The Animal Kingdom is one of those movies that just appears out of nowhere and takes you by surprise, my wife wanted to watch it for some time mainly because of the drama aspect and it caught my attention because of the mutation topic, it’s a French production mixing drama, comedy, fantasy and even horror at times without losing its core around a family story, I'm not so much into dramatic content but this movie is worth watching even twice, a great movie with what I could consider very little flaws. At first I thought "another X-Men like mutation movie" when I first saw the trailer, but this movie is much more grounded in what would happen if people began turning into animal hybrids in our current timeline, and shows us how society would react to such changes, most of this reactions cruel ones and discriminating.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt16606592/
- Platform: AppleTV+
The film was released in 2023, and it was the second feature film from director Thomas Cailley, who waited almost 10 years to make another film since his first one Love at First Fight in 2014, I found this information online while I was doing some research about the movie. The script was done just before the Covid pandemic, so it’s purely coincidental that what happened during those times is similar to what we see in the movie, knowing how society reacted to that crisis, when some wanted to help others and some wanted to blame others.
It is set in France where a strange disease is turning people into animal hybrids, and not everyone turns into the same animal, the science behind why this mutation happens isn’t explained, which I think was a good call as the movie is more about the human element than trying to explain the science behind it but I think this might bother some viewers, might think its an inconclusive aspect of the movie explains why things happen and not just because. The government has made the facilities that are helping those who are turning but these places are more like detention centers not as rehabilitation clinics, we humans usually fear what cant understand or control.
Francois and his teenage son Emile move to the south of France to be near Francois’s wife Lana, who has started to turn into some kind of ape creature, its here when we get a first taste of society response to these mutations on the way to their new home, when a bird man hybrid breaks free from a transport vehicle, but most people don’t even react to it, and that interesting because it’s now part of their everyday lives. Lana is kicked out of the place they move into to and is being moved to a new facility with others in town, but during the transport, their there is an accident and she escapes with other hybrids into the forest mostly because they fear what the government might do to them. It is expected and obvious that this is the basis of the main conflict of the movie, but its the dramatic aspect within the family that makes the movie special, Francois having to look for his wife while getting his son Emile to deal with his symptoms of mutation, how can a father and husband deal with such situation having to take care of both although they are not sick but still their life might be in danger because of others who fear them and do not understand them. The movie doesn't go through the rules of the mutations, or explain them scientifically, it just throws you head first into this family drama that hangs on as the anchor to the bigger story about the acceptance and change.
As Francois, Romain Duris looks so smooth and natural during his performance, as a father trying to hold his family together while the world around him drastically changes specially against him and his family, hes an optimist who wants to believe there is a cure and that his wife will be fine, but down deep you can see the fear in his eyes. Paul Kircher is the kid that turns into the real star of the movie playing the role of Emile, he brings such a strong performance of a teenager growing pains, but also growing into something else, and you can see how his movements start to change, how he tries to hide what’s going on to him from others, you can only imagine how he must feel since its not only a physical transformation but both psychologically and emotionally he must be different, his body and mind for sure goes through some hormonal changes.
Adele Exarchopoulos plays Julia, a police officer who assists Francois in searching for his wife, and while she’s not on screen very much, she makes the most of it adding some humanity to the law enforcement side of the story, its almost like the story tells you there still light at the end of the tunnel. Emile is a half human, half bird hybrid who possesses a sort of mentor in the form of Fix, played by Tom Mercier, who is able to help us accept change and when they do, it’s amazing, the way he moves and the sounds he makes sell that he is very becoming more bird than human.
I loved how the movie plays with different genres, a father son scene is touching and then it’s a tense chase without feeling forced. And, the hybrid creatures just look real enough that you buy into the concept, but not so overblown that you get taken out of the story, nothing feels over the top considering is a fantasy story. The movie besides been dramatic and part fantasy it also touch on comedy with a few moments to help balance the heavier themes.
The towns Saint Johns Day festival is where everything comes to a confrontation and tensions between humans and hybrids finally explode, when Emile can no longer hide his transformation, he is hunted down and other hybrids by a mob of angry people from the town. There is a beautiful sequence where Emile runs through the forest and sees all kinds of hybrids coming out to help him and that there is a whole community out there, but when the military arrives with gas and begins taking the hybrids Francois finally decides to let his son grow up and change into what he is becoming, officially accepting that there is no other way out of it than let things take its course, he can no longer cover up or hide them, to a certain point he probably fear this situation will eventually break his family in half for ever.
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