“A Monster Calls”: Review

A Monster Calls is not going to be the ‘must see’ film this holiday season. It really isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, and that is a downright shame.

Probably one of the most beautiful trailers of the year, right behind Collateral Beauty:

Based on Patrick Ness’s fantasy novel, A Monster Calls uses many of the late Siobhan Dowd’s original watercolor illustrations.  The plot of the film follows the book rather faithfully, 13-year-old Conor O’Malley (Lewis MacDougall) deals with the illness and loss of his mother (Felicity Jones) from cancer.

Connor endures the same nightmare for months, a collapsing church sinking into dark fathoms while he attempts to save his mother from falling down. He loses his grip every time, and has to watch her fall, which causes him to wake up. At seven minutes after midnight (12:07), a voice calls to him from outside his bedroom window. The voice belongs to The Monster, a Groot-Iron Gigantesque Yew Tree from the neighboring church graveyard. The Monster insists that Conor summoned it, and that it will help him by telling three short stories.

The design for The Monster is incredible, truly a beautiful piece of CGI work.  After how dissapointed I was with the various creatures-to-human touch interactions from Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them, The Monster and Connor were fabulously pulled off. The conceptual design of the Monster, straight from the original illustrations, really brought the film to another level.

Presented in an animation style similar to those used in Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows for the Beedle the Bard story, The Monster weaves tales that directly relate to things Connor is experiencing. There are hidden moments in these stories that connect the dots, the Prince in the first wearing the same sweater Connor pretty much lives in.

In sequences between The Monster’s tales, we learn about Connor’s mother undergoing what seems to be yet another chemotherapy treatment after many. Things don’t look good for her, and Connor’s absentee father (Toby Kebbell) visits from America. We get the impression while well meaning, Dad isn’t there to take Connor home with him if things turn for the worst.

The astute viewer will no doubt get the impression that Connor’s church collapse dream is his subconscious wrestling with the desire to save his mother. Nothing he can really do to help her other than be present, and supportive.

Conor goes to live with his grandmother (Sigourney Weaver) while his mother stays in the hospital.  Grandma is a stern sort, a “don’t touch anything in my house” type which is so completely different from the Weaver we’re used to seeing. This of course doesn’t go too well, as during the Monster’s second story, Connor destroys EVERYTHING in Grandma’s living room. I haven’t been in a theater where the audience collectively gasps like that EVER.

The film progresses along with Connor’s stages of grief, even though Mom isn’t dead yet, the process is beginning. We see his denial, his anger, his sorrow, and eventually his acceptance of her loss.

There are few movies that tackle this sort of subject from the child’s perspective, and does it with such brutal honesty. This is how it feels to watch your parent suffer, to deal with the pain and stress, and to grow from the experience.

SCORE: 8 OUT OF 10, viewed in standard non 3d

I don’t know if I’ll be watching A Monster Calls again anytime soon, as it’s emotional punch is KO worthy. I don’t think anyone in my screening came out unscathed and dry-eyed.

There is a sequence in the film where we see Connor’s grandmother’s family photos on display, and we see a little girl (assuming his mother) being held in the arms of (assuming) her father.  The man in the photo is none other than Liam Neeson, the voice of the monster.  He’s obviously not around now, and that leads me to believe that maybe, perhaps, Connor’s mother and grandmother lost him. At the end of the film, we see pages from Connor’s mother’s art diary, which contains in it a shocking image; a watercolor painting of The Monster, with what looks like Connor’s mother on his shoulder. If the viewer’s impression is The Monster is REAL, and not just imaginary, what if his mother conjured him up during the loss of her father, and that’s why Liam Neeson’s voice?  Maybe that’s looking for too much into an already beautiful story, but why not?

A Monster Calls opens in select theaters in December 2016, and worldwide on January 6th 2017.