Monster

“The enemy of art is the absence of limitations.” (Orson Welles)

Any creative endeavour, whether art, music, writing or dance, is no mean feat. Filmmaking is especially demanding, a medium that throws up obstacles without needing an invitation.

Yet as Welles understood, art sometimes needs boundaries. Limitations can be exactly what makes something unique, and what allows it to thrive.

Writer/director Finn O’Toole and his team have embraced that idea with their short film Monster. Conceived as “an exercise in creative restraint”, Monster shows that even when you box yourself in, getting the fundamentals right will often produce the most effective results.

In the film itself, our unnamed protagonist arrives home clearly perturbed, with something evidently not as it should be. As they try to sleep and escape their worries, a haunting figure looms nearby. But what appears to be yet another ghost story soon reveals itself as a poignant study of mental health struggles and self-acceptance.

O’Toole and his team set themselves a challenge: five minutes, a three-page script, one actor, one location and absolutely no dialogue whatsoever. No problem.

There are a few elements worth shouting out. Firstly, three pages isn’t a lot to work with, but O’Toole achieves exactly what he sets out to do on every one. If there’s one criticism, it’s that those self-imposed limits inevitably leave you wondering what more could have been done. But as already mentioned, that isn’t the exercise here, and it’s powerful while it lasts. At no point are you left alone to figure out what’s happening or what the film is trying to say, which is damned impressive without the running time or set-up other films get the luxury of.

The film initially plays out as a tense horror, and the way it builds that tension, and honestly a bit of fear, is so, so clever. The effects team deserve some of the biggest kudos here, backed by some masterful cinematography. Even more impressive is how effortlessly it then switches tone, never jarringly, turning into something else entirely but no less effective, and landing a hefty emotional punch at the end.

Final plaudits go to Christina’s solid solo performance. She captures the essence of every moment, making sure that, in the absence of dialogue, everything is said through her actions. It’s show, don’t tell at its finest.

Self-restrained it may have been, but Monster is a noteworthy example of how getting the basics right can take you a long way.