Watching this film, one feels as if they are moving through a Spanish art gallery, each warm painting beckoning us to not only enter its world but to judge it with our own. This is really the main theme in "The Spirit of the Beehive". What is the world and humanity really like? We are asked to compare our world with the dreamlike state of film, the insect world of the beehive, and most importantly, the innocence of childhood. Against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War, the film starts with the children of a small village going to see Whale's incomparable retelling of Mary Shelly's "Frankenstein". For those of us who have read the book, we know that it is not really a story about monsters made from dead bodies. It is a story about human nature. A being, not asking to be born, (Shelly's very human-like man whose name in the book is Adam) finds himself thrown into a hostile world. A violent world of fear and ignorance where the only crime he seems to have violated is that he is different. Yet, "Frankenstein" is only a horror movie, right? Or is the monster, as little Ana's sister teases her, real? Ana decides to find out. Her journey forces us to not only see how the world is, but ask why. This is what separates this film from many others that have tried to tell the story of a child eventually learning the hard truths about life. We can explain how, but can we really explain why the world is the way it is? Can we explain this to a small child let alone to ourselves? For those who have not seen the film, a warning for I feel I must say something about how it ends. Perhaps the most haunting and memorable scene is at the end where little Ana looks out into the night of war-torn Spain and we feel as if she has found the answer to her quest. Almost ghost-like in the darkness, she slowly turns to face the camera as if asking for us to now deny or confirm. We have nothing to say.
Review of The Spirit of the Beehive
