Monkey Love

I really wondered how this got made. The real genius here is the person that designed the DVD case. The producers owe all there money to this person. The Video would have been Awful but the writing got better. First video? What happened here, couldn't afford to do the transfer? The acting was questionable at best. The Girl (Amy Stewart)is cute, but in the beginning of the movie she had a whole different look. She got much better looking as the film went on. The one guy (Jeremy Renner) had this weird Corey Haim look but only if Corey Haim tried to look like James Dean. The sex scenes were videoed so bad, I wondered if the director ever saw a sex scene in a movie before.

I could not bring myself to sit through the entire 135 minutes. My wife and I were both bored soon after the film started. The acting was over dramatic and unrealistic. Perhaps the fight scene was supposed to be funny as well as the behavior of Amy's parents. The Amy's performance was satisfactory but her two friends over reacted in many of the scenes which made it unbelievable.

Where other films were shot on a dolly this film was hand held. DVD sound quality was acceptable and even. The cinematography was clear and sharp. Continuity was acceptable. It reminds me of the student films created in a 8mm cinematography class I took 30 years ago. The story could have been told in 30 minutes.

My first impression watching Monkey Love was that the characters were shallow. Based mostly on excessive use of the "F" word, which is a little hard on my sensibilities. Ten minutes into the movie, I was hooked on the frustrations and feelings of young single people trying to cope with mixed emotions. There are a couple of insane characters in the movie and cuts to silent films, leading to a surreal emotional state in the middle of the show. I found the ending completely satisfying. Overall, I liked the film and came away well entertained and felt good.

This movie is so bad I can hardly contain myself. I feel like less of a person for watching the whole thing.

The performances appeared atrociously bad because of the student-project feel that oozes from the inexplicable, horrible choice of shooting to VIDEO(!!!!) instead of film, and more so because of the follow-up stinky editing. Sudden bursts of emotion seemed totally out of place. The story flow was totally disjointed. I could not care about the characters at all. I hated them for being in such a bad movie. The movie didn't know if it was quirky or funny or serious or romantic. The ending was jaw-droppingly shallow.

The car kidnap/ fight scene was comically bad. I mean, downright funny bad. I watched the scene again to see if I had just seen what I thought I did. It was even worse the second time around.

I could go on and on. This movie stinks. Bad.

Some serious questions: How do movies like this get made? It's like seeing a misused apostrophe on a neon sign. How can anybody be involved in something like this and not know how awful it is going to turn out?

Unbelievable.

Watched it on cable TV in 2020 during covid-19 pandemic. Wasn't sure if this was a student-diploma movie or a "normal" movie.... Either ways it was bad, very poor directed and filmed, very poor acting. It lacked on so many levels that I am wondering how even they let this movie hit the public? It brings nothing to the film arts.

I was amazed when discovered this movie was filmed in 2002, it looked like an early 70's movie. Jeremy Renner looked like he's 18 y.o. in this one, but he is 31. lol

It was bad, but I've seen worse. My rating 2/10.