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Beasts of the Southern Wild: Letterboxd Rating Four out of Five, ‘This Movie Was Depressing’

 I sometimes laud my ability to remember the most arbitrary of things. They can range from useless tidbits of knowledge, like happening to know the name of my classmate’s ex, to more functional memories, like the date and place of the upcoming Plus23 concert. This random retention also affects my academic life. For example, I may have forgotten both the full and shortened course name of my first science general elective, but I do remember bits and pieces of the most random of lessons.

One lecture I particularly remember talked about climate change. Perhaps I remember it for its horrifying implications or perhaps because it somehow foreshadowed the global pandemic that would sweep the world in a few months’ time. Whatever the case, I had a very vivid memory of my professor lecturing about the rising temperatures, the melting sea caps, and how it has been theorized that the thawing permafrost may give rise to ancient diseases we are unprepared to deal with.

A movie still from Beasts of the Southern Wild. Quvenzhané Wallis plays Hushpuppy, while Dwight Henry stars as Wink. Photo from https://www.pluggedin.com/movie-reviews/beasts-of-the-southern-wild/

As I watched the film Beasts of the Southern Wild, I couldn’t help but remember that discussion as I sat and watched the characters deal with the terrible aftereffects of the climate crisis. The story follows a father-daughter duo, Wink and Hushpuppy, who lives in an enclave area called “The Bathtub.” A bayou area located just beyond the walls of a dry mainland, The Bathtub is a wilderness that is susceptible to natural disasters. When a fierce storm arrives and drowns The Bathtub underwater, Wink, Hushpuppy, and the remaining survivors build a make-shift floating community to get by.  

Unable to find another solution to salvage their underwater home, Wink bombs a hole in the levee enclosure to drain the water in the bayou. This alerts the mainland authorities, and the residents of The Bathtub are taken into custody. Eventually, the residents manage to escape the shelter and return to their neighborhood. Wink, who happened to be battling a debilitating disease of some kind, dies peacefully in his home.

While all this happening, the movie shows an interesting, fantastical depiction of the polar ice caps melting—thawing and bringing to life the aurochs of a time long gone. The film ends when the aurochs come to The Bathtub. After Hushpuppy wards them off, she sends her father’s funeral pyre down the sea.

Due to melting ice caps, polar bears have been known to visit towns in the Arctic region, rummaging through trash for food. Photo from https://www.livescience.com/64741-polar-bears-are-taking-back-russia.html

Throughout watching this movie, several key points harshly stood out amidst the depressing and alarming storyline. Lessons I learned from the current climate crisis class I am taking and the freshman science elective I took came to mind.

  • People living on the fringes are usually the first to feel the effects of climate change. People within poorer demographics tend to be the hardest hit by the extreme natural disasters brought about by global warming. Workers whose livelihoods are particularly dependent on agriculture and natural resources are affected the most. Moreover, those in the poverty line do not have a setback in dealing with this crisis. Thus, climate change actually exacerbates the global poverty problem.
  • The awakening of the aurochs can be likened to an actual real-world problem: permafrost melting. Although permafrost is usually located within uninhabited places with harsh temperatures, rapid global warming may pose even more of a threat than already melting them and awakening microbes of a time long gone. In an article for Unearthed, scientists have said that climate change has prompted animals to move north and inhabit new and “virgin” areas. This increases the chance for microbes to inhabit hosts and cause diseases.
  • Climate change destroys homes and cultures. The sociocultural effects of the ongoing climate crisis are often overlooked. In the film, it was depicted that even though the residents acknowledged the difficulty of life in The Bathtub, they made a conscious and strenuous effort to save and remain within their land.

The movie’s message is clear: The effects of climate change expand beyond simply decreasing land mass. The effects of climate change often intersect with different aspects of anthropocentric life. One way or another, the climate crisis impacts us all.  

A flooding incident in a Cebu City barangay during mid-2022. Flooding even within the metropolitan area has displaced many people. Photo from https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1648639/heavy-rains-cause-floods-in-metro-cebu-leave-people-stranded 

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