| Monster | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Erik Estenberg |
| Produced by | David Michael Latt David Rimawi Paul Bales |
| Written by | Erik Estenberg David Michael Latt |
| Starring | Yoshi Ando Sarah Lieving Shinichiro Shimizu Erin Sullivan |
| Cinematography | Sarah Lynch Erin Sullivan |
| Distributed by | The Asylum |
| Release date(s) | January 15, 2008 |
| Running time | 90 mins. |
| Country | United States Japan |
| Language | English Japanese |
Monster is a 2008 direct-to-DVD monster film produced by American studio The Asylum, written and directed by Erik Estenberg.
The film is an Asylum mockbuster created to capitalise on the release of Cloverfield. It was released direct-to-DVD on January 15, 2008.[1] Cloverfield was released theatrically three days later on January 18, 2008.
Contents |
The film takes place in Tokyo in 2007, where two reporters - Sarah Sullivan (Sarah Lieving) and Erin Lynch (Erin Sullivan) - have arrived from the United States to document unusual seismic disturbances that have been picked up around Tokyo. The disturbances are originally thought to be aftershocks left over from a supposed massive earthquake on the Kanto Fault that occurred two years previously, causing hundreds of thousands of casualties and several hundred billion dollars in damage(possibly referencing the real-life Fukuoka earthquake or the Miyagi earthquake), although careful analysis of the evidence suggests otherwise.
As time goes on, all of Tokyo begins to suffer from abnormal earth tremors similar to those registered in 2005, but the tremors are found not to be caused by an earthquake, but by a gigantic octopus that has been dormant for centuries, but has since been awakened by mankind, and now sees Tokyo as a new feeding-ground, with the filmmakers documenting the catastrophe as it unfolds.
It starts as Sarah and Erin are talking about filming Tokyo. The scene then switches to the interior of Sarah's car as the two drive to LAX, to catch their flight to Tokyo. In Tokyo they rent a hotel room, and, the next day, Erin films Sarah talking with the global warming minister. During the interview, an earthquake strikes and the scene again switches to the reporters in the basement of the environmental building trying to find someone who can speak English. Eventually, they find Justin - a worker - who is from America as well. He says that they have to go to the American embassy, and, as they flee, they hear the sounds of panic and plane engines from a tunnel.
Later, they find a mall, and another earthquake occurs. In the chaos, Justin is impaled by a pole as the reporters flee in panic. Some small text appears on the screen saying that tape #3 was damaged. As the reporters run toward a mall they find a woman and her grandfather, and they eat and sleep, Sarah not realizing she had left the camera turned on. Then, another earthquake begins and kills the grandfather as the woman tells the reporters to flee. They hear the mall explode as they run away and soon find a building which they enter. They have gone upstairs when the building suddenly collapses. The reporters survive, but, unfortunately, the collapse damaged the camera lens.
Night arrives and they see helicopters ready to save refugees, but a tentacle destroys them and proceeds to throw cars at the people, killing many of them. Panic ensues and Erin abandons Sarah but a tentacle slams into the ground where Erin is and she is wounded. Additionally, the camera's batteries are running low. Sarah cries for Erin as the crash of a tentacle hitting the ground is heard, ending the film, indicating that the reporters were crushed by the monster and were among the thousands, if not millions, killed.
The few reviews of the film posted online have been extremely negative.[2][3][4] A particularly infamous review was made by Dread Central, which habitual Asylum film critic Scott "The Foywonder" Foy did as an audio file in a parody of the "found footage" concept used by the movie: in this case, the file consists of Foy giving his thoughts on the movie while at the same time pretending to be slowly going insane due to the movie's abysmal quality culminating in him apparently jumping out of a window.[5] Foy would later state that some people actually thought his "insanity" was real[6] and would also name Monster the "Worst Direct To DVD Horror Movie of 2008" in a later podcast.[7]