America finally gets right what Spanish directors can do in their sleep: magical realism! I’m actually surprised that Beasts of the Southern Wild got nominated for an Oscar because at times it is verging on surreal. The film unrelentingly shows life from a child’s point of view so sometimes it is unclear if the events that unfold are in her imagination or real. To muddy the waters further, the child’s world is unlike anything that the audience for this film will be familiar with so it will take even the most ardent independent film lovers awhile to get into the rhythm of the film and be ok with not knowing what is going on (basically the adults aren’t very adult, but for a kid at that age, the mixture of adult outbursts of drunken traipsing through the streets, haphazard survival & physical tantrums can be seen by a young child as normal and even delightful or like a grown up version of childhood play). The director translates what people tell the child into visual literalism which can lead to frightening or fantastic images. There is also a feral Rousseau quality to her community that would make Hobbes (& frankly many viewers) collapse in a dead faint. If you love the movie, you will be joining a well-respected, great number of individuals, but I also think that it is permissible to respect the commitment to Zeitlin’s first feature film’s vision without necessarily enjoying the experience. Felt like the little brother to Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust.