Film Review - A Monster Calls (12A)

How does this story begin? With a boy too old to be a kid, too young to be a man.

Now here's a true original to start the year - a fantasy film with more struggle and heartbreak than many dramas that limit themselves to pure realism. Question is, for all that it's marketed as a family film, who's it really aimed at in the end? I'm still not sure.

A Monster Calls tells the story of twelve-year-old Conor O'Malley, a lad who we learn early on is struggling to cope with his mother's devastating illness. Dad is nowhere to be seen, Grandma is austere and distant, and school has traumas of its own, so Conor conjures up a friend from his young artist's imagination - a giant fearsome tree-man. As imaginary friends go, the tree monster is terrifying, voiced with Liam Neeson's growly lower register and sharing some decidedly comfort-free stories with the boy. So begins Conor's tough journey towards understanding and some kind of hope at the hands of his unsettling, self-uprooted mentor.

For a children's story involving a talking tree, A Monster Calls is unflinching in its portrayal of a boy's pain. Young actor Lewis MacDougall has a natural pathos as Conor, whether when he's brooding silently or raging against the demands life has placed upon his schoolboy shoulders. Equally affecting is Rogue One's Felicity Jones as Conor's ailing mother, conveying bravery and compassion, tinged with fear more for her boy than for herself. The situation they portray is quietly heart-rending.

The supporting performances are good here too. Sigourney Weaver is strong and brittle as Gran (try to get past her wonky Brit accent), and Toby Kebbell plays Conor's absentee dad as likeable, if rendered utterly helpless. Neeson meanwhile rumbles with authority and menace as the 'monster', while Conor either quails in fear or rails against the lessons he must learn. All the cast tackle the subject matter squarely - too squarely perhaps for younger viewers. The screenplay's grimness is unleavened by much humour and even the magical elements can prove as dark as the reality.

Ultimately it's the film's sheer physical beauty, along with its compassion, that redeems it from despair. Director J.A.Bayona (of Asian tsunami drama The Impossible) selects and frames every shot to perfection and the cinematography is glorious throughout. Both mother and son are artistic, the sketches and water-colours they have created evolving into vivid animations as the monster tells his stories. The monster himself is spectacularly realised, volcanic fire glowering beneath the creature's gnarly frame, and every movement suggesting his awesome power. Stirring stuff, particularly when monster and boy join forces in carrying out some cathartic destruction.

A Monster Calls is a fascinating, difficult film. The story from which it was adapted stemmed from writer Siobhan Dowd, who was as gravely ill as Conor's mother when she conceived the tale, perhaps explaining its striking honesty and psychological weight. Hope is hard-earned here, and older cinema-goers with a love of gorgeously crafted film might be a more natural audience than children of Conor's age. Unless, that it, those children are unlucky enough to know what he's going through. 

This film is no cheap tear-jerker. It feels, and it feels with depth.