Love and Monsters

Despite its uninspiring title and the worryingly “YA” tone of the premise, this is actually a surprisingly funny, warm and charming monster flick.

Premise: Seven years after a chemical fallout caused Earth’s cold-blooded animals to mutant into giant monsters, the remnants of humanity hide in small, isolated underground communities, only communicating with other colonies by radio. But when Joel (Dylan O'Brien) finds himself in a life-or-death situation, he realises that all that matters to him is reuniting with his pre-apocalypse girlfriend, Aimee (Jessica Henwick), even if that means having to cross 85 miles of monster-filed wilderness on the surface.

Review:

On paper, the premise for Love and Monsters doesn’t sound all that inspiring, but this is a case where you shouldn’t judge the book by its cover. This isn’t an out-and-out comedy like, say, Zombieland, but it also isn’t a “YA” love story (which is certainly what I feared when I first heard about it). Instead it’s a surprisingly earnest monster flick, albeit one with a strong vein of survivors’ humour running through it. But the humour is limited to snarky comments and quippy one-liners, while the action itself is played straight.

I’ve not really seen Dylan O’Brien in much before this, but he does a good job in this role, balancing the various different aspects of the lead character Joel’s personality. Joel wants to be brave, like the other members of his community, but he (quite understandably) freezes when he’s actually confronted with the horror of a giant 10-foot tall mutated ant. Equally, he wants to be the romantic hero for his long-lost love Aimee (Jessica Henwick) despite the fact that he hasn’t seen her in 7 years, and the world is a very, very different place now than it was back then. These conflicting sides of Joel’s personality could have become irritating, or even worse, twee, but Dylan O’Brien manages to balance everything well and presents Joel as a very likeable lead character.

“…the film is fun & engaging…”

Which is a relief, because Dylan O’Brien has to carry the film as its narrator, its lead character, and the only human being on screen for large chunks of time, so if he wasn’t up to the job, the film just wouldn’t work. Despite having very little screen time, Jessica Henwick brings enough warmth to Aimee that we can see why Joel has obsessed over her for 7 years, as well as showing the strength she’s had to find to survive the monster apocalypse for this long. I can’t really say too much about the other characters that Joel meets on his odyssey, but Michael Rooker and Ariana Greenblatt are both excellent in their roles – so much so that you almost wish they’d been in more of the film. But then the film might have started to feel a little too similar to Zombieland, whereas by keeping Joel alone for most of his journey, it does give the film quite a distinctive feel.

The tone of the film is fun and engaging, but it also doesn’t shy away from addressing some of the realities of the situation. Making Joel the narrator means that what he doesn’t talk about is sometimes just as telling as what he does talk about – for example, Joel doesn’t really talk or think about the start of the apocalypse or what happened to his family, instead choosing to remember his pre-apocalypse happiness with Aimee, before they knew of the horrors to come. There are also some very informative character interactions that speak volumes about what life has been like for the survivors, for example, the way it’s taken almost for granted that everyone you speak to will have suffered some unimaginably bereavement, or that fact that every time anyone meets Joel on his journey they assume he’s been exiled from his colony for stealing food (after all, why else would someone be out in the open alone?).

“…an unexpected delight…”

A monster flick also needs, well, monsters – and Love and Monsters manages to deliver on the promise of its title. This is a 12-rated film, so the monsters aren’t too horrific, but because they’re based on real-life creatures (including a particularly nightmare-inducing giant mutated centipede) they’re still fairly chilling. The film was rightly nominated for the Best Visual Effects Oscar (although it ultimately lost out to the excellent Tenet).

Overall, this film was an unexpected delight. Even when I thought the film was becoming a little predictable in the middle section, the final act was able to develop certain plot elements in unexpected and interesting directions. While Love and Monsters might not change your life, it’s a charming and entertaining post-apocalyptic film that is also surprisingly uplifting for these current times.