Monsters

This is not a monster film, despite what the title may say. Indeed a better title would simply have been People. Or in this case, two people. What we have here is someone who took all the cliches Hollywood has built up in the last few decades about what a monster movie should be like and swept them aside in favour of showing how people would truly react if their world was invaded.

It was only a few weeks ago I saw Skyline, an indie movie showing what would happen if humanity was ever invaded by aliens. And it was awful. Here was a low-budget film trying to shoot well above it’s weight, losing everything that makes an indie film special in the process.

Monsters takes an entirely different approach. Film two actors walking through a jungle, throw in some special effects and let the viewers decide. What you end up with is a story of people, set against an alien backdrop. Even the very nature of the aliens themselves can be questioned towards the end.

The primary cast consist of just two individuals; the daughter of a media mogul and a photographer employed by said mogul who is charged with returning the girl to America. When they miss the last boat home they must treck through the Infected Zone, a quarantined area across the US/Mexico border where extra-terrestrials have found a home.

The threat of the aliens is ever present, even if they are not. Planes fly overhead constantly, warning signs remind residents to carry their gasmasks and The Wall is a sight to behold. And in the few brief encounters with the creatures, it is hard to believe all of it was created by a tiny team on a shoe-string budget.

Out of all the monster movie released recently, Monsters is unique and worth seeing because of it. This is definitely not one to miss.

My rating: 9/10