Monster Summer
Review by Mark Woodring
It’s Spooky Season, even for kids and young adults, which means we’re destined to get some “less dark” material hitting theaters.
**NOTE: You can read Mark’s review below, then use the links to listen or watch as he and Ryan discuss the movie in more depth. Remember, though, you can listen to all our discussions of this and every other movie directly over on ACAST. Stay tuned.**
97 Minutes, Rated PG-13
Written by Bryan Schulz, Cornelius Uliano
Directed by David Henrie
Synopsis:
When a mysterious force begins to disrupt their big summer fun, Noah and his friends team up with a retired police detective to embark on a monstrous adventure to save their island.
Monster Summer is such a movie.
Not too dark, but not too fluffy.
Director David Henrie, himself a child star for Disney in such properties as The Wizards of Waverly Place and That’s So Raven (both supernatural… hmmm), presents a tale which borders on Stranger Things sense of nostalgia, although it’s far more contemporary.
On a beautiful tourist trap of an island, young Noah is an aspiring journalist, whose attempts at writing hard-hitting investigative pieces keep being shut down by the local newspaper editor, played by Kevin James.
Imagine his sense of luck (?) when one of his friends turns up missing for a few hours, and the girl he was with says they were attacked by a witch!
His friend, Ben, reappears, but he’s now in a not-quite-catatonic state. He can talk and respond, but slowly, as if he’s in a constant state of half-sleep.
Noah feels compelled to investigate, and rounds up his other two friends, Sammy and Eugene, to help him, despite their reluctance to believe in witches.
What follows hits most of the standard “kids investigate a crime” tropes: misidentification, general malfeasance, and of course, recruiting the creepy old guy shunned by the town because… things.
[Side note: Mel Gibson plays Gene, the disgraced and shunned police officer as if he were Martin Riggs but had never gone nuts.]
Slowly unfolding, Monster Summer gives glimpses into the witch’s (yes, the witch is real) methods and desires, but I promise, you’ll never see the ending coming.
It’s either weirdly clever or just weird, but either way, I didn’t see it coming (though it did put me in mind of a riddle Kevin Costner posed in the classic Tin Cup).
By the end of the film, the kids win, the witch loses, and all is right with the world.
So, I guess Monster Summer is… fine? I mean, it’s pretty non-controversial. I can’t imagine anyone being upset by anything in here. But that also means it’s pretty forgettable. It’s not legitimately scary enough for older teens, but it’s just dark enough to maybe scare small children.
Monster Summer is here for Spooky Season, but it’ll be gone just as quickly.
Maybe it will show back up next year on one streaming service or another, but I doubt this will become a Halloween classic.
Monster Summer is in theaters now and stars Mason Thames, Mel Gibson, Lorraine Bracco, Kevin James, Patrick Renna, Abby James Witherspoon, Lilah Pate, Julian Lerner, and Noah Cottrell.
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