Beasts of No Nation (2015)

  I tried to watch this at the start of the pandemic and couldn't do it.  I finally made it, but it took a judicious use of the fast-forward button.  Content Warning:  war violence, dead children, moderate gore, child sexual abuse (off-screen)

Agu (Abraham Attah) was a normal kid until a civil war destroyed his family and he was press-ganged into being a child soldier for the PNF, a guerrilla group led by the Commandant (Idris Elba).  Initially, Agu believed the propaganda that they were fighting to regain their homes but after witnessing and participating in atrocity after atrocity, he realizes that there is no moral high ground in war.

There are movies that are hard to watch, and then there's Beasts of No Nation.  Cary Joji Fukunaga wrote and directed this based on the novel by Uzodinma Iweala, an Ivy League-educated doctor.  I know that at least one actual child soldier turned his experience into a book but it was not Dr. Iweala, who was born in Washington, D.C.  Fiction or not, the story is a powerful look at the cost of war on the most vulnerable in society.  

Elba is incredible here as the charismatic Commandant, but Attah is the real star, and his performance carries the film.  Not a fun watch, not an easy watch, but so far, the leading contender for Best Anti-War Movie.  It is currently streaming on Netflix.