The boy soldier story has been done before, but that doesn’t make it any less tragic or disturbing to watch. Netflix’s Beasts of No Nation is a visceral exploration of the loss of innocence, even if it doesn’t tread into new territory.

Abraham Attah stars as the young Agu, a boy from an unspecified country who is captured and eventually accepted into the ranks of a brutal rebel faction led by the Commandment (Idris Elba). Both Attah and Elba deliver great performances, though as much acclaim as Elba has received for his role—one of his two Golden Globe nominations this year were for his portrayal—it’s Attah who has, and succeeds at playing, the more complex character.

The movie itself, directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga (“True Detective: Season One”), is wonderfully shot and beautiful to look at, even if it is often hard to watch. Fukunaga holds little back, only occasionally opting to show the committed atrocities off screen (and even when he does, you see the spatter of blood on the camera). More importantly, Beasts of No Nation is intense from start to finish, a film that grabs hold of you and rarely loosens its grip.

The movie’s only real weakness is its relative predictability; if you’ve watched other movies or read books about boy soldiers, the film—which is based on a novel by Uzodinma Iweala—you know pretty much how things are going to proceed from start to finish. The experience is only slightly diminished, but as disturbing as much of the material is in the movie, it’s hardly shocking from a storytelling perspective.

Beasts of No Nation may not offer anything new, but that doesn’t keep it from being a powerful, impressively made and disturbing movie that ranks among the year’s best.

Review by Erik Samdahl. Erik is a marketing and technology executive by day, avid movie lover by night. He is a member of the Seattle Film Critics Society.