The Monster (2016) Review

"My mom tells me there's no such thing as monsters.  But she's wrong."

-Lizzy

10-year-old Lizzy (Ella Ballentine) is being driven to her father's house by her abusive, alcoholic mother, Kathy (Zoe Kazan).  On the way, they get into a car accident and are stranded on a rural road in the middle of a dark forest.  As they wait for help to arrive, they realize that there is something unnatural in the woods.  Something violent...

What Works:

The Monster has an extremely simple setup.  It's pretty much as bare-bones as it gets.  It's simply two characters in a car with a monster out in the woods.  Occasionally, other characters arrive, but that's pretty much it.  98% of the film takes place on the side of the road and I love it.  I really enjoy it when movies take place in basically one location.  It forces the filmmakers to get creative with their storytelling and ramping up the tension.  The Monster is a simple story with brilliant execution.

Ballentine and Kazan both do an excellent job.  I've said before that I usually don't like kids in movies.  The child characters are usually pretty useless and often get other characters hurt and killed. The actors usually aren't great either, but that isn't the case here.  Ballentine does an excellent job in the role.  There are moments in the film where she is too scared to do the smart thing, but it makes sense and it gives her a great character arc by the end of the film.  The Monster also does a great job of making you feel bad for Lizzy.  From the get-go, we see her stand up to her mom and how much she hates her.  You feel awful for the kid and want her to make it out of this and go on to have a happy life.

On the flip-side, Kazan does a fantastic job of making you hate Kathy.  She's an awful human being.  She drinks too much, swears and shouts at her kid, and even hits her.  We do see that she does care about Lizzy in theory, but she's honestly just the worst person.  The film doesn't hold back on giving you reasons to hate Kathy, but it's all very realistic.  She feels like a real person and that makes the relationship between her and her daughter that much more painful to watch.  You could see this happening in real life and that adds a lot of weight to the story.

The horror movie aspects are also really well done.  It takes awhile for us to actually see the monster, which allows our imaginations to run wild, and when we finally do see it, it's pretty terrifying.  The death scenes are mostly off-screen, but we still hear the deaths happening and the sound design is very satisfying.  The one on-screen death is particularly brutal and very effective.

What Sucks:

My only complaint with The Monster comes from the female paramedic, Leslie (Christine Ebadi).  She isn't in much of the film, but during her screen-time, she makes two extremely stupid decisions that get everyone either hurt or killed.  For such a minor character, she was extremely frustrating.

Verdict:

The Monster takes a very simple story and executes it extremely well.  The acting is top notch, the kills are solid, and the story is emotional.  There are a couple of stupid character decisions, but this movie has still got it going on.

 9/10: Great