Actor’s pain pays off in directing debut
An impressive action bow for Dev Patel, who broke his hand while making thriller
Monkey Man
✩✩✩ (out of 4)
Starring Dev Patel, Sharlto Copley, Pitobash, Vipin Sharma, Sikandar Kher, Sobhita Dhulipala, Ashwini Kalsekar, Adithi Kalkunte and Makarand Deshpande. Written by Dev Patel, Paul Angunawela and John Collee. Directed by Dev Patel. Open Friday at GTA theatres. 121 minutes. STC
Dev Patel’s bloody revenge thriller “Monkey Man” signals early on it’s not going to be the same choreographed mayhem as its main inspiration, “John Wick,” the payback franchise starring Keanu Reeves.
Patel’s bid for action star acclaim, which is also his feature directing debut, instead goes in for pure mayhem, period.
A back-alley gun seller offers Patel’s anonymous revenge seeker — who variously goes by “Kid” and “Bobby” (let’s stick with the latter) — a large handgun he claims is the same model used by Reeves in “John Wick.”
Bobby declines: “I need something small and effective,” he says.
This is hilarity times two. A small gun looks ludicrous in the hands of the six-foot-two actor and Bobby is anything but effective at this stage of the story.
He’s struggling mightily to transform from a trauma-scarred orphan into the gorilla-masked vengeance seeker he aspires to be, based on Hanuman, the monkeyfaced god of Hindu mythology. (Patel also cites late martial arts star Bruce Lee as an influence for the tale, which he co-wrote.)
“Monkey Man” isn’t designed to be one of those action flicks where the hero comes out of the chute with superhuman fighting skills. On the contrary, Patel says he wants his film to be viewed as “an anthem for the underdogs.”
That’s where Bobby comes in, after a prologue establishing his idyllic childhood as the forest-dwelling son of a beatific single mom, Neela, played by Adithi Kalkunte. Subsequent horrific flashbacks will reveal the tragic circumstances, brought on by a vile cabal led by a greedy guru, a scheming politician and a corrupt cop, that spurred Bobby into becoming a vigilante score-settler.
His first battles in the fictional Indian city of Yatana (think Mumbai) aren’t auspicious. Patel still seems more like the mild-mannered guy audiences know from “Slumdog Millionaire,” “Lion” and “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.”
Bobby dons a gorilla mask to fight for cash in backroom brawls conducted by Sharlto Copley’s leering emcee Tiger, who pays according to the amount of blood spilled on the mat.
The one super power Bobby could claim is his incredible ability to take a punch — and later bullets, knives and burns — and still come back for more.
With his haunted eyes and permanent grimace, he’s like Wile E. Coyote slamming into a wall and bouncing back, a comparison made real in the film when Bobby tries to escape pursuers by jumping through a window.
The glass doesn’t break and he’s ingloriously thrown back into the fray, one of the film’s many moments of comic relief.
The aborted escape attempt follows a chaotic men’s room brawl in which Bobby, having infiltrated an evil empire in the guises of a kitchen worker and waiter, confronts crooked cop Rana (Sikandar Kher), the man most responsible for his family’s misery.
The scene is the opposite of the efficient lavatory bloodletting of “Casino Royale,” where Daniel Craig’s nascent 007 notches his first official kill. Another comic extreme is Bobby’s choice of vehicle: a stolen rickshaw — so unlike the company-supplied luxury ride Bond wheels around in.
Bobby remains a punching bag until he falls in with the hijra, led by Alpha (Vipin Sharma), a third-gender tribe that helps him reconcile his conflicting impulses and to focus his abundant strengths to achieve his goals.
The interlude is a refreshing nod to the real world. The hijra have long been treated as outcasts in Indian society. They vow to fight alongside Bobby in his quest for justice, although obtaining it will be easier said than done.
Many of the film’s other comrades and combatants don’t fare as well. Patel and his co-writers Paul Angunawela and John Collee don’t seem to know exactly what do with street hustler character Alphonso, played by Pitobash, who befriends Bobby and pops up at various points.
Female characters are similarly ill-served. Apart from recurring glimpses of Neela, there’s also an escort, Sita (Sobhita Dhulipala), who would probably be the love interest in a different kind of action movie. And there’s Ashwini Kalsekar’s ruthless Queenie, a profane club manager, who manages to make the most of an underwritten role.
“Monkey Man” is an invigorating watch, but not an easy one. Cinematographer Sharone Meir whirls the camera around like a top and frequently goes in for claustrophobic, luridly coloured and poorly lit close-ups, perhaps to disguise the fact that Patel didn’t have the money to pay for elaborately choreographed fight scenes or unlimited retakes.
He also had to fight with a hand he broke in the film’s first action sequence, which helps explain why Bobby looks like he’s in real pain most of the time. Yet the fight scenes are thrilling and one employs the novel concept of stabbing a guy with a knife between your teeth.
Patel makes no secret of the struggles he had making “Monkey Man,” which included having to move the production from India to an island in Indonesia after the COVID pandemic erupted in 2020.
The film was originally destined for streaming online until Jordan Peele saw it, joined the team as a producer and negotiated a theatrical release.
Despite his struggles and setbacks, Patel has managed to turn necessity into virtue.
For all of its one-take roughness, “Monkey Man” signals an impressive new directorial career for Patel and perhaps the start of an action franchise that can build on its many vivid characters.
The fight scenes are thrilling in ‘Monkey Man,’ which signals the start of an impressive directing career for Patel and maybe even an action franchise