Film Review: Monster is a stunning cinematic achievement

Monster.

• Monster
• ★★★★☆
• Cinema release

The winner of Best Screenplay and the Queer Palm at last year’s Cannes Festival, Monster (12A) stars Sakuro Andô as Saori, a mother horrified to discover her young son, Minamato (Soya Kurokawa), is being bullied by his schoolteacher, Mr Hori (Eita Nagayama).

But when Saori confronts the principal (Yuko Tanaka), she discovers the truth is nowhere as straightforward as she assumed.

Monster.

Written by Yuji Sakamoto and directed by Kore-eda Hirokazu, Monster is a beautifully nuanced film that effectively tells the same story from a number of conflicting perspectives, each successive retelling folding back into its predecessor and adding new layers of meaning and understanding.

At the story’s core is the poignant figure of the ostracised Yori (Hinata Hiiragi), a child who has been brutalised into believing he has a pig’s brain; the complex, tenderly rendered relationship between Yori and Minamato exerts a force of gravity that drags a host of uncomprehending adults into their self-contained lives to heart-wrenching effect.