Movie Review: Beast


The problem with the new movie “Beast” is that it is essentially one of those horror movies, where the people involved do such unbelievably stupid things that it causes some in the audience to yell out, “are you stupid?”, “why are you doing this?”, “nobody would do something so stupid”. There are so many incidents in this movie where the main characters who are on a safari in Africa (a father played by Idris Elba, and two daughters, played by Leah Jeffries and Iyana Halley) do so many idiotic, dumb and stupid things that it becomes infuriating very quickly. The story is a good one, about a rogue Lion who is out to kill every human being in revenge for poachers killing his tribe. Unfortunately, this good idea for a movie, is wrapped within an envelope of stupidity.

One critic, Odie Henderson on Rotten Tomatoes says it all perfectly: I mean, people do stupid things in horror movies all the time, just to get the audience to talk back to the screen, but this is excessive. Whenever Nate tells them to stay in the car, they don’t. They wander off at inopportune moments, knowing full well that Rory’s out there biding his time. When their father is trying to silently evade his nemesis, his kids start blowing the damn Jeep horn and trying to engage him on a walkie-talkie.

When you’re sitting there for two hours watching this level of foolishness where there is a huge Lion slaughtering every human being in sight it can actually make you angry watching it. The ending is the dumbest idea of all – but I will not give away the moronic conclusion to this below average film.

The bottom line is that nobody, no matter how stupid they are, would ever do any of the things to save themselves that the screenwriter decided to create within this story. A great screenplay about this kind of a story would include strategies and ideas that make sense – that someone with a functioning brain would come up with. Especially in the case where there is a father, who is a doctor in the middle of nowhere trying to protect his two daughters.

The special effects are good, showing a huge Lion attacking and killing many people, jumping on the jeep the father and his two daughters are in. Unfortunately all the rest of this mess is too ludicrous to ever recommend.

The low Rotten Tomatoes for Beast of 73% are not low enough, with my rating around 45% and a big pass for this film.

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