Monsters Dark Continent review: 'A crushing disappointment' - LFF 2014

Director: Tom Green; Screenwriters: Tom Green, Jay Basu; Starring: Johnny Harris, Sam Keeley, Joe Dempsie, Kyle Soller, Nicholas Pinnock, Parker Sawyers; Running time: 123 mins; Certificate: 15

Produced on a shoestring budget with prosumer camera gear and bedroom-made digital effects, Monsters was a minor miracle of a film. Its director Gareth Edwards is now in charge of the Godzilla franchise and working on a Star Wars spinoff, and it's easy to see why when you look back at his 2010 breakthrough. Focusing on two lost souls wandering through Central America's infected zone after an alien invasion, it juxtaposed an intimate human story with bigger sci-fi ambition. Terrence Malick meets monsters from outer space.

Unfortunately, all this subtlety goes out the window for sequel Monsters: Dark Continent, which chooses to make war not love. Edwards remains as executive producer, but directing chores are handed over to Misfits helmer Tom Green, who co-writes with Jay Basu. Like its predecessor, the extraterrestrial action is very much placed in the background, but this time around the characters and storyline aren't compelling enough to support a film that dances around a title that promises blockbuster havoc.

The story picks up as the infected zone has spread to the Middle East and the US military are dispatched to quell both the alien visitors and local rebels. Johnny Harris's Frater and Nicholas Pinnock's Forrest lead a team of young recruits from Detroit (Sam Keeley, Joe Dempsie, Parker Sawyers) on a mission to rescue captured soldiers.

What unfolds is a film that's crushingly disappointing and, save for one thrilling shootout at the midpoint, surprisingly boring. Green apes the kinetic visual style of Kathryn Bigelow and Paul Greengrass when the bullets start to spray, but when those involved are cliché-spouting obnoxious "ooh-rah!" grunts you're never going to care when they get ripped to shreds. Only Keeley and Harris manage to illicit an ounce of sympathy, but even they are still barely developed beyond a single dimension.

What unfolds is a film that's crushingly disappointing and, save for one thrilling shootout at the midpoint, surprisingly boring.

The budget is significantly boosted from last time, and this gives Green the scope to come up with some striking imagery. A sequence of two soldiers tearing through the arid desert on motorcycles and an alien releasing glowing purple spores into the night are particularly memorable. It's all for naught, though, because this is overlong, takes itself way too seriously and is packed with characters you can't wait to see bite the dust.

War is hell. Personal sacrifice. PTSD. Are we the real monsters here? All the points this movie is trying to make have been ticked off before and in much more successful fashion. Monsters: Dark Continent has the visual eye candy to surpass its superb predecessor, but in truth it's one of the most beautiful bad movies you'll see.

Simon Reynolds

Movies Editor 

Simon has worked as a journalist for more than a decade, writing on staff and freelance for Hearst, Dennis, Future and Autovia titles before joining Cision in 2022.