Animals — Characters & Cast

Winning the mayoral race and protecting his image and political future.

Mark begins as a frustrated candidate and is pushed into a moral test over a child who is not his own. According to Affleck, the film does not redeem him in the end.

Saving her family while managing a failing marriage.

Abigail is a mother in crisis whose secrets, including an affair, emerge as the marriage buckles. Washington says her character was not originally written as Black, which made the central marriage interracial.

Profit, leverage and control, including a 20% fee regardless of outcome.

She enters as an icy problem-solver and is read by some critics as possibly in on the scheme. The film leaves her motives only partly explained.

Winning the election.

The campaign manager pushes Mark toward aggressive outreach and the fixer, and he weighs every crisis against its electoral impact.

Getting Hector back safely.

The Kimballs' nanny. She reports being attacked, and it emerges that her partner Ramon's son Hector was taken by mistake.