Blue Monkey

There are no monkeys in this cheesy horror film, blue or otherwise; what we do get is a giant killer bug terrorising the occupants of a hospital under quarantine.

The film opens with handyman Fred pricking his hand on a rare Micronesian plant and collapsing soon after. Fred is rushed to the hospital where doctors are surprised to see a giant maggot emerge from the man's mouth. When the maggot is cut open, an insect emerges, which is trapped under a glass container for later examination.

Meanwhile, Detective Jim Bishop (Steve Railsback) is waiting for news about his partner Oscar, who has been shot. While Oscar is on the operating table, Dr. Rachel Carson (Gwyneth Walsh) gives Jim a tour of the hospital, including its high-tech laser research laboratory, which you can bet your bottom dollar comes into play during the film's finale.

Also guaranteed to be a major plot point: the network of old, deserted tunnels used as a playground by four of the hospital's youngest patients (health and safety be damned!).

Speaking of the film's four troublesome tykes, it is their actions that cause the insect to grow to immense proportions, the dumb kids discovering the bug trapped under glass and feeding it with NAC-5, an experimental growth promoter. Doh!

Given the schlocky nature of the film's plot, I had hoped that Blue Monkey would be a huge helping of gory B-movie fun, with plenty of creature effects; unfortunately, there is more goop than gore, and the killer insect doesn't get much screen time until the final act, when it finally gets to run amok (chewing off a guy's head in the movie's bloodiest moment -- if only there had been more of this kind of mayhem!).

Director William Fruet's direction is uninspired, borrowing heavily from James Cameron's Aliens, but without that film-maker's style and imagination (or his budget!). There's lots of crawling around dark passages and blue-lit tunnels, and shots of the characters running for their lives while being chased by the scuttling bug, but perhaps the most blatant crib comes when the bug's larvae emerge to feed on still-living human victims trapped in gelatinous cocoons.

As this sort of silliness goes, Blue Monkey is passable B-movie fun, but with more gore and more bug action it could have been great.

4.5/10, rounded up to 5 for IMDb.

Blue monkey is actually mentioned in the film but not in any way that makes any possible sense. At one point,some kids are wandering thru the deeper levels, exploring.

They begin to discuss what they'll find down there and one of them (a girl) says she bets they'll find a blue monkey.

Yes, thats it. Totally inconsequential to the story, the only sad connection to the title, and no idea why she would suppose she'd find a blue monkey in a hospital's basement.

I'm embarrassed for having remembered it but somebody had to remember I suppose!

I recently watched the Canadian film 🇨🇦 Blue Monkey (1987) on Tubi. The storyline follows a hospital that admits a patient with a mysterious insect bite. Before long, an outbreak of deadly insects spreads throughout the facility. Now, local law enforcement must find a way to contain and destroy the creatures before they escape and threaten the world.

Directed by William Fruet (The House by the Lake), the film stars Steve Railsback (The Stunt Man), Gwynyth Walsh (The Crush), John Vernon (Animal House), and Sarah Polley (Dawn of the Dead).

This is another sci-fi/horror hybrid that's clearly an Alien knockoff-complete with strobe-lit creature reveals and incubation pods. The practical effects and creature design are solid, and the film delivers a few satisfying kills toward the end.

In conclusion, Blue Monkey isn't great, but it has enough worthwhile elements to keep horror enthusiasts engaged. I'd score it a 5/10.

This low budget sci-fi tries to incorporate so many elements from "Alien", "The Thing", "Arachnophobia", "Mimic" and "Them", it should be called "Blue Ripoff"!

I know, I know... this film pre-dates "Arachnophobia" and "Mimic", but the "mutated insect-out-of-control, rampaging-through-a-decrepit hospital" idea provides little chills, little suspense, and a lot of sympathy for health insurance litigation. The casting was erratic at best (c'mon...Joe Flaherty and Robin Duke of SCTV fame?) and though the pace was fairly quick in the right places, you still had the sense that too much was crammed into too little a film all too late. The name, "Blue Monkey"?? What's with that? Probably a red herring only the writer and director are aware of.

It's easy to see why the movie received poor reviews. The screenwriting overall is not very good, although the direction is for the most part not too bad. Some of the attempts at humor are more silly than actually funny.

Although there are a few capable people in the cast, some of the other actors and actresses in this one are not so good.

The title "Blue Monkey" made no sense, since the creatures are neither blue nor monkeys. It should perhaps have been titled "Insect" instead.

That being said, it is well-paced and keeps one's attention. When I watched it, there were no parts when I felt like fast-forwarding ahead. For all it's flaws, to be fair, it is a somewhat entertaining film.