‘Beasts of No Nation’ Wins 2016 Peabody Award

Beasts of No Nation has won a 2016 Peabody Award. The film, based on the highly acclaimed novel of the same name by Nigerian author Uzodinma Iweala, brings to life the gripping story of Agu (newcomer Abraham Attah), a child soldier torn from his family to fight in the civil war of an African country. Idris Elba portrays Commandant, a warlord who takes in Agu and instructs him in the ways of war.

Written and directed by Cary Fukunaga, Beasts of No Nation won two Film Independent Spirit Awards: Attah for Best Male Lead, and Elba for Best Supporting Male.

Elba won the BAFTA award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, and picked up the Screen Actors Guild award for his performance.

The Peabody Awards Board of Jurors called the film “a superbly acted, strikingly photographed film about an African warlord training an orphan child to join his guerrilla army, it never loses sight of their humanity, brutal acts notwithstanding.”

The Peabody Awards are based at the University of Georgia’s Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Click here for the complete list of winners.