Beasts of No Nation
Short description
Beasts of No Nation is set in an unnamed West African country torn apart by civil war. Agu is a young boy whose ordinary life is destroyed when the fighting reaches his family: his father is killed by militants, and he is separated from his mother and sister. Left with nowhere to go, he is taken in by a group of fighters and becomes a child soldier. The unit is led by a domineering commander, a figure who both terrifies the boy and fills the void left by his father, and Agu finds himself caught between horror at what he is made to do and a growing familiarity with the violence around him. The film is based on the experiences of its young protagonist.
Cary Joji Fukunaga directed and wrote the screenplay, and also produced alongside Idris Elba and Amy Kaufman. It followed his earlier features Sin Nombre and Jane Eyre, and came before No Time to Die. Abraham Attah plays Agu, with Elba as the Commandant, and the cast includes Emmanuel Nii Adom Quaye, Opeyemi Fagbohungbe, Emmanuel Affadzi and Richard Pepple.
Released in 2015 and running 137 minutes, the drama was made for about 6 million dollars. Audiences rate it 7.7 on IMDb and 7.6 on TMDB, while critics give it 7.9 from 149 reviews, a rare case of critical and audience scores sitting closely together.
What's left behind the scenes
- During filming in Ghana, director Cary Fukunaga contracted malaria.
- Filming took place in Ghana and lasted 36 days.
- Infrared optics were used in the scene where the colors change from green to red. This scene was inspired by the "Enclave" project by Irish conceptual photographer Richard Moss, which he filmed in Congo.
- Some actors were detained on suspicion of being mercenaries, and local residents had to be filmed in their place during mass scenes.
- The most difficult part of the filmmaking process was delivering food to the set. As Cary Fukunaga said: "An army is led by its stomach. And so is a film set."
- To prepare for filming, Idris Elba stopped exercising, gained weight, stopped shaving, and shaved the hair from the front of his head to depict his character beginning to go bald. The actor wanted his hero to be different from the characters he usually plays – strong, fit, and well-groomed.
- The actor who played the naked soldier nicknamed 'Tripod' participated in the Liberian Civil War as part of the Liberian army. He insisted on filming naked himself.
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