Dev Patel really said: Be the movie you want to see.

Origin

“I was gonna only be the funny sidekick in a movie like this, or the guy that hacks the mainframe” – Monkey Man star, director, writer, and producer Dev Patel explains to Simon Mayo that, in order to see the kind of action movie he imagined, he had to just make it himself:

Dev Patel’s Monkey Man Watchlist & Filming Challenges (via Letterboxd):

Themes

“I never had someone like you expressed in a movie like this,” Dev Patel tells Jimmy Fallon. “I didn’t have anyone to look up to. But my son does”:

My favorite part of Dev Patel’s interview last night on @FallonTonight — a man expressing gratitude for what Monkey Man means to him:

“I never had someone like you expressed in a movie like this. I didn’t have anyone to look up to. But my son does.” pic.twitter.com/iRIRDaqZfP

— Todd Owyoung (@toddowyoung) March 30, 2024

Production

The full, wild story in Variety has more of this:

Dev Patel says “everyday we faced absolute catastrophe” on MONKEY MAN.

“I begged our financier not to shut us down a few weeks before [filming]…most of our equipment broke. We couldn’t fly in new stuff so we literally shot stuff on my mobile phone."https://t.co/2T4qXZzsf1

— Zack Sharf (@ZSharf) March 29, 2024

Universal Studios featurette on Monkey Man, Dev Patel’s Directorial Debut:

Further Viewing

For a fine double-feature, another inventive, scrappy, star-creating action caper (though this time sci-fi), Attack The Block (2011):

Review: Attack the Block (2011)