Paul W.S. Anderson brings more video game mayhem to the big screen with Monster Hunter
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Note: The writer of this review watched Monster Hunter on a digital screener from home. Before making the decision to see it—or any other film—in a movie theater, please consider the health risks involved. Here’s an interview on the matter with scientific experts.
Paul W.S. Anderson, one half (with Milla Jovovich) of the power-couple-slash-brain-trust behind the often irresistible and reliably not-screened-for-critics Resident Evil films, has found himself a literal sandbox: About half of his latest video game adaptation, Monster Hunter, takes place in a desert. There’s a couple badass heroes with humongous swords, a few big scaly monstrosities, and frequently not much else. The minimalism is consistent with Anderson’s career-long devotion to delivering caloric content with an unlikely combo of classical unities and pounding, insta-dated electronic beats. The movie’s called Monster Hunter—what more could it reasonably need?
A wildly original plot? Relatable characters? If a viewer can’t identify with the existential need to not get eaten by toothy, fire-breathing megafauna, then all hope is lost. This isn’t to imply that the movie’s source material, the bestselling game series Monster Hunter, is about nothing more than hunting monsters; it is also about crafting items and eating food prepared by bipedal cats, both activities well represented in the film. Anderson’s chief liberty with (or sacrilege against) the source material is his decision to make the protagonist, Lt. Artemis (Jovovich, naturally), a soldier from our own world who gets sucked into the Monster Hunter universe through an interdimensional storm along with the rest of her squad. Is it kind of goofy? Definitely. Is it goofier than the high fantasy setting? No.
Jovovich is our last classic action hero, capable of going toe-to-toe with the greats of the ’80s when it comes to delivering cheesy dialogue with a steely glare. “Flamethrowers?” she says, looking over some charred bodies that might as well come with a blinking neon “Here Be Dragons” sign. “Never seen a flamethrower do this to a man.” In the Resident Evil films, her character wielded two guns; here, she eventually comes to wield two blades. The screen time of her grunt comrades is mercifully brief—they all die within the first 10 minutes. Having established the necessary motivation (monsters), the movie shifts into wasteland survival mode before Artemis crosses paths with The Hunter (Tony Jaa), a local with a personal arsenal of exploding arrows and grappling hooks.
The breathless, fast-forward pace is an Anderson trademark. The budgets of his films may be in the mid-eight-figures but their generic pleasures are those of good old-fashioned B movies. In Monster Hunter, that includes Aliens-riffing claustrophobia (another Anderson specialty) and some terrific giant spiders—it’s been a while since anyone made a decent giant spider movie. As far as themes are concerned, they are mostly chestnuts: evil forces and impromptu solidarities between archetypes faced with the odds. The former is represented by some kind of lost civilization, the latter by the initially antagonistic Artemis-Hunter relationship.
Being a resident of a different reality, The Hunter doesn’t speak English. The communication barrier is probably for the best, as Anderson’s generic dialogue is sub-James Cameron, and his plots have more dimensions than his characters. But there is something going on in these films. In the anti-snob nomenclature invented by the critic Manny Farber, Anderson is unquestionably an industrious, unpretentious “termite.” The monsters in his movies are not metaphors—they are not representatives of some kind of lurking unresolved trauma or of our deeper fears. But there is a certain point at which, say, the Resident Evil films’ plot formula of clones, corporate machinations, and time limits coalesces into some artistic themes.
Of course, there’s a much simpler case to be made for Anderson as having some kind of artistry: If making these movies were easy, more people would be doing it. The global industry has no shortage of wannabe franchise-starters with generic plots, sequel-teasing ancients evils, and digitally animated abominations, but none of them have a fraction of the poise that Anderson brings to any given project. He is a dexterous director of set pieces, with an excellent sense of space and scale that goes a long way when it comes to showdowns with hulking demon things and oversized creepy crawlies or a climactic battle that pits the military-industrial complex against a colossal dragon. (Like the classic tagline of Anderson’s Alien Vs. Predator says, “Whoever wins… we lose.”)
Anderson’s breakthrough, Mortal Kombat, is still the benchmark for infectiously fun video game adaptations. If Monster Hunter is intentionally a more spartan piece of work, its gamer aesthetics and bare minimums, even at their crudest, still feel like an antidote to the lethargic drag of movies with better VFX and cooler trailers. There is something to be said for a film that sets up its entire third act by having Ron Perlman, with full-on console RPG hair, unfurl a map and declare, “I believe that the ancients knew how to travel between both worlds. I believe that is the purpose of the Sky Tower.”
64 Comments
Aww. I thought this was going to be the sequel to that movie where Charlize Theron was ugly.
Monster 2: Electric Monster Hunter Boogaloo
Monster Hunter Soldier Spy
Extremely Monster & Incredibly Hunter
I thought it was a prequel to Monsters.
That’s Monster, Inc. from Pixar.
Before she had the plastic surgery and moved to Wee Britain?
Anderson’s breakthrough, Mortal Kombat, is still the benchmark for infectiously fun video game adaptations.
Literally every single time the Mortal Kombat movie is mentioned the theme song starts up in my head. ‘MORTAL KOMBAT!’
TEST. YOUR MIGHT.
That’s what it does – it starts up. Whether it’s in your head, before the credits, before the New Line logo, before there’s a single image on the screen, it starts up. Really, the whole movie is just expanding on that first 0.8 seconds. Also, when people dump on Paul WS Anderson they should take a moment to compare the first and second Mortal Kombat movies. There’s a… noticeable dropoff in quality. (It’s also true of the first and second Resident Evil movies, although I fucking love the second Resident Evil movie precisely because it has no grasp of tone, structure, or anything else).
“Also, when people dump on Paul WS Anderson they should take a moment to compare the first and second Mortal Kombat movies.”Yeah the first one is an example of a really good B movie, the second one is an example of a garbage B movie. Anderson found a niche that he’s really really good in.
I’m not sure we can dock Anderson any points at all for the world-crossing conceit. MHW, which propelled the franchise into the core-gamer-mainstream, had fully-blown crossover events with Final Fantasy and The Witcher that they actually wrote shit for. It was perfunctory, sure, but they took time out of their day to explicitly declare “wow somebody stumbled into our world from another world” and build a few quests around that conceit.On top of that, it had a kinda-sorta crossover event with Resident Evil. It had a Devil May Cry costume for hunters, some Street Fighter stuff on the Playstation, and a cat costume and weapon from Mega Man.
Heck, you could argue we were within a few corporate nuthairs of getting a “Milla Jovovich as Alice from the Resident Evil movies” skin.
It also had a crossover with Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, it’s a series that’s gone for anything and everything.
isn’t a thing coming out of the sand at a bunch of soldiers the same as transformers 1?
“Jovovich is our last classic action hero…” Huhnowwhatsaywhatnow? Tom “I will literally do anything that makes you genuinely concerned for my safety” Cruise might have something to say about that, after he’s done saving Hollywood from those pesky maskless crew members.
Anything except allow the people around him to break COVID guidelines
To be fair, Tom Cruise has also acted in a variety of other genres. Despite Bruce Willis starring in Die Hard and other action flicks, his resume is varied enough that I rarely hear him referred to as an “action star”. But Jovovich has her wheelhouse, and that wheelhouse is action-y. So I can kinda see what that writer is getting at here.
Vin Diesel, then.
I think Action Hero in this case does not mean someone who can star in an action movie, but instead is someone who basically only stars in action movies and whose skills specifically reflect that. Jean Claude Van Damme, Steven Seigal, ect.
Came here to say this.
Real Schwarzenegger-as-Hamlet erasure here.
Milla Jovovich Milla Jovovich makes everything better.
Heh.
Tom Cruise does movies with stunts but he’s not a bad-ass take-no-prisoners ass-kicking hero in the Schwarzenegger mold. Ethan Hunt is all gadgets and spycraft. Jovovich does a reasonable impression of being able to beat up anybody and anything, Cruise just dangles off stuff.
Paul WS Anderson:
Last classic is a bit much. I really like Jovovich though.Saw Monster Hunter today and enjoyed it. Just the right movie to end the year for me.
Please don’t go to the theater to see this. You will be the same amount of disappointed in the movie if you wait to watch it at home, and you won’t die (potentially.)
I’m still waiting/yearning for the day when Bill Murray does a Paul WS Anderson movie after confusing him for Paul Thomas Anderson.
Well he did actually do Garfield thinking that it was a Coen Brothers movie (it was written by Joel Cohen and not Joel Coen). So it’s possible.
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Oh, dang, you’re right. I read it too fast and got my Andersons all mixed up. My bad.
He’s never done a PTA movie either.
“The monsters in his movies are not metaphors—they are not representatives of some kind of lurking unresolved trauma or of our deeper fears.”I watched Anderson’s Shopping a little while back and it was interesting to see his strengths of choreographing action in an outsized world applied to a relatively straightforward no-future-for-the-youth story. The only monster is society! Heavy-handed but pretty good stuff, even on a low budget his skill was apparent.
It’s a slightly vapid but very attention-grabbing directorial debut. The ending shot, set to an instrumental track by James (the band), is particularly memorable and haunting. No surprise he moved up the ranks so quickly.
Shopping was the reason he got hired for Mortal Kombat. I watched a behind the scenes when it came out and Joel Silver said when they started production they wanted to hire a director who was new and young, but could handle action choreo and he got a bunch of screeners to screen candidates, saw Shopping, and went, “That’s my guy.”
Before I see this, I need to know: is there any mention of “knees” in it? My family has a unique phobia of the word knee and they will become violently upset if a character mentions that body part.I’m currently lobbying all the major movie studios to include a Content Warning before any movie that says that k-word.
“I believe that the ancients knew how to travel between both worlds. I believe that is the purpose of the Sky Tower.”- to be fair, it’s likely that real-world Ron Perlman has casually mumbled that to his cat while making coffee on a normal Sunday morning.
Paul W S Anderson does one thing: take advantage of the set pieces available like no one else. I rewatched the first RE movie yesterday after a long time and is the guy good at making you always feel oriented.
He also gave us Event Horizon, a film that’s both terrifying and ridiculous, sometimes in the same scene.
He also has gorgeous art direction and set design. Mortal Kombat isn’t just fun it looks gorgeous. To go back to Event Horizon you have the flashier stuff like that scene with Sam Neill in the crawlspace and the room with the engine, but you also have smaller things like the lights on the walls look like futuristic torches and once you see that you realize the entire ship is designed to look like a futuristic take on a Gothic castle and it’s pretty much literally a haunted house in space.
It’s very blatant with the Gothic tropes – I recall there are even some kind of thunderstorms.My favourite scene is when they switch on the gravity. It’s a take on the Alien initial scenes but so beautifully made.
Those CGI blobs turning into water is still a great effect. It doesn’t look “realistic,” but it’s a really clever use of (at the time) new technology.
It’s weird to say about Paul WS Anderson, but he’s kind of an old-fashioned stylist. He’s been aggressively deploying CGI since the mid-90s (he was more or less an early adopter), but his movies are filled with careful production design and costuming (even if it’s tacky). His editing is very rapid-fire, but he also composes shots and choreographs movement carefully.
It’s also a precursor to the Imperium’s ships in Games Workshop’s BattleFleet Gothic…
I love it so much. It was one of the most terrifying experiences I had in a big screen.
I rented it in junior high and tried to watch it at night, made it maybe ten minutes, and then had to wait until morning to finish it. Even then I had to pause every fifteen minutes or so to catch my breath. It’s a silly movie but I had never seen a movie that was so aggressive about putting scary stuff on the screen. It was probably an early forerunner in the trend of doing a jump-scare every ten minutes, rather than spacing them out.
Does Event Horizon still count as woefully underrated or has its cult status elevated it?I love that movie so much. I remember shortly after it came out we had some sort of dollar-movie-night in college and they played it. Back when it was a box office bomb and a critical failure as well. I feel kinda good for how hard I sang its praises at the time since it has aged pretty well.
No one else? Kid, watch more movies.
“ behind the often irresistible and reliably not-screened-for-critics Resident Evil films”As a RE (games) fan, oh no, those movies are very much resistible.
Right? He has never made a Good video game movie, or even a “good adaptation” – he just didn’t lose enough money (I’m guessing), and kept getting the ‘video game movie’ gigs?*Sigh, fine, I guess Mortal Kombat ‘worked’ – but that’s it!
““Flamethrowers?” she says, looking over some charred bodies that might as well come with a blinking neon “Here Be Dragons” sign. “Never seen a flamethrower do this to a man.””
I haven’t heard amazing action movie banter like that since the 80s!!!
I love Milla Jovovich and will watch anything she’s in. I find it endearing that her career has taken this turn where she plays baddasses in pretty terrible but nonsensically funny movies like this.Will watch no question. It looks god awful. lol.
Event Horizon is legitimately great. Fight me.
Anyone who fights you on that point is worse than Hitler, obviously.I like that it’s a flashy 90s horror movie premised entirely on the Christian concept of hell being 1) real and 2) a physical place you can go in a spaceship. It’s a sci-fi horror movie with a distinctly Medieval worldview.
yeah well, it took that from The Black Hole. Actually the whole Event Horizon is a pastiche of other movies, with Black Hole, Alien and Solaris above them all.
Big burn on James Cameron up there. I’ve always found his dialogue to be perfectly suited to the tone of the movie he’s going (although obviously he didn’t write all of them). How many lines from Aliens can we all recall instantly?
This looks like good dumb fun, but I’m still not risking a theater visit. Why they couldn’t get this, NEWS OF THE WORLD, and PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN as virtual options boggles my mind.
News of the World and Promising Young Woman will be on VOD by mid-January due to Comcast’s window deals, so you’ve got those two at least.
Given he’s known to be a good action director, and that Event Horizon is at the very least considered to be pretty effective at what it does, I have to wonder why he’s never been given a bigger project. I figure he at least gets to choose what films he does, but it feels like a waste when we’ve had big budget ‘action’ films made by big name directors who just can’t pull it off.
he is a bit like Roland Emmerich: give him all the budget in the world and he will still do a B Movie. It’s what he likes.
I’m impressed with the titular Monster Hunter. Running through sand is difficult enough. I can’t imagine it in those pants with a bow in your back pocket and a ridiculously large sword over your shoulder.
This is my favorite white savior movie of the year.