Maybe you’ve heard the advice not to judge strangers who act rudely because you never know their struggles. The barista who ignores your order might be distracted by his mother’s illness; the DMV clerk might snap at you because she’s worried about a sick child or a missed mortgage payment or an alcoholic brother, not your badly done paperwork. Beef (streaming on Netflix) builds an exhilarating, addictive, genre-defying thriller/comedy/drama on this premise. In Beef, however, the main characters don’t extend the benefit of the doubt to each other, no matter how much evidence piles up suggesting they should.
When Danny (Steven Yeun) almost backs his truck into Amy’s (Ali Wong) SUV on his way out of a parking lot, she lays into her horn before speeding off. Just as Amy didn’t pause to consider Danny’s distracted circumstances, Danny does not consider what pain might cause someone to act so aggressively toward a stranger over such a small inconvenience. He instinctively revs his engine and speeds after her.
Each refuses to back down, and their mutual road rage escalates, destroying property, nearly wrecking their cars, and entangling their lives in a kaleidoscope of chaos. As we get sucked in, we can see what Danny and Amy both refuse to acknowledge: they are far more alike in their heartbreaking loneliness and despair than their conflict suggests.
