Monkey Up
Directed by Robert Vince
How would I describe Monkey Up? It’s the unimaginable horror that comes about when a person whose only real “hits” are talking animal movies hears the infinite monkey theorem but all he takes from it is “monkey” and “Shakespeare”. That’s right folks, it’s another Robert Vince movie, but this time a monkey wants to act in Shakespearean plays. Buckle up, this one’s going to be a trip.
Meet Monty! Also Meet These Other People.
So to start off, our protagonist is the talking monkey Monty, the spokesprimate for the popular soda Monkey Up, who wants to transition from being in commercials to having a film career. Simultaneously in New Jersey, there’s a family that just moved to town because the mom is the newly appointed president of a toy company in New York City. Why did they move to New Jersey if it’d be way easier for the mom to not commute like that everyday, especially with all her newfound responsibilities as a company president? Stop asking questions, that’s why. Why did the dad quit his job as a successful high powered lawyer to be a writer even though he’s never written anything fictional before? What’d I just say about asking questions? Well I’ll accept one question: How does Monty fit into this? He absconds from the Monkey Up set and ends up in this family’s house to learn about the true meaning of familial love. I’m not kidding, that is his actual reason. Barf.
About Those People…
Aside from the parents’ careers being plot points we also have the two kids, Ethan and Sophie, and their extracurricular activities. Ethan wants to audition for the middle school (I’m assuming) play, which is of course Romeo and Juliet, and he wants to be Romeo. Does he have a genuine interest in theatre? Absolutely not. This is to impress the hot neighbor girl who’s also auditioning for the play. Is she even auditioning for the role of Juliet? You can make the assumption she is based off every sappy 90s sitcom plot this is ripped from but we’re never actually shown any proof of that happening. Regardless, this kid should definitely not get the part because a monkey has to call him via headphones to coach him through his audition. You think he’s remembering his lines opening night?
They’re Not That Interesting…
Meanwhile Sophie is in gymnastics classes despite being so afraid of heights that standing on a balance beam freaks her out. This raises a few questions. First and foremost, how do you not know your own kid well enough to not know of her debilitating fear of heights? Secondly, if the parents did know and are forcing their kid to do it anyway does that count as a form of child abuse? Honestly it couldn’t have been too bad because a week or so of monkey encouragement cures her fear pretty quick. The reason for that though is probably because the purpose of Sophie’s entire character can be summed up as, ‘child teaches jerk of a monkey that family is the greatest treasure’. Which is garbage, because her family totally sucks.
But Is There A Plot? No? Okay, Carry On.
Obviously the villains at the Monkey Up soda company don’t like being down a mascot so they spend the entire movie trying to get Monty back. Shenanigans ensue. There’s a chase sequence with the evil Monkey Up director and Monty’s rarely mentioned siblings in the Monkey Up factory after Monty gets taken. No laughs were had this day, and not just because this movie isn’t the least bit funny. It’s entirely unoriginal, and while it occasionally dips into the trend of referencing things being taken as a joke the real horror is the stitched together fragments of about four different Robert Vince movie plots except instead of dogs it has monkeys.
Pure Sitcom Goodness(?)
Robert Vince might be perpetually stuck in the 90s. All the plot points with the family sound like an alien was given nothing but 90s family sitcoms to watch and then told to write a script. It’s abundantly clear that Robert Vince doesn’t have siblings with the way he writes the siblings in this movie. An exchange that made me furious between Monty and Sophie was an offhand joke, and I use that term loosely, about Monty wanting to recast the brother. Sophie’s reaction is a literal speech about how he’s a precious member of the family that they could never get rid of.
Maybe They Could Have Done This…Ah Forget About It.
This is a prime example of everything wrong with this movie, there are moments where there could be character development outside of the little archetypal boxes that Robert Vince plucked these characters from and they’re never utilized. If the 12 year old neighbor girl recognized a famous director later in the movie, why not have her going out for a behind the scenes role, like stage manager, to give her a more well rounded character? Or after the dad can’t write a courtroom drama he realizes that writing isn’t for him, and that he shouldn’t have quit a job he was good at to chase after a childhood dream.
WHY ROBERT WHY?
There are a lot of questions that get raised but no real answers for any of those questions. If Monty has the higher brain function to speak in full english sentences and comprehend Shakespeare well enough to have memorized Romeo’s “what light” soliloquy why is he considered a pet? Why, after we’ve seen that all the animals in this movie can talk do none of them have rights? How does the dad have an editor and an advanced payment if this is his debut novel and he hasn’t even written any of it yet? If the mom is the president of this toy company why is she in charge of planning a charity gala? Why is there a reference to Cyrano de Bergerac? Who is this movie for? Why does Robert Vince keep making terrible talking animal movies?
WHY DO YOU TORMENT ME LIKE THIS ROBERT VINCE?!
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