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‘Monos’ a frightening fable of savagery

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A scene from the movie ‘Monos’.
October 23, 2019 01:11 pm

There haven’t been many recent stories on the screen more exciting than the one told by director Alejandro Landes in his new movie “Monos.”

This extraordinarily disturbing fable about a small co-ed army of children stationed in the mountains of Ecuador, where, on their own and without much adult guidance, keep watch over a hostage. When the mission dissolves into chaos, they abandon their fragile social system and revert to savagery. The movie is loaded with suggestions of the inner ferocity of the human animal as well as many riveting and touching dramatic moments.

It is as gripping and shocking a plot as any that has unfolded in a movie this year, but where the first half is a brilliant, tightly constructed essay on pent-up adolescent violence and physical authenticity, the second half, set in a jungle, is a strangely derivative take on William Golding’s novel “Lord of the Flies,” which was filmed in 1963 and 1990.

The acting, by a cast of spirited nonprofessionals, is vivid and convincing, indicative of the daring way Landes chose to make the picture. He gathered an ensemble of lively teens and children who have never acted before but who have the physical characteristics and personalities of youngsters who would be aimless, lost and ripe for conscription into what they see as a big, improvised game of war. A fairly consistent authority is Julianne Nicholson as the hostage, an abducted American doctor the children’s leaders want to swap for concessions.

Landes’ strategy works, and he gets a movie that looks natural, spontaneous and unrehearsed. Even when the plot twists and turns and the climaxes pile up, Landes maintains control. The children all look realistic and the atmosphere of the mountains and the jungle is unmistakably genuine. The camera work is exquisite; shots are carefully composed with actors and objects unobtrusively arranged within the frame and the vistas of peaks and sky are breathtaking.

As a result, the strong drama of conflict among the youngsters as they battle one another over maintenance of order and preventing the hostage from escaping is enhanced by the mood and visual style. “Monos” runs into trouble when the teens start painting themselves and turning into brutes. These scenes, lifted from “Lord of the Flies,” are both vaguely defined and underdeveloped.

When the drama reaches its apex of savage pleasures and ritual violence from throwing a large group of hormonal youngsters into a leaderless, raw-nerved ordeal, the horror and significance of ‘Monos” snaps into clarity. The terror of turning on their friends is palpable. For a brief time, barbarism reigns. Then there is a brief moment of salvation, and the movie ends with its more frightening image.