Dev Patel has stated in interviews that he wanted to give MONKEY MAN a soul. While the film’s heart is there, it struggles to beat consistently since the narrative structure is so irregular.
I really wanted to love MONKEY MAN. It’s a new take on a familiar JOHN WICK narrative with ridiculous Paul Greengrass-like shaky camera. And when I say ridiculous, I mean it. Some of MONKEY MAN was shot with phones, and you can tell. Its grainy, fast-cutting, and overly shaky style makes it virtually impossible to make sense of at times. Yet, I think that’s the point and what Patel was trying to achieve with his directorial debut.
Despite the impressive style, I, once again, didn’t care about much that happened in MONKEY MAN. This has been a repeated theme for me in big-budget action movies (see DUNE 2) with a positive Audience/Critic score on Rotten Tomatoes. I’m beginning to think:
With that note aside, I fully support films like MONKEY MAN that try to bend the genre. It’s an action-packed, muddled movie that showcases Dev Patel as a director to watch for in the future.
MONKEY MAN is currently available in theatres.
