Monsters and Men

Not everything is black and white.

(2018) Drama (NEONJohn David Washington, Anthony Ramos, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Chanté Adams, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Nicole Beharie, Rob Morgan, Cara Buono, Grant Jaeger, Josiah Gabriel, Emilie Allen, Brian Pollock, Joe Tippett, J.W. Cortes, Giuseppe Ardizzone, Steve Cirbus, Samel Edwards, CJ Wallace, Joshua Rivera, Lana Young. Directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green


Timing can be everything in the movie business. Monsters and Men tackles a subject that is near and dear to Hollywood’s heart; police brutality in African-American neighborhoods (in this case, Bed-Stuy in New York City). Family man Manny (Ramos) hears an altercation at a local bodega and chances upon a heated confrontation between white cops and Big D (Edwards), a local neighborhood figure who sells loose cigarettes outside the bodega. When the confrontation turns violent, Manny captures it on his cellphone.

He is torn as to whether to make the video public; he’s just started a new job working security while his wife (Jones) is finishing up her degree. He is arrested on trumped up charges. Dennis (Washington), a cop of African-American heritage, is not to thrilled with the overall situation but is under enormous pressure to keep his opinions to himself. He has a unique viewpoint which surfaces at a dinner party. Then again, there is Zyrick (Harrison), a high school baseball player who has unlimited potential whose father (Morgan) is proudly inviting major league teams to check his kid out. He has a career to think about and every reason to keep quiet but there’s this activist (Adams) who gives him food for thought. Meanwhile, a vigilante incident is fanning the flame, turning Bed-Stuy into a powderkeg ready to explode.

The movie is divided into three chapters and has a curiously unfinished feeling about it; even though there is a climactic moment that essentially brings the narrative to a close, the broken-up narrative doesn’t serve the film well. Although Washington stands out talent-wise and the young, largely unknown cast delivers surprisingly strong performances.

I think the movie also suffered from a timing issue; there had been a number of similarly themed movies released over the past two years and I think that there was a kind of audience fatigue going on for the subject so Monsters and Men fell off the radar a little bit which it may not have deserved, flawed or not.

Green definitely has a good eye and I think his only problem here was in his choice of narrative structure. A more linear means, while less bold, would have served the narrative better. I can’t say that this stands up well with some of the other films of similar subject matter, but I can say that especially for those who haven’t yet burned out on the subject, it is worth checking out just to get an early preview of Denzel’s kid, who will be headlining a Christopher Nolan blockbuster this summer and will likely be a huge star after that.

REASONS TO SEE: Washington has legitimate potential to step out of his dad’s shadow.
REASONS TO AVOID: Dividing the film into three separate chapters gives it a feeling that the story is not being fully told.
FAMILY VALUES: There is plenty of profanity and some violence.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: This is the third time Washington played a cop in 2018; the other two occasions were BlacKKKlansman and The Old Man and the Gun.
BEYOND THE THEATERS: Amazon, AMC On Demand, AppleTV, Fandango Now, Google Play, Hulu, Microsoft, Redbox, Vudu, YouTube
CRITICAL MASS: As of 2/22/20: Rotten Tomatoes: 65% positive reviews: Metacritic: 68/100
The Times of Bill Cunningham


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