The Animal Kingdom (2023)

A cross between District 9 (2009), The Fly (1986) and the Animorphs TV series in which Paul Kischer twitches and pouts with his bee-sting lips throughout the 127-minute runtime. Now that I think of it, however, whilst District 9's political metaphors were admittedly only half-baked, it seems that they forgot to turn on the oven for this one completely. Loved Albert the dog, though. He was great.

In the end, Cailley’s soft-pedaled approach to his various narrative beats almost gives the film the feel of an extended television pilot, as there’s a lot of seed planting but not quite enough follow through to make The Animal Kingdom feel like a complete story or one that, like Fix, truly takes flight.

— Gregory Nussen (Slant Magazine)

This could be my American moviegoing sensibilities talking, but I need someone to blame here. I don’t always need someone to blame in every single situation, but in the case of “Who is to blame for the destruction of our natural world?” it’s cowardly and boring to not name a villain in this day and age. It’s not that Cailley must make a black-and-white political film on principle, but he’s put forth a political topic and then—in the interest of satisfying [everyone]—doesn’t ask tough questions. He’s made a film that lacks both ambiguity and a larger political message, leaving us with an indistinct, fleeting coming-of-age narrative.

[…]

In their refusal to confront the political or the philosophical questions about what it means to be human—or to contend with genre—Cailley and co-writer Pauline Munier could have replaced their characters’ animal mutations with countless other plot devices, and the result would have been the same.

— Katarina Doclovich (Paste Magazine)

The Animal Kingdom is so determined to cast its tale as one about the evils of bigotry and the virtue of acceptance (and selfless familial love) that it stumbles over its own scenario, pretending that everything would be great if France would simply stop hunting mutants and, instead, create an idyllic social system of cohabitation. Cailley and Pauline Munier’s script, however, never suggests how that might be feasible, save for imagining, in its closing passages, a quasi-Garden of Eden for its alienated Dr. Moreau-via-saturated-fats monsters.

Worse, the film imagines its characters in ways that stymie any inner conflict or development. Émile has no choice except to embrace his animalistic destiny, and François is such a compassionate guy from the start that it’s inevitable he’ll do right by his son. They have nowhere to go but in the exact direction one expects, although that’s still better than Exarchopoulos’ fate as a police officer tasked with standing around doing nothing at all.

— Nick Schager (The Daily Beast)