortable, he looks properly bad ass and they quite smartly explain why he does what he does, which I wasn't expecting. I also enjoyed the great visuals, the beautiful cinematography rounding off the African landscape there could have been more animals, I was hoping for a crocodile but was pleased with the snake at least), decent music, decent action (the scene with the poachers is pretty atmospheric), plenty of suspense and a few brutal shots (mutilated people), had there been some severed limbs I would have been very happy. The finale is a nice build up to 4 stars for me. An awesome intense duel that is brutal and raw (I thought of The Revenant right away) and a pretty clever ending. Beast is similar to Aja's Crawl, and anyone who loves animal horror like I do (if they are crafted with skill of course) should have little to complain. I was a bit disappointed with the music from the trailer, which wasn't in the film after all, I was looking forward to it, it sounded properly creepy. Beast meets those basic criteria, and that's enough for me, because genre films like this come out barely once a year. 7/10
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Beast offers a different world and a different predator alongside the older The Shallows and Crawl, while being on par in quality with the aforementioned animal horror films. The visuals of the lions are really impressive, as are the shots of the daytime and nighttime wilderness. While the viewer has a hunch from the beginning how the film will eventually end, the film still managed to keep me in suspense almost the entire time. What bothered me about Beast was the behavior and (stupid) decisions of some of the characters.
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The suspense sets in early and effectively and the survival-drama potential is solid until the end. Good work with the setting and digital animals, with a likable acknowledgement of Jurassic Park’s inspiration (endangered characters trapped in a jeep). And Idris Elba fits in perfectly. The “broken family comes together in an extreme situation” ultra-cliché doesn’t matter; after all, this is a genre flick that solidly entertains with suspense in an exotic setting. But there are some occasional bits of nonsense. There aren’t many of them, but this high-powered and technically high-quality adventure would be better off without them.
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