Writer and Director Cary Fukunaga (True Detective Season 1) orchestrates an uncompromising nightmare reality for one boy’s life, in a decision that will ultimately dictate the rest of his life. In “Beasts of No Nation”, the life of young Agu (Abraham Attah) living in West Africa is disrupted when his father is slaughtered in a civil war and he is recruited as a child soldier into a mercenary unit led by the sadistic Commandant (Idris Elba). Commandant leads Agu down a lifestyle of vicious murders, rapes, and fields of blood that will force Agu to grow up faster than he rightfully should.

This film has been getting a lot of controversy for Fukunaga’s choice to split the rights to the film 50/50 to Netflix and theaters alike. As much as the corporate theaters are shunning Cary’s decision, i am grateful for the Netflix release, as “Beasts of No Nation” is a film that everyone should see. Fukunaga worked on the film for seven years, offering a sobering reality into the true stories of these children with no role models to look up to. There is some real nice color symbolism in the film, including a field of red to represent the bloodshed that follows this group of renegades. Cary also always has a way of mastering long winded shots with as little edits as possible, and this made for some truly compelling graphic details on the actions that these children are quite literally forced to make because they are all alone in this world. The haunting graphic imagery of these children doing grown up deeds, is slowed down and shot up close and tight to give the viewer a feeling that it’s impossible to look away from these horrific details. Fukunaga might not earn any admirers with the direction he takes his young actors in, but it really is eye opening when children are doing adult deeds.

Perhaps any child’s greatest fear is that they lose their parents at such an early age. That feeling of loneliness in a world whose safety net ends at the front door. This is the struggle that Agu is thrust into as a result of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Attah communicates a reaction in just a simple look, for what takes other child actors sentences of dialogue to explain. This performance not only should garner this 15 year-old an Oscar nomination at the very least. It truly is one of the most impactful child performances that i have ever seen, mainly because this boy is quite literally maturing in the disgusting choices that he must make as the film goes on, without truly ever aging one year physically for the principal photography of filming this movie. Elba also boasts a quiet storm, as a father figure for Agu’s new lifestyle. As sick as we recognize it from the audience standpoint, there is a reason why Agu cannot turn his back on this man. His future is uncertain until this guy comes along, and what follows will no doubt bare some serious psychological damage to the child. This father/son aspect of the film is what really gives the movie it’s legs during the times when the pacing is a little off in the progression of the storytelling.

The third act of the movie is easily the weak point for me, as the film feels like it doesn’t know what direction to end this film with. Agu is figuratively and literally at the crossroads of what direction to go, and it feels like we never get an answer one way or another. This makes the film feel like the juice isn’t quite worth the squeeze investment of an over two hour film, and that might be true if it weren’t for the production values and stellar performances that I already mentioned.  There is definitely an uneven feel with powerful punch that the first two acts produced. An ending as impactful as it’s first two acts, and this might’ve been my second 10/10 for 2015. As it stands, “Beasts of No Nation” is a great film, but falls just shy of that modern masterpiece mantle.  Quite an amazing first effort for a mainstream movie being released to a streaming video service.