Intensity: 🩸.5 out of 🩸🩸🩸🩸🩸
Directed by Caroline Lindy
Your Monster is that rare Horror Rom-Com that succeeds on multiple levels. It takes the breakup film and mashes it up with the Beauty and the Beast and Imaginary Friend tropes. And then it pours madness sauce on top. Familiar tropes all, but this is propelled along by the strongest performance in Melissa Barrera’s career to date. The comedy hits. The romance is likable and endearing. And, though it saves the horror for quite a long stretch, Your Monster eventually delivers a great coup de grace of horror.
I have in the past described horror musicals as a rare breed. The Horror Rom-Com surpasses that sub-genre when it comes to the difficulty of narrative. The Rom-Com is inherently a feel-good movie genre. Of course, rom-coms skew strongly towards the female experience, with an inordinate proportion of these films using the woman as the protagonist. Know your audience! When you pair this up with horror, there is a risk of incongruity of messaging. If we are being honest with ourselves, the horror audience and the rom-com audience are often two very different camps. Please one set and you very well may alienate the other.
The most notable horror rom-com efforts include the recent Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Human, Extra Ordinary, and Warm Bodies. These movies succeed on all three levels. I am always measuring films by the connection I find with the protagonists. For a romantic comedy, those stakes are even more profound. If you don’t fall in love with your romantic leads, forget it. No amount of horror is going to save it. Even IF you manage that part, it’s got to be funny and tap into something more meaningful. Sadly, Lisa Frankenstein is an example of how NOT to execute a horror rom-com.
Here’s the good news: the Your Monster pairing works wonderfully.
The Cast of Your Monster:
- Melissa Barrera plays Laura Franco, a young actress and a cancer survivor. She falls into a funk after her boyfriend dumps her as she returns home from recovery.
- Tommy Dewy plays Monster, Laura’s cantankerous childhood monster in the closet.
- Edmund Donovan plays Jacob Sullivan, Laura’s ambitious former boyfriend who is opening a big Broadway musical.
- Meghann Fahy plays Jackie Dennon, a star actress who has been given the lead in Jacob’s musical… a role that was written for Laura.
- Kayla Foster plays Mazie Silverberg, Laura’s best friend. Mazie is an actor like Laura, and she is trying out for Jacob’s musical.
A Short Summary
Life should be turning around for the better for Laura Franco. She just completed her therapy for cancer treatment, with a bill of good health. However, during what should have been a moment of celebration, her boyfriend Jacob decided that their relationship was no longer tenable, and he broke up with her at the hospital discharge. The two of them had been working on “House of Good Women”, a musical number where Sarah was to be the star.
Instead, Sarah is left without a boyfriend, without work prospects, and in a sorry state following her surgery. She has taken refuge in her mother’s New York townhome, where she grew up, and finds that an old nemesis has returned. Her childhood monster in a closet has taken up residence in the house too, and now freely roams the entire home. No longer quite as terrifying as he was to her as a child, he is nevertheless a menacing beast, doing whatever he wants in the house. Moreover, the monster wants Laura to leave, and that this place is his house now.
Though initially stunned by his appearance, Laura and the monster make an amiable truce in the house, though bickering like an old couple. Despite not getting a casting invitation, Laura musters the courage to try out for the musical, even though her best friend, Mazie, got an invite. Laura auditions for the lead. She discovers that Jacob gave the role to a more notable and more glamorous actress, Jackie. The role was written for Laura though, and it shows. Even Jacob recognizes this, and she is brought on as an understudy.
Old jealousies and new rivalries emerge, and Laura’s mental stability becomes questionable. Meanwhile, Laura and her monster (if he truly exists) develop an understanding of each other, that inevitably moves towards something romantic. Laura is reluctant to try and claim what she feels she deserves. But with some monster counseling, she decides to take a more aggressive approach, with the backing of tooth and claw.
EVALUATION OF YOUR MONSTER
This is a breakup revenge film, with a monster. Your Monster provides all the trappings of a traditional rom-com. The tropes include the jilted young woman, a questionable ex-boyfriend, the sad lows of being dumped, and the dogged climb back onto the… monster? In an interview with Deadline, director Caroline Lindy is very coy about whether the monster is real. Lindy offers up that, for Laura, Monster is real. There are a few “Mr. Snuffaluffagus” moments, where it is unclear whether anybody else in a crowded room can see Monster or not. Granted, Laura does dance with him at a Halloween party, which would allow him to blend in a bit. But if he is a pure figment of imagination his presence would represesent an unreliable narrator moment.
That would become very important late in the third act when the horror arrives. Whether the carnage is Monster or Laura (or both?) is an open question. Lindy is less concerned about the logistics, and by leaving the options open satisfies her storytelling. This is Laura’s story, and it ends in bloodshed, song, and dance. It’s all quite entertaining and satisfying too.
Melissa Barrera has been in a number of other recent horror movies. She has appeared in the two rebooted Scream franchise films, and Abigail. This is by far her most nuanced and appealing role. She plays the vulnerable heroine, the underdog, and it’s very endearing. That charm gets tested seriously when her mental health wanders from having a potential imaginary lover to actual aggressive mania. But that’s what you need to do to make it a horror film.
Tommy Dewey is a lot of fun as the rambunctious Monster. He is a bit naive, still graduating from childhood antagonist to sympathetic emotional bodyguard. Your Monster earns the romance. He would be a dream boyfriend for many a lonely disrespected young woman, even if he has been hoarding all your missing stuffed animals and unmatched socks. Monster may be a monster, but he’s certainly not unappealing. Check off romance on the shopping list.
CONCLUSION
Your Monster tackles familiar themes but does it very well. Laura is very appealing but flawed. The antagonists are believably thoughtless but they aren’t evil people. The denouement is shocking largely because the fates of several characters are an overreaction, even if satisfying for the audience. Jacob’s greatest sin might not be dumping Laura, but creating a cringey feminist empowerment musical given his wholly insensitive manner. Is he an insensitive dick? Yeah, but he’s less of a monster than Monster… except for Laura. The banter between Laura and Monster is a step above regular rom-com fare, with a different romantic power dynamic.
This has a chance to be a cult favorite, particularly for fans of movies like Warm Bodies. It pulls off the rom-com better than the horror, but it makes for a popcorn-worthy sofa watch. It also provides a lot of vicarious satisfaction if you are in romance rebound mode. Its fun, and sweet, with a nasty kick at the very end. Credit Tim Williams for writing convincing Broadway numbers (“My Stranger” in particular) and Melissa Barrera for nailing the numbers. That woman can sing! (I have added this as #10 on my Horror Musical Dead List!)
Your Monster received an R-rating from the MPAA for sexual content, violence, a little bit of gore, and a bunch of swearing. This content would be fine for most older teens. It is available on most streaming platforms.
Review by Eric Li
