A Monsters hit

If you take what Warner Bros spent on broomsticks for Harry Potter 7, slightly more than double it and you have the entire film budget for Gareth Edwards' Monsters. Which when you watch the film is gobsmaking.

A low budget monster flick should by all accounts be cliched, cheesy, amateurish and well a bit dodgy but this one isn't. The story is set six years after samples of alien life were accidentally dumped in northern Mexico and subsequently grew up into fully fledged alien life forms. The area has been quarantined, huges walls built and there is a growing battle to contain them.

Magazine photographer Andrew Caulder is in Mexico trying to get the one shot that will earn him lot of cash. However, he is tasked with getting Samantha, the tourist daughter of his publishing house boss back from Mexico after an incident with an escaped alien leaves her slightly injured.

On paper it appears predictable but there are several things that raise this film above and beyond. First is its reportage style which gives it an edge of realism. OK so the idea of aliens on earth is fantastical but this movie feels like it could be real. Edwards shot everything on location, often without getting permission first, drafting in people that happened to be around to make up the extra characters.

Secondly much of the dialogue is improvised. In an interview Edwards said that the dialogue had to feel natural to the two actors and was aided by the fact that Skoot McNairy and Whitney Able who play Andrew and Samantha are a real life couple. It was a conscious decision to cast a couple to get genuine chemistry and in doing so Edwards has succeeded in avoiding contrived speech.

The film is as much an 'are they/aren't they going to get together' as it is an 'are they aren't they going to get back to American in one piece' story. The romantic strand to the story, like the aliens doesn't feel forced. Edwards also shies away from giving you too much of Andrew and Samantha's back story leaving the audience to fill in the gaps which is refreshing.

The aliens themselves aren't hidden away but are there to see right from the outset in all their created-on-a-computer-in-Edwards-bedroom glory. And they are a testament to just what can be achieved with relatively cheep software.

Monsters seems to be grabbing the critics and discerning film goers alike with a rating of 72% out of 120 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. On Metacritic of the 10 reviews counted it got 62/100 with a user rating of 8.5/10.

It gets a Rev Stan rating of 4 stars out of 5. So go on, support independent, low budget film-making at its best and go and see it. It is Christmas after all and unlike most of what you unrwrap on December 25, you won't be disappointed.