Monkey Shines USA,
R, 113 m, 1988
George
A. Romero, who had us scared shitless over the cannibalistic goings-on down on
the zombie-infested farm in the low-budget cult classic Night of the Living Dead, now gets us laughing ourselves silly over
the high jinks of a syringe-wielding primate in the not-so-low-budget box office
washout Monkey Shines. Jason Beghe
(who looks a lot like a young Ryan O’Neal) plays Allan, a jocko law student
who goes for a run one morning (wearing a backpack full of bricks) and winds up
under the wheels of a semi-truck. Allan survives the accident, but is left a
quadriplegic. Allan’s hottie girlfriend, Linda (Janine Turner), finds it hard to love a man
whose legs are bent and paralyzed, so she takes her love to town and hooks up
with Allan’s lothario doctor (Stanley Tucci). This makes room for Allan’s
overassertive mother (Joyce Van Patten) to come in and take control of her
son’s life. She hires a live-in nurse (Christine Forrest) who lets her pet
parakeet, Bogart, flutter about the house and peck at Allan’s eyes. All this
tension drives Allan to attempt suicide by suffocation. But Allan’s emotional
state rebounds after his scientist pal, Geoffrey (John Pankow), presents him
with a little helper. Her
name is Ella (Boo), a capuchin monkey, and she cheerfully attends to a variety
of odd jobs for her new crippled master, such as putting on music and fetching
sippy cups. What Allan doesn’t know is that Geoffrey has been shooting up the
tiny ape with human brain cells, which somehow helps her to mind-meld with
Allan. Ella starts acting out Allan’s darkest fantasies; she becomes the
furry, sharp-toothed embodiment of his id. As Allan grows more aggravated and
mistrustful with those around him, Ella grows more lethal. One night, Ella kills
the parakeet and deposits its carcass in one of the nurse’s slippers. Later,
she sneaks out of the house to pay Doc and Linda a visit, and then sets them on
fire while they engage in the old in-out. Eventually, Ella gets so possessive of
Allan that she tries to off his new gal pal from the helper monkey program.
Who’d of thought that such a sweet little thing could bring on a bloodbath
this, uh, bloody? Monkey
Shines
runs a solid two hours, which is an unusually long running time for this sort of
B-grade junk, but Romero smartly invests much of that time in building Allan’s
relationship with Ella so come their climactic face-off we’ll be shaken out of
our seats. Well, you’re more likely to fall out of your seat convulsing with
laughter as the whole thing comes off looking utterly absurd. Still, Romero
keeps you watching. Never mind the inbuilt ridiculousness of the premise, Monkey Shines is good sneaky fun. Though Monkey Shines marks her first and last appearance on the silver screen, Boo gives the film’s most compelling performance. That’s not to say that her co-stars are bad actors, but rather they’ve been handed such ludicrous parts that even the most seasoned thespian this side of Olivier would come off looking like a schnook. I felt the sorriest for Van Patten. The filmmakers see her as a two-dimensional harpy—an emasculating shrew who keeps her talons deeply dug into Allan’s numb nuts. She probably only wants what’s best for her boy, but you know by the unflattering way Romero frames her that she’s high on the chimp’s shit list. Though it was Ella’s wheelchair-bound senpai that I really wanted to see get it in the end. I found his sanctimonious self-pity pretty damned annoying. August 31, 2007 © Copyright 2007 by Edward Larsen Terkelsen. All rights reserved.
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