Your Monster review - A little indie theatre kid gem with a beastly touch

The premise of a woman falling in love with a monster-like man is a tried and tested genre of some success within Hollywood. There is Beauty and the Beast, the first animated film to be nominated for Best Picture, Guillermo Del Toro’s The Shape of Water, which won the award in 2018, and one of Tim Burton’s best, Edward Scissorhands. Whilst this is not a roadmap for success (see Venom), Caroline Lindy’s Indie comedy with a dash of horror, sci-fi and drama, Your Monster, is another to add to the collection.

The film follows Laura an isolated and deserted woman who is coming to the end of her cancer treatment. However, despite the positive news, she is low, wheeled through the hospital by a man who has a flirtatious conversation with a colleague. As the film flashes back, we realise that she has recently broken up with her boyfriend Jacob, who whilst visiting Laura in the hospital states he needs time for himself. During an evening on her own, lightning strikes and a beast living in her closet reveals himself in a moment of pathetic fallacy.

Your Monster is based on an already extensively made premise, it is basically an indie version of Beauty and the Beast but with early-career Theatre kids. Even, the design of the monster, which is creatively just known as Monster, looks like a recreation of Dan Steven’s Beast from the 2017 live-action film where the budget has run out halfway through the make-up process. However, what it lacks in creativity it has in heart. It is both comedic with an abundant emotional core, that takes you on a journey with a magnificent performance by Melissa Barella as Laura who plays it with grounded hypersensitivity as she slowly seeks revenge on her almost moustache-twirling ex-boyfriend, in a film with an endearing small-scale nature.

Lindy does a good job of balancing genre. At its core, it is a comedy, but this is not of the modern, often buffoonish style where every heartfelt moment is undercut by an attempt to force a laugh, instead, the comedy serves to add to the tragic nature of Laura, for instance, in prolonged montages of her getting boxes of tissues from her Amazon delivery driver, who she eventually hugs like an overbearing puppy.

The film’s success is in its strong characters, going through an emotional struggle, with Laura’s relationship with the Monster at the film’s core, as she softens the beast attempting to scare her off, in a well-lit and stylised piece. Whilst the film goes where you expect it to, with the beastly monster softening up whilst watching musicals, in turn, helping Laura get over her previous relationship, it is nevertheless an accomplished piece.

Whilst Your Monster follows the characteristic beats of the Falling in Love with the Beast sub-genre, it still does a compelling and assured job at creating a nuanced and heartfelt narrative, which although predictable is an enjoyable and fun watch.