Joel on Film

There is a bit of engineering by director Johannes Roberts in Primate that might easily go unnoticed, if not for how ingenious it turns out to be. Indeed, the conceit of the screenplay, written by Roberts and Ernest Riera, might have fallen apart, if not for the crucial way the film figures out how to isolate its handful of characters, who spend the majority of the running time trying to survive this monster-movie scenario. The key detail of the production design here is a swimming pool, on either side of which is only danger: the angry chimpanzee that wants to kill them, standing sentinel in front of any possible exits through the house, and a 75-foot cliff drop to the rear.

Mostly, the movie works because it gives us precisely what we might want and what it promises us in the brief prologue: The chimp can no longer differentiate between its beloved human friends and a deadly, immediate threat. The violence is quick, vicious and almost shockingly gory, with the features of multiple faces ripped or torn off, heads and torsos pulverized into pulp, and lots of sharp tiny objects lodged into sensitive joints or palms or cartilage. Roberts rarely cuts away from this, meaning that those who find enjoyment in such carnage will have a field day with all that this movie offers.

After a scientist discovers—the hard way, of course—the shocking truth of chimpanzee Ben’s current situation, we meet the human family who adopted him: widowed author Adam (Troy Kotsur) and his daughters Lucy (Johnny Sequoyah), who has just returned after some time away, and Erin (Gia Hunter). Lucy arrives at the family home, with its cliff-side features and many modernist touches, alongside friends Hannah (Jessica Alexander), Kate (Victoria Wyant) and Nick (Benjamin Cheng) for some much-needed rest and relaxation. Unbeknownst to them, kindly Ben (played, under a mountain of prosthetic makeup and some digital enhancement, by a thoroughly convincing Miguel Torres Umba, also credited as movement specialist) was bitten by a mongoose infected by rabies, leading to a rather loose interpretation on the filmmakers’ part of what exactly that means.

It’s unlikely, of course, that a real case of rabies in such a mammal would result in the drooling, bared-teeth, but still creepily calm (apart from his outbursts, obviously) being that the movie gives us. The need to set aside reality is, of course, about as crucial as ever here, and thankfully, it’s easy to do that right from the start. All that we need from Ben is a quick glimpse of what he’s like as the normal, lovable doofus sent into an excited frenzy by his reunion with Lucy to communicate why, later, the turn toward the rabid violence might be so terrifying to his human owners.

The human element is basic but, at least, engaging, as Lucy’s time away and estrangement from Erin in particular has its roots in recent family tragedy. Their mother, who passed a year before the events of the movie, was the light of everyone’s life and, in fact, adopted Ben into the family. Some relationship drama also ensues, as one of the friends pines for Nick and a couple of hot guys (played by Charlie Mann and Tienne Simon) offer the other girls a reason to fantasize.

Obviously, all that is either put on the back-burner or dismissed rather violently and suddenly with the changes in Ben, and the movie proceeds in a relatively predictable way. It doesn’t take too much math to figure out who among the cast is reasonably safe from the chimp’s viciousness, and those who are pretty good at math are probably going to ace that proverbial quiz. These movies aren’t necessarily meant to be unpredictable, though, so the inevitability is hardly a problem when the movie is so cleverly crafted.

Again, there’s the layout of the house and its additions, with that pool a particular delight in floor-planning and a sliding glass door with a big, solid latch that does its job nicely at a certain, desperate moment. There is also the realization that Ben, like most chimpanzees, is not just intelligent but logical, with one particularly clever bit of misdirection resulting in a genuinely startling jump scare on account of his appearance in an unexpected place above the poor humans, just as they think they are safe. Place a key fob or a shovel in his hands and watch as he learns to use tools, but don’t underestimate his more primitive definition of the word.

In other words, he’s a great movie monster, not only for how the film first establishes a reason for sympathy, but also because Roberts knows instinctively how to flip that switch. Primate spares no viewer in its exacting of violence upon the human form, but as surface-deep as the whole affair ultimately is, it’s also an enjoyably nutty and fitfully clever genre exercise.

Rating: *** (out of ****)