Beloved Beast: Written Review

Beloved Beast

Written Review

Hi everyone and welcome to MyIndie Review Vlog, the show that gives you spoiler-free reviews of indie films. My name is Asaf Angel from MyIndie Productions.

Today I’ll be reviewing 2018’s horror feature film Beloved Beast written and directed by U.S. indie filmmaker Jonathan Holbrook.

Thank you, Jonathan, for sharing your film with us.

Nina, a pretty, young girl, effectively portrayed by Sanae Loutsis, is at a pivotal point in her life as she survives a horrific car accident in which she loses both of her parents.

Lost and confused, Nina is assigned to the care of her young aunt Erma, played by Joy Yaholkovsky. Erma, the estranged sister to Nina’s deceased mother, being a bitter, psychedelic-drug indulging party girl, is clearly not suitable to raise a child in any way. Furthermore, Erma is extremely resistant to this new living arrangement and only goes along with it as she would be receiving an allowance for allowing Nina to live with her.

Erma takes Nina into her home, located in a small town named Slough, which is infamous for its unusually high crime-rate, as described by its veteran and seemingly indifferent sheriff, Chief Marchesi, played by Andrew Tribolini.

As the slow-burn plot progresses, a plethora of shady characters are introduced. Mostly hardcore criminals, almost all connected in one way or another to a man named Ash, played by Earl Gray. Ash is introduced to us as the man controlling most of the illegal business conducted in and around the town. We, as viewers, have plenty of time to get acquainted with all the people in the mix of the story.

In circumstances you’ll see for yourself, Ash crosses paths with Erma and becomes aware of Nina, who is now living with her. Being a cold-hearted businessman, running, among other endeavors, a human-trafficking business, he schemes to kidnap young Nina.

While all that is happening, the town’s mental facility suffers a devastating and deadly breach. A very large and mentally-ill individual, played by director Jonathan Holbrook himself, who’s history is well-known to Chief Marchesi and the older generation of policemen in the town, escapes his confinement into the night, leaving a trail of brutally murdered crew of orderlies in his wake.

As the story progresses, the plot eventually centers around the crossing of paths between the giant brutal murderer and young Nina, who decides to name him Harvey.

As these characters collide with one another, Holbrook places some of them in specific scenes, which help us understand their personalities better. For example: Even though it doesn’t take us very long to understand what kind of person Ash is, we get to see how he experiences an encounter with truly evil men, more so than himself, thus revealing an interesting character arc in him.

Different characters in the film communicate with one another in a fairly unique manner that effectively becomes an integral part of the cinematic language. Holbrook built a unifying rhythm to the film that does an awesome job in captivating our attention as viewers. Characters will often overly linger in silence and stretch-out moments in conversation to allow us to read their body language and have a better understanding of who they are and what the scene is about.

The film seems to draw inspiration from works by filmmakers the like of David Lynch, The Coen Brothers and even David Cronenberg.

The lingering, prolonged moments between characters discussed above, seem to be a nod to Lynch’s 1990’s series, Twin Peaks. It also has a lot of breathing room in many of the scenes, where characters communicate heavily in a non-verbal manner. There are also a handful of sequences that depict drug related experiences and the distorted perception that is caused by them. These scenes seem to deviate from the narrative, as their purpose is to convey a certain feel, or experience, rather than plot points.

The Coen Brothers-inspired elements have to do with the way Holbrook shoots dialogues. He uses a lot of wide-lens shots, which open up the background and give the characters in frame a larger-than-life and mildly distorted look. By shooting dialogue this way, he can place the camera closer to his characters and still be able to include the background from either side of the character in frame. That way you get a conversation between two or more characters, where the camera seems to invade each character’s personal space. Making the whole scene look somewhat unsettling, yet intriguing.

David Cronenberg’s influence is apparent in the way many of the gory kill scenes are constructed. If you’ve seen films like History of Violence, or Eastern Promises just to name a couple, that should give you a frame of reference.

Holbrook shoots his kill sequences in a simple and to-the-point fashion. Without fancy camera work, he will simply show us a soon-to-be victim, and then introduce the killer into the frame. Our killer is fond of bashing-in skulls. Holbrook might show the first blow ON camera, with the kill-blow, (normally to the head) most likely taking place off-screen, with parts of the victim’s body still visible in frame and reacting to the blow.

Now, it needs to be mentioned that Beloved Beast is almost THREE hours in run-time. At this level of quality, it makes this film a very ambitious project from a very ambitious filmmaker. Although I can imagine how the film might seem to be too long for some, I personally had little issue with its length. Some scenes may have benefited from being shortened in certain parts, but still, the film holds its own without a doubt and does not feel to drag at all. No easy feat for a three hour film!

Production value is extremely high for an indie film. Cinematography is very professional and provides numerous beautifully executed shots and sequences. The practical and special effects, colour grading and sound design were excellent and the performances were decent and complemented one-another.

I strongly feel there is a lot more to be said about this wonderful project, but I chose to summarize the highlights and keep the review from being too long and for fear of stepping into spoiler territory. This is a film that needs to and should be experienced by audiences worldwide.

Beloved Beast gets an 8/10 on the Look At Me, I’m a Film Critic Scale!
Until next time, keep supporting indie film. My name is Asaf Angel, I thank you for tuning into MyIndie Review Vlog. I’ll see you next Thursday!