By Stacy Nguyen
NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY
I watched “Monkey Man” based on my devotion to Dev Patel’s career alone, and thus came into the theater with no context on this movie at all. I wasn’t sure whether I was about to watch a fantasy epic, a Frankensteinian fable, or a frightening horror flick.
“Monkey Man” surprised me! It is actually an action-thriller with some mythical elements, a tale of transformation, and one that tackles India’s caste system and extreme wealth disparity. Patel is a prominent presence throughout the entire movie. He is its director, co-screenwriter, producer, and he has deliberately made a movie that is very culturally centered.
The film is set in India and follows a man who is kind of nameless. He goes by Kid, Bobby, and Monkey Man by turns, and he spends his existence vacillating between worlds. He dons a monkey mask at night and fights in a dark, bloody underground ring. And then he alternates that with nights where he rides an elevator all the way up a tall skyscraper to where he works at a kitchen server for a luxury brothel with an extremely high net worth clientele. He grinds through this pretty miserable existence in part because he has no other choice — but also because he has devoted his life toward vengeance. His goal is to kill the men responsible for the destruction of his family and village.
Many white male critics have said that this movie is like “John Wick, but in India.” And while I understand the overly simplistic comparison, my eyes still want to roll right out of my head. It’s a really reductive comparison for a film that is so deliberate in how not-Western it looks.
Like, in addition to Patel himself, the main cast is just about made up of notable Indian actors. Woven throughout is the legend of Hanuman, a Hindu deity that takes the form of a monkey. There’s significant transgender representation in the movie through hijras, (who also get to kick ass in the movie.) And the nationalistic bad guys in the movie have this real-life analog with India’s current prime minister Narendra Modi — so much so that Netflix, which originally had bought worldwide rights to the film, almost canceled the release of it because they deemed the film’s political commentary too dicey.
We’ve all watched many film debuts of actors-turned-directors — and we all know there are some stinkers (like when William Shatner helmed “Star Trek V: The Final Frontier” and almost killed an entire franchise) — but dude, Patel is not another Shatner. Patel’s “Monkey Man” directorial debut is actually kind of great! His movie is super violent and gritty, but that violence and grime is also very beautifully framed and lit. I imagine Patel didn’t have the kind of budget Michael Bay gets when Bay does a “Transformers” movie, but man did “Monkey Man” look real slick when it wanted to be.
And when it didn’t want to be, this film was convincingly brutal and sad. The constant switch between scenes in the ultra rich privileged world up above versus the scenes portraying brutal poverty were effective. Through Patel’s lens, not much felt artificial or corny. It all stayed grounded and felt real, even when the action genre forces the main character to keep on moving forward — forces the movie to avoid lingering in too much societal detail. Patel does a solid job stretching the confines of the genre. “Monkey Man” is like a Trojan horse. You flock to it due to promises of a high-adrenal bloodbath, where heroes get to be heroes. And you leave fulfilled, but also with a touch of lingering unease about pervasive inequality.
“Monkey Man” is also stealth funny! There are moments in the movie that play against our expectations for laughs, and I genuinely was surprised and delighted at such moments. They are well-timed temporary salves for all the butt-clenching and eye-wincing you get to do for the rest of the film.
“Monkey Man” is currently only in theaters. Check local theaters for show times.
Stacy Nguyen can be reached at info@nwasianweekly.com.