In my
original review for Beasts of No Nation,
I mentioned how important it is that Agu’s experiences as a child soldier
aren’t uniformly horrific. As perverse
as it sounds, it’s true that he at times finds friendship, a sense of purpose,
and a feeling of power in his circumstance, all of which play a major part in
keeping him there. Like many abusers,
the Commandant makes Agu feel like he needs him as well as the army, makes him
feel like there’s nowhere else he can go, and so he stays.
In a
different but related vein, I really like how Agu’s life is depicted in the
early parts of the film, before the war, getting separated from his family, and
being conscripted. So often, America is
given a single narrative of what “African life” looks like. “Poor African.” “Starving African.” “Suffering African.” “For just $.10 a day, you can help…” It’s all squalor and suffering and pity. However, that’s not what the first act of Beasts of No Nation gives us.
Don’t
get me wrong: Agu and his family are
poor, no question. From the looks of it,
just about everyone in his village is poor.
But if you asked Agu, I’m sure he wouldn’t describe himself as a
suffering African. On the contrary, he,
his older brother, and his friends invent numerous creative ways to pull
lighthearted cons for a little extra money or food. Whether they’re trying to get the occupying
soldiers to buy “imagination television” (the empty shell of a gutted TV,)
catching chickens, or volunteering to clean up messes of their own making (for
a profit, naturally,) wheeling and dealing is just part of everyday life for
him. He doesn’t view it as a grim necessity,
or even a chore; instead, he views it as a challenge to be met.
Time
and again, the film shows that Agu’s poverty doesn’t negate his happiness. His family may have unreliable electricity
and no indoor plumbing, but being “poor Africans” doesn’t stop them from being
very much a typical family. Agu plays
with his friends, his older brother obsesses about girls, and all the men/boys
in the family make rude noises at the dinner table to rile Agu’s mother. Agu teases his brother in the pestering way
that only younger siblings can, and his brother responds by tackling him to the
ground.
The
soldiers don’t really seem to be regarded as figures of danger or protection. Instead, they’re just sort of there, men with
more money than Agu’s family who might be cajoled into purchasing junk from a charming
kid with bright ideas. And even the
looming prospect of war really doesn’t cast a pall on Agu’s life until it
arrives. This aspect of the film’s early
scenes is interesting to me. The war is
talked about distantly, remotely. It’s
occurring in Agu’s country, but far away enough that it doesn’t touch him. Though everyone knows that the war is making
its way toward them, it’s treated like the imminent approach of harsh weather;
they know the storm is coming, so they’re making hay while the sun shines. Agu’s parents store up food and other
resources in anticipation of the war’s arrival, and his brother is desperate to
sleep with his crush before the war comes.
The refugees from further out who come through the village augur what is
approaching, but it’s not tangible for Agu until it actually happens. Granted, part of that is down to him being a
kid, but it’s also a great demonstration of “life will out” and the idea that
people are people no matter where they’re from or what they’re going through. That, to me, is so critical, and it helped me
to know right from the start that Beasts
of No Nation was going to tell its story respectfully and well.
No comments:
Post a Comment