It could be worse.
At least the kid has a roof over his head … sometimes. Where he sleeps, on the floor, with a couple dozen other folks.
At least he has a job … donning a monkey mask, climbing into a ring and getting beat up in front of jeering, bottle-throwing fans. And hey, if he bleeds? He gets a nice little bonus.
At least he—um … at least he …
OK, so maybe things can’t get that much worse. In the have-and-have-not world of Mumbai, Kid is certainly a have-not. In a country where family is so important, he has none. The only family he had, his mother, was killed years earlier during a vicious attack on his community, murdered as the terrified boy watched.
But while Kid may not have much, he has a dream—one that keeps him alive, keeps him moving forward. A dream to destroy everyone responsible for his mother’s death: the man who killed her. The man who let him off his leash. The corrupt institutions that made it all possible.
But such dreams of red-slick revenge don’t come true without a plan. Kid has one of those, too. One, he’ll need a gun. Two, he’ll need another job—not just any job, but one that gives him access to Mumbai’s most exclusive enclave, one filled with high-grade drugs, high-end prostitutes and all the high-placed people whom Kid wants to kill.
Taking a beating, night after night, is part of the plan. Every rupee he earns brings him closer to buying that all-important gun, that lead-filled equalizer.
So he puts on the mask. Shakes his arms. Climbs into the ring while the drunken crowd screams for his blood.
He’ll give them what they want. Maybe a tooth if they’re lucky. He knows the blood he leaves on that dirty canvas will be dwarfed by the blood he’ll take.
We can understand Kid’s desire to kill the people who killed his mother—even if we can’t praise that appetite for vengeance. But the love that powers that desire? Yeah, we can get behind that. Even now, Kid remains devoted to her—and we get an inkling of why.
In flashback, we see the tight, loving relationship between mother and child. Though Kid was probably around 10 years old when he lost his mom, she still passed on some really nice lessons to her little boy—instilling in him a sense of strength and resilience that’ll come in very handy. And when attackers descend upon him and his mother’s house, Mom does her very best to protect Kid—even though she’s well aware that she’s in grave danger herself.
When Kid becomes an adult, he proves to loyal, resourceful and absolutely dedicated to the task at hand—attributes echoed in another monkey/man we’ll talk about below.
“You are my Hanuman,” Kid’s mother tells him at one point. And this may be the single most important line of dialogue in the entire movie.
Hanuman is a Hindu god represented as half-monkey, half-man. He’s a hugely popular deity in Hinduism, and his character embodies loyalty, self-control and utter commitment to a cause. These attributes are pretty critical in Kid’s story. (Also fitting: Some Hindu literature suggests he’s the patron deity of the martial arts.)
But the symbolism goes deeper, with the film suggesting that Kid’s own journey mirrors Hanuman’s own origin story, in a sense. Hanuman, we’re told, once tried to take a bite out of the sun as a child, thinking it was a mango. The gods were not pleased, and they punished Hanuman (and in some Hindu legends even killed him).
Monkey Man suggests that, for much of Kid’s journey, he and this humbled Hanuman echo each other’s stories. And Kid’s journey of endurance, self-discovery and redemption seems to include elements of Hanuman’s own rehabilitation: The gods gave him a number of boons, including speed, strength and immortality. And while Monkey Man never suggests that Kid is actually immortal, he certainly becomes quite strong, quite fast and survives wounds that others say should’ve killed him. “The gods must have a greater plan for you,” he’s told.
But if someone was to just step in and out of the movie at critical intervals, that someone might mistake Monkey Man as having Christian elements. Kid’s mother rears Kid to be deeply faithful, and together they pledge their love and devotion to one god and call him their savior. That god, in these recitations, is never namechecked as Hanuman specifically, and sometimes Kid talks about how he prays to “God,” with an uppercase G. These moments can give Monkey Man a sometimes quasi-Christian tang.
Another Hindu deity plays an important role in Monkey Man: Ardhanarishvara is the combined manifestation of Shiva (a very important Hindu deity, and the god of destruction) and his consort, Parvati (a deity that illustrates the balance of male and female energy). Kid spends several days or weeks in a shrine dedicated to the latter god/goddess, and he bows before a statue representing the deity (one half of which is obviously designed to look masculine, the other obviously feminine).
In the seedy fight club where Kid dons his mask, the owner references the eclectic mix of faiths likely represented there, including Hindus, Muslims and Buddhists. “There may even be a closet Christian,” he says, to a round of lusty boos. But all of those present actually worship one main god in what he calls this sacred space: “The Indian rupee!”
A seemingly pious religious leader preaches nonviolence and becomes a major player in some upcoming elections. He engages in plenty of reverent ceremonies and displays loads of false humility, but he’s revealed as a hypocrite.
We hear about Shiva elsewhere, particularly in reference to his role as a cosmic destroyer. (One worshiper notes that from Shiva, “I learned that you need to destroy in order to grow—to bring about new life.”)
We see dozens of depictions of various Hindu gods and demons—from paintings to puppet shows. Warriors don outfits that identify themselves as (I think) blue-skinned demons.
We mentioned the shrine of Ardhanarishvara in the last section: Now we must mention that the majority of the shrine’s devotees would identify as transgender. The group’s leader, Alpha, is a fairly burly middle-aged man who wears makeup and dresses in women’s clothing, and he gently talks about how some are threatened by the attributes of Ardhanarishvara.
A musician who also lives in the temple plays a pair of drums—one symbolizing man, another woman—and how the two must be played in harmony to truly make music. (Kid boxes to the rhythm of the drums—perhaps designed to suggest to moviegoers that he’s tapping into his own duality in order to exponentially improve his ability.) We hear news reporters discuss the intolerance shown by a political candidate to minorities within India—at one point specifically namechecking the trans community.
The manager of the club at the heart of the story also manages an assortment of expensive call girls (perhaps victims of human trafficking) who entertain the club’s extraordinarily wealthy clientele. They wear sultry eveningwear (most of which reveals at least some cleavage), and some clients indeed take advantage of these women in very public areas. We don’t see any nudity in these scenes, but one man does reach between an unwilling entertainer’s legs, while another snorts cocaine off a woman’s thigh. (It should be noted that Hanuman is traditionally portrayed as celibate, and Kid is revolted by the activities he sees.)
Another, lower-class brothel does include a nude scene, wherein a woman and man are engaged in sex for a split second before being interrupted by a pair of fighting men. (We see the two intimately engaged characters from the side.) Other men and women cavort in the dim-colored lights.
Men make some ribald comments about call girls. Someone jokes about another character’s inability to have sex (using some crass terminology). When Kid strips off his shirt to punch a punching bag, he hears some hoots of approval from onlookers.
We’ve already unpacked a lot, obviously. But this section is what the film is really all about. We chronicle every instance of violence, but a few elements deserve special attention. And the first comes with a …
[Spoiler Warning] We know that Kid’s mother dies. But we only learn, in a flashback about two-thirds of the way through the movie exactly how it happened. Rana, an important police chief, enters the home of Kid’s mother, clearly with the intent of raping her. The woman fends off her attacker initially by slicing his ear with a knife, but Rama beats her and chokes her into submission, before pouring gas on the woman and lighting her—and the house—on fire. (Kid bears some horrific scars on his hands, which we ultimately learn were caused by him trying to save his mother.)
Kid’s in-ring fights can also be brutal. After the first, he feels around his mouth for broken teeth and spits out gobs of blood. Elsewhere, he battles a near-giant with a club wrapped in barbed wire. (He wins the fight, and the crowd seems to encourage him to kill his adversary with the club, but Kid drops the weapon instead.)
But things really get cranking outside the arena. Characters and lackeys are dispatched in all manner of creative, brutal ways. One guy is basically beaten to death with a woman’s shoe. Another suffers an axe wound to the neck. Kid slowly pushes a knife into someone’s neck and, when his hand can push no farther, he grabs the knife’s handle with his teeth to finish the job.
Combatants die via gun, knife, sandal, microwave oven door and silver platter. Someone’s thumb is cut/crushed off a hand via said platter and used to provide a critical thumbprint. Someone nearly drowns. A bullet wound severely injures someone and is messily stitched up. Pieces of broken bathroom furniture serve as bludgeons. A hand gets skewered by an awl. Someone suffers a couple of terrible wounds and coughs up blood and gore. Fireworks become effective weapons.
We hear that someone’s scrotum was cut off. Someone snorts bleach, thinking it was cocaine. (He survives the experience, though his nose does bleed.) A painting depicts a massive mythical battle, with Hanuman as the composition’s central character. A seriously disgusting toilet bowl becomes something of a weapon during a fight sequence. A manager appears to discuss an unplanned pregnancy with a weeping call girl, with the manager reassuring her that the “problem” will be taken care of when a certain doctor returns to town.
About 65 f-words, at least two s-words and a couple of other stray profanities, including several uses of “a–” and one or two of “b–ch.”
While staying at the shrine of Ardhanarishvara, Alpha encourages Kid to undergo a drug-induced trial to help him figure out his future path. “The pain, it will leave you once it’s finished teaching you,” Alpha says. (The drug, blown into Kid’s face, leads to an extended flashback sequence.)
As a waiter serving the club’s rich clientele in an uber-exclusive VIP room, Kid serves guests flasks of cocaine. He also serves wine, champagne and other alcoholic beverages, and one guest takes him to task for pouring red wine in a white wine glass.
Monkey Man focuses much of its narrative on social issues and inequality—and the corrupt, unfeeling people at the heart of much of Mumbai’s suffering. Police officers are considered to be the most corrupt individuals of all.
But Kid himself is aided by a supposed wheelchair beggar who swipes a woman’s wallet and, after a couple of blocks, stands up and runs down the street. (The wallet changes hands nearly a dozen times before reaching Kid, suggesting a huge network of underprivileged people who don’t mind lending a hand to a theft; Kid himself later returns the purse.)
When Netflix bought the rights to Monkey Man in 2021, it described Dev Patel’s directorial debut as “John Wick in Mumbai.”
But when horror auteur Jordan Peele saw the film, he saw something more. His own films are notable for their social undercurrents, and Monkey Man has plenty of those—from economic inequality and caste conflicts to trans rights and violent societal revolution.
And all of this is anchored by the Hindu stories that Patel remembers from his grandfather.
“Hanuman really captivated me,” the actor told the Hindustan Times. “He has been sort of an emblem for my father and many in my family. … When you go deep into it, he is sort of a guy who has lost faith in himself and had to be reminded of who he was.”
You can’t fault the movie for its ambitions. But for its extreme content? Yeah, we have something to say about that.
From the get-go, Monkey Man is not made for families—certainly not families inclined to check out Plugged In for entertainment advice. The film does feel like a John Wick movie, to be sure. But while the Wick franchise is stylish and silly (in its own bloody, R-rated way), Monkey Man comes with a grim, blood-slick seriousness that makes it more of a critical charmer, but less fun.
Some of the issues it champions are controversial and perhaps even offensive. But its solution—to wage merciless war against its admittedly heinous array of villains—seems even more problematic. This is a revenge-soaked fantasy that thumbs its nose at Mahatma Gandhi’s pleas for nonviolence and suggests, instead, that the most satisfying solutions end with severed limbs and pierced foreheads.
Hanuman is something of a superhero in Hindu culture—even starring in a series of comic books. But Kid, Hanuman’s alter-ego in Monkey Man—reminds us of another side of what monkeys can be, especially when in unfamiliar territory. They can become aggressive. They can fling filth. They show no restraint, they show no mercy.
Kid is no moral, conscientious Hanuman. He is feral. And he’s liable to chew a face off.
Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.
