By Jonah Naplan

August 20, 2022

Sometimes movies can surprise us. Sometimes movies can travel far beyond what’s expected and be successful in their own right. Sometimes movies can actually be good, as opposed to what the trailer promised. Such is the case with Baltasar Kormakur’s “Beast.” And for a ninety-minute bee movie that includes a sequence in which Idris Elba punches a lion in the face, it’s actually pretty fun. But we go to flicks like this knowing full well that the least they can do is provide a good time at the movies. Recent blockbusters such as “Jurassic World Dominion” and maybe even Netflix’s “The Gray Man,” have forgotten about that long-lost concept of camp. Movies like those two are just too self-serious for their own good—so much so that they forget the whole point of their existence is to entertain and please an audience.

“Beast,” however, feels like it came out in the summer of ‘94. And if it had, it would probably be considered part of the reason why that year is sometimes hailed as the best in film history. A movie like “Beast” isn’t trying to do too much. It’s dumb entertainment at its absolute dumbest. The dialogue is filled with banter, and characters make some of the stupidest decisions you’ll see in film this year, all for the good of the movie’s plot. It feels so old school that I half-expected a Guns N’ Roses song to play once the credits began to roll.

In “Beast,” Idris Elba plays Dr. Nate Samuels, a recently widowed father struggling to reconnect with his two daughters. The three of them travel to a remote South African game reserve, managed by Martin Battles (Sharlto Copley), an old family friend. But things soon go awry, when a lion, the survivor of a brutal battle with poachers, begins to stalk and attack our leads. It’s a fight for survival as this apex predator starts to wreak havoc. African cats and chaos aside, the movie has an underlying plotline about the Samuels family drama, and the relationship Nate had with his wife, and thereby the relationship he has with his children. But the plotline is unnecessary. No one comes to a movie like “Beast” expecting human storylines. There are three dream sequences inside of the movie that involve Nate’s ex-wife, and they all seem random, and out of place.

Because “Beast” is at its absolute best when it’s about the lion attacks, or rather, the aftermath of them. Much of the horror radiating from this movie doesn’t come from the occasional jumpscares and attacks from the lion. It comes from moments that build suspense upon when said bloodshed will begin again. The movie is very tight, executing a solid example of what to do when given a concept filled with just enough suspense to satisfy any runtime, even a short one. The movie has many long, unbroken shots, especially towards the beginning, in a sequence when Nate and Martin explore a village filled with mutilated bodies. But this is also the scene where the stupid decisions begin. This village looks completely abandoned, from all angles, but I would still think its unsafe to just go wandering off anywhere in the African wilderness.

As is the case when Nate’s younger daughter Norah, wanders off, surprisingly to a far distance, and Nate scrambles to find her in the fear of the lion showing up again. But of course she wandered off. Decisions like these are so convenient, and become the weakest parts of “Beast.” Nate’s eldest daughter honks a car horn trying to get his attention, and tries to communicate with a walkie-talkie, all while the lion is on its rampage, and our leads are trying to make sure it can’t hear them. The movie also has a problem with shutting car doors, and windows, and other doors, and not having enough ammo, and what have you. It can be predictable at times, but not always. It takes some directions in the third act that are slightly, but only slightly, different than you might expect.

A lot of the movie takes place in one day and one night as our leads are trapped in one spot with one broken-down car, and limited resources. It’s a survival thriller through and through. But what surprised me the most actually, as opposed to the expectation the trailer built, was that the lion was actually pretty menacing. Especially after he gets burned in a fire in the third act, and the final showdown begins, the threat becomes more prominent and worthwhile, shall I say.

All of the South African sequences (98% of the movie) are given a beautiful backdrop and a nice shine by cinematographer, Phillippe Rousselot. The movie is really beautiful to look at, and isn’t overshadowed by the theatrical aspects of this obviously prestige material. And the camp value works. I’m surprised to say that myself. “Beast” would work really well as the second half of a midnight double feature or like as a movie that a prankster projectionist would put on instead of “Emily the Criminal” at an arthouse theater. “Cinema is the most beautiful fraud in the world,” said Jean-Luc Godard. “Beast” shouldn’t have to be any one thing, it should be, you know, allowed to splurge every now and then. Because when you put logic and stupid decisions aside, “Beast” is just a good old time at the movies.

Now playing in theaters.