Stories are Wild Creatures.

2016 was a shocking year for cinema with phenomenal box office busts and amazing little gems spread sparsely throughout. It was also just as shocking off screen with many beloved silver screen icons taking their final bows and departing our theatres for the last time. With these losses in mind we kick off the year with a film that above anything teaches us that it's okay to not be okay when we must say goodbye to those that hold a special place in our hearts.

Based on the book of the same name and penned by the same author, Patrick Ness's, A Monster Calls is a small but powerful look into the way we deal with grief and the inevitable knowledge that sometimes we are powerless to help the ones we love.

Whilst the basic story treads familiar boards of an everyday family dealing with a terminal trauma, seen in such films as 2009's My Sister's Keeper, and more recently The Fault in our Stars (2014).
Director J.A Bayona manages to subvert our expectations of established tragedy by weaving the issue into the background and choosing instead to focus on telling a tale thats far deeper and ultimately more complex.

As our main protagonist Conor O'Malley (Lewis MacDougall) is visited each night by an ancient monster (voiced by Liam Neeson) he is forced to endure three grisly tales that not only change how we see the world around him but also propel Conor into facing the truth of his nightmares.

Whilst visually spectacular on the big screen through a mastery of digital water colour, the three tales do much more than add a showpiece to to the film. Allowing the audience to question what is really going on behind the closed doors of Conor's experience and ask just how reliable is the viewpoint of teenage boy. And it is this viewpoint that A Monster Calls manages to capture so skilfully, putting us into a mindset most haven't experienced since puberty. A middle ground between childhood and grown-up where you're expected to shoulder the same responsibilities but given none of the same freedoms.

Numerous times throughout the film Conor asks why he is not punished for the acts of violence he has committed, always meeting the same answer of "what would be the point?" Before the fourth and final story is told, Conor and much the audience, are unable to think outside the basic rules of story established in childhood and grasp concepts beyond good and evil. But as the nightmare plays out we share in the experience as Conor must confront his truth and transition not only through the stages of denial to acceptance but also from child to adult.  And so begin to understand the grey areas of life where good people make bad choices, cruel acts are often not met with justice, and fairness is an ideal rather than reality.

This murky look into the complexity of human behaviour in the face of grief and the various ways it can manifest in the best of us is what makes this movie shine. Pile that with a stellar cast, some fantastic visuals and a script that smacks with quotable lines and you've got yourself a recipe for one the best films to emerge from 2016.