Watch The Gripping First Trailer For ‘Beasts Of No Nation,’ Netflix Original Movie That Looks Tremendous

In a very, very short amount of time, Netflix has gone from regurgitating television shows, documentaries and movies to creating their own original television programming. They have a very steep learning curve and not only have developed their own TV shows, but they’ve furnished fantastic, award-winning TV shows such as House of Cards, Orange Is the New Black, Marco Polo, Bloodline, BoJack Horseman and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Now Netflix attempts to produce an Oscar-worthy film in Beasts Of No Nation.

Beasts Of No Nation is based on Uzodinma Iweala’s 2005 novel of the same name, and it follows a young African boy named Agu (Played by Abraham Attah) who gets swept into the life of a child soldier. The trailer starts with a convoy getting ambushed on a road by militants in an unnamed country. While most of the people in the convoy have been killed, one man has survived and he is brought to the violent warlord named Commandant. The guerilla commander, played by Idris Elba, saw this opportunity as a teaching moment and instructs Agu to kill the man with his machete. The young and scared recruit hesitates, but Commandant barks, “These are the ones that killed your family.” That’s when the boy flashes back to scenes of his family being killed by soldiers as M83’s “By The Kiss” plays in the background.

Netflix has some star power besides The Wire and Pacific Rim star Elba, they also recruited True Detective Season 1 director Cary Fukunaga to bring the book to life.

Beasts Of No Nation will begin streaming Oct. 16, the same day that it will debut in select Landmark theaters in New York, Los Angeles, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington D.C., Atlanta, Indianapolis, Detroit, Chicago, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Houston, Dallas, Denver, Seattle, San Francisco and San Diego. The film will debut at the Venice Film Festival and also screen at the Toronto International Film Festival. So it will be eligible to win more awards for the streaming service.