Brave Men Don't Run From the Bathtub

Beast of the Southern Wild. Dir. Benh Zeitlin

Feat. Quvenzhane Wallis (Hushpuppy), and Dwight Henry (Wink)

20th Century Fox, 2012.

Benh Zeitlin’s 2012 film Beast of the Southern Wild was the kickoff to very young Quvenzhane Wallis’s acting career. Wallis plays the character “Hushpuppy” in the film, and she is a very curious, independent, and strong female protagonist. She was an only child who grew up in bayou community on the outskirts of New Orleans. They referred to her community as “the bathtub”; a community cut off from the rest of society by a levee. It is mentioned early on that her and her father are leaving without a female figure in the family (the mother is presumed dead. Hushpuppy tries to take her mother’s place, and keep her alcoholic father in check; and she did.

The community that she grew in had a very strong bond; there was not many of them, but they were all very close. After a storm rattled their community, flooding it with several feet of water something had to be done… Wink suggested that someone breach the levee, but Miss Bathsheba (Hushpuppy’s teacher, and fellow community member) believed that was a bad idea. Her philosophy was that when that if the levee was breached, the authorities would notice that there were people living “off the grid”, and come and evict them. Hushpuppy went ahead listening to her father’s idea, blew the levee up, and drained out the water from the bathtub.

As I said before, Hushpuppy was very close with her father; she was also somewhat inspired by his actions. What I mean by this is, her father suffered from alcoholism, and that led him to lash out, and be belligerent from time to time. When he was belligerent, so was Hushpuppy. For example, when they were in their “house” one night, he was drinking and he became belligerent, Hushpuppy then started to act up. Before you could even tell what was going on, they were throwing stuffed animals at each other, and kegs on the floor. Overall, Hushpuppy was very much affected by her father’s alcoholism.

After the authorities found the “off the grid community”, and forced those living there to evacuate they took them to a very big shelter– where there were many other people, a lot of food, and doctors giving people check-ups. Wink had a check-up, and got some very bad news back. A doctor told him that he was basically dying… As time went on, Wink remained in the hospital barely being able to take his own medicines without help from another. In the meantime, Hushpuppy stayed in the hospital care center, and you could tell she hated it. One day there was a huge rebellion, and the “off the grid people” forced themselves passed the doctors, and broke out of the hospital/shelter. Wink forced Hushpuppy onto a bus, because he did not want her to see him die, but Hushpuppy refused, because she wanted to be with her dad for the rest of his time being. This was very sentimental.

Overall, I think this movie was very sentimental. I enjoyed it to say the least. Hushpuppy was portrayed as a fantastic female protagonist; one who was strong, brave, and independent. Her and her community friends eventually stowed away on a boat, but returned to their community a few weeks later. Hushpuppy knew she had one home: the bathtub. This is why I titled this blog: “Brave men don’t run from the bathtub.”