MOVIE NEWS – Dev Patel burst into the public consciousness with Ghetto Millionaire, received his Oscar nomination for The Lion and was a great success also in productions such as Eastern tranquility – Marigold Hotel and its sequel, and Hotel Mumbai. Indian-born Briton Patel is billed as an iconic dramatic actor, so it’s a huge surprise that he’s next up with a gut-wrenching action flick, Monkey Man , which admittedly it evokes the world of John Wick. (The company that made John Wick, Thunder Road is one of the producers of Monkey Man.)

The Monkey Man is a revenge drama based on an ancient Indian legend featuring the invincible monkey god as a protector of the poor and downtrodden. The hero, portrayed by Patel and simply called Kid, first wants to take revenge on his mother’s killer, but along the way he realizes that he has to oppose the entire corrupted system by all means in order to bring justice to the victims.

Sometimes character actors get into action movies and do well, for example Liam Neeson (Kidnapped series) or Denzel Washington (The Defenders series), because whoever has the talent for it, you can learn how to move like a martial artist. But with Dev Patel, the situation is different. He has been practicing karate – taekwondo – since he was a child, as a teenager he already competed in martial arts competitions as a black belt, and in 2004 he won a bronze medal in the world championship. He already showed off his martial arts skills in one of his films, The Last Airbender. In 2012, his master, Stuart Anslow, told The Standard: “Dev doesn’t just pretend to be a fighter, he really is, we’re very proud of him. Many parents enroll their children in karate to release their energy and gain confidence, but Dev came to us because he loves what he does. By the way, as far as I know, his best fight scenes were cut from Airbender because it’s still a fantasy and not an action movie, so I think Dev deserves a real martial arts movie.”

The master’s words turned out to be a prophecy. The well-deserved film, Apeman, has been in labor since 2018. When the project started coming together, it was originally supposed to be presented by one of the streaming providers. During post-production, however, it was already apparent: the result was so great that it has a place on the big screen.

(Monkey Man – domestic premiere: April 4, 2024.)

Source: UIP