Blue Monkey is a 1987 Canadian horror film directed by William Fruet and it stars Steve Railsback, Gwynyth Walsh and Don Lake.
Plot[]
Marwellia Harbison is an eccentric old woman who owns a greenhouse and posesses an odd looking plant with yellow flowers, which came from a newly formed volcanic island off the coast of Micronesia. Its current state happened overnight and Marwella is at a loss to explain what could have caused it, when she discovers it.
When handyman Fred Adams comes by, he inexplicably hurts himself on the plant. He seems okay, but, when he walks out to his truck, he immediately starts feeling strange and collapses. Marwella calls the paramedics and Fred is taken to the Hill Valley Hospital with a very high fever. On call are Doctors Rachel Carson and Judith Glass.
Their attention is taken away from Fred when police detective Jim Bishop brings his partner in with a bad gunshot wound. Still, soon after, in the adjacent bed, Fred begins convulsing and winds up vomiting an insect pupa out of his mouth, after which he seems to stabilize. The pupa is hurriedly contained in a bell jar in the hospital's in-house laboratory.
Rachel then orders mandatory checkups of everyone and when Jim comes back clean, Rachel decides to show him around the hospital, including their high-tech research facility where they're testing out new and powerful surgical lasers. Attempts to x-ray the pupa prove futile, so it is decided to slice it open. In doing so, the doctors unleash a particularly feisty insect-like creature, but with Jim's help they're able to get it contained.
Meanwhile, Fred is faring worse. In addition to having had an insect, he's come down with a mysterious disease the creature was carrying. He goes into cardiac arrest and, when Judith Glass attempts to revive him with shock paddles, his chest violently explodes. Meanwhile, Marwella and the paramedic who brought Fred in are coming down with the same symptoms. Rachel then the entomologist Elliot Jacobs in the hopes of identifying the mysterious insect.
Before Elliot arrives, a group of children from the hospital's pediatric ward start roaming the halls. Lab technician Alice Bradley, tasked with guarding the insect specimen is lured away from her post by her boyfriend, Ted Andrews, to have sex, which leaves the insect completely unguarded. The children wander on into the lab unnoticed and, seeing the insect, they decide to feed it some bluish powdery substance one of them finds in a bottle on a shelf. They inadvertently pour in an excessively large amount of it and, hearing the nurse and orderly returning, the children quickly leave.
Unbeknownst to Ted and Alice, the insect has now grown into gigantic proportions. It breaks free of its glass prison and kidnaps them. Elliot Jacobs arrives and he, Rachel and Jim survey the carnage. Elliot discovers that the bluish powder was a growth hormone, which means the insect is giant and could be anywhere, so they begin to search for it.
It turns out the insect is in the utility tunnels underneath the hospital, where the creature begins building a nest there for its brood using the two kidnapped as food. Rachel, Jim and Elliot figure out how to stop the insect while Judith deals with the consequences of the disease the creature has spread throughout the building. In the meantime the government has found out about the infection, which, until then has killed four others, and has quarantined the hospital in order to protect the population from the disease.
The three find the nest and, through diversion, they manage to destroy it and give Ted and Alice, who they cannot save, a fast death. The insect then wants revenge and begins to attack the people in the hospital and kill them. They cannot get out of it because of the quarantine. Judith, in the meantime, casually finds out that a large amount of alcohol in the body kills the infection and cures the ill this way.
Jim's attempt to kill the insect with a gunl proves futile. However, they manage to lure him into the laser facility and, taking the advice of Elliot, he shoots him with a laser and hits him in the eyes. It horribly hurts him, and, in time, also kills him. The quarantine is lifted, when they find out about the cure, Elliot intends to turn the dead insect into a legend in the eyes of the public and Rachel and JIm decide to date.
Unbeknownst to them a larva has survived.
Cast[]
- Steve Railsback as Detective Jim Bishop
- Gwynyth Walsh as Dr. Rachel Carson
- Susan Anspach as Dr. Judith Glass
- Don Lake as Dr. Elliot Jacobs
- Sandy Webster as Fred Adams
- Helen Hughes as Marwella Harbison
Production[]
Sirius Effects created the special effects in this movie. The original title was Green Monkey but it was changed because of a theory at the time that AIDS was started by infected African green monkeys.
Reception[]
It received mostly negative reviews upon its release.
