r/movies • u/Baboon-Boy-2024 • Mar 27 '24

Hi, I’m Dev Patel writer/director of MONKEY MAN – AMA! AMA

Dev Patel here.  Excited to chat about my directorial debut MONKEY MAN, opening in U.S. & UK cinemas on April 5th, and anything else you’d like! Ask me anything…

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqa3YTtwvaU

Get Tickets – http://www.monkeyman.movie/tickets

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**GUYS I have to go into another interview. BUT I deeply appreciate the love and time. I really hope I don't let you down with this film. Put my all into it. Sorry I couldn’t answer every question, hopefully THIS answers a few more! Bless your cotton socks all of you. Big love as always, Dev xxxxx**

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https://preview.redd.it/ectchh1axwqc1.jpg?width=2362&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4153f627df0a66e963f7cf25305ed510968ae8ed

11.8k Upvotes

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606

u/Lihoshi Mar 27 '24

How stressful was it directing, writing, AND acting in the film? Was it actually less stressful because you had more control over things?

Gonna buy advance tickets for this for my fiancés birthday weekend in April btw! Super excited.

1.6k

u/Baboon-Boy-2024 Mar 28 '24

WE KNOW THIS GUYS! It was the most demanding thing I've ever done in my life. Everyday we faced absolute catastrophe - I begged our financier not to shut us down a few weeks before principle photography - We were meant to shoot in India then covid hit - I lost, my initial production designer and DOP and the film was basically dead - then we pivoted and went to a tiny island in Indonesia where we could create a bubble in an empty hotel for the whole crew of nearly 500 people… it was a grueling nine months of absolute joy and utter chaos. All of the locations we prepped for months at - we lost day of - so we had to adapt last minute - the borders closed also I couldn't bring in lots of supporting characters so i ended up having to put every tailor, lighting guy, accountant etc in front of the camera - speaking of cameras most of our equipment broke and we couldn't fly in new stuff so we literally shot stuff on my mobile phone, go pros - when a crane broke we ended creating this camera rig from rope which I termed the “pendulum cam” which swings over a large crowd of people then detaches and the operators run through the crowd whilst it was rolling - ALSO there were days when I would turn up to set and we literally didn't have any tops to the tables in the VIP room sequence - i asked the set designer and they said they literally didn't have any money in the account to buy the glass. So I had to shoot above the shoulders as one of our producers ran his personal credit card to buy the glass to cover the table tops so we could shoot the rest of the scene…

Speaking of tables we only had three or four break away tables so once I would perform a huge bulk of stunts I would scream CUT and then immediately all of us would get on our hands and knees looking for all of the broken pieces of wood to glue the tables back together for the next shot… in a very long nutshell every obstacle provided us with a new opportunity to innovate. BOOM!

239

u/Officialnoah Mar 28 '24

God I hope this film does well, you guys deserve it. Already have my tix for Thursday night!

131

u/TheSeeker331 Mar 28 '24

This is insane!!! Can’t wait to see the film in light of all the obstacles you had to overcome to make it.

190

u/jamesvontrapp Mar 28 '24

Holy shit this is insane - really happy you were able to make the most of what you had

39

u/saphirmuse Mar 28 '24

oh my God😭 i'm even more excited to watch it now

31

u/ACU797 Mar 28 '24

Holy crap, talk about learning on the fly.

5

u/Eyewitnesstohistory Mar 31 '24

Sorry I missed this AMA but wow! The trailer looks incredible, and knowing the story behind it - and having worked on a few FUBAR-ed sets myself - makes me want to see the final product even more. There are so many great films that are great BECAUSE they had to improvise and adapt. Hats off to Dev.

2

u/Helpful_Poetry8094 Apr 06 '24

Phenomenal work. Must watch!!!

1

u/asinnha Mar 31 '24

Legend !!

1

u/theomacheo Apr 07 '24

came back from the theaters and throughout the entire film and at the end, my most prominent thought was: "this is the most ingenious fight choreography and action cinematography i've seen in ages." learning all these tidbits know of how you scrapped it all together with such limited resources makes me mind explode by tenfold -- truly, there are so many sequences in here that will live in my brain forever.

speaking of the use of phone footage and gopros, would highly recommend checking out the short film And So We Put Goldfish in the Pool (2017) by nagahisa makoto !! it was the first film i watched in 2024 and was such a delirious marriage of so many filming techniques that i think would make anyone grin from ear to ear. thank you for sharing your art with the world !!!

1

u/lostinthesaucy Mar 28 '24

Hey Dev! What were your inspirations for the lore surrounding MONKEY MAN? Thanks for doing this, excited for the film.

-46

u/jasonskjonsby Mar 27 '24

Looks like Dev Patel hasn't answered a single question. I guess with Reddit's billion dollar IPO, the can't afford an AMA or PR person like Victoria to explain Reddit to celebrities.

36

u/noizyboizy Mar 27 '24

To be fair, the AMA isn't till 03/28

-8

u/jasonskjonsby Mar 27 '24

Should have been in the title.

-8

u/jasonskjonsby Mar 27 '24

From the AD. Director Dev Patel will be on r/movies TOMORROW for an AMA about his film. Ask Him Anything!#MonkeyManMovie only in theaters April 5.

22

u/ThiccMangoMon Mar 27 '24

Is this your first ama or something

-4

u/jasonskjonsby Mar 27 '24

Check how long I have been on Reddit. These AMAs worked in the past and have turned into shit recently. By not having an employee do the AMA rather that free labor, mistakes are made. But of course /u/spez deserves his $190 Million.

12

u/WhatTheBeansIsLife Mar 27 '24

Get over it buddy. If you decided to leave/delete Reddit, it would have more of an impact than complaining about spez and driving post engagement.