| Monster | 
 enlarge | Director: Patty Jenkins
Actors: Charlize Theron, Christina Ricci, Bruce Dern, Lee Tergesen, Annie Corley
Studio: Sony Pictures
Category: DVD
List Price: $9.95
Buy Used: $0.01
You Save: $9.94 (100%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  340 reviews
Sales Rank: 9932
Format: Ac-3, Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dts Surround Sound, Dvd-video, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), Spanish (Subtitled)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 109
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: COLD05552D
ISBN: 1404958274
UPC: 043396055520
EAN: 9781404958272
ASIN: B00005JMUK
Theatrical Release Date: January 30, 2004
Release Date: June 1, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
Critics have universally praised Charlize Theron's performance in Monster, and the praise, for once, is astonishingly deserved. The gorgeous star of The Italian Job and The Cider House Rules vanishes into the character of Aileen Wuornos, a real-life serial killer and prostitute who murdered at least seven men in Florida. Monster traces her relationship with a young woman named Selby (Christina Ricci, The Ice Storm, Buffalo 66), which intertwines with Wuornos's murder spree. This remarkable movie finds compassion for Wuornos but unflinchingly faces her brutal crimes; Theron expresses this woman's horrific life history without softening her terrifying, dead-eyed stare. This is a gripping, devastating performance, a physical and psychological transformation comparable to Robert DeNiro's in Raging Bull. The movie's moral and emotional complexity wouldn't succeed without this searing performance--but succeed it does, and it will stick with you for some time afterward. --Bret Fetzer
Product Description
A shockingly moving film that burrows deep beneath the tabloid-sized headline stories of aileen wuornos the man-hating serial killer executed last year in florida. Studio: Sony Pictures Home Ent Release Date: 02/28/2006 Starring: Charlize Theron Bruce Dern Run time: 108 minutes Rating: R
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| Customer Reviews: Read 335 more reviews...
 sympathetic yet horrifying portrayal of a serial killer November 10, 2008
This is a great film. The actors are absolutely first rate: Theron must have gained 30 pounds for the part and is completely unrecognizable and thuggishly ugly; Ricci is a kind of mousy yet complicit accomplice, greedy for experience. The two meet and find an unusal synergy: Theron is a seriously troubled, alcoholic hooker with a horrible past and prone to violent rage, and Ricci is a lesbian trying to escape her prying family. Somehow, they find love in a completely believable way. In addition, the story is rivetting. To maintain their life style and express her rage, Theron goes on a murderous rampage of robbery and murder, after killing a brutal rapist. In a way, she is searching for justice, but gets crazier as she continues and feels increasingly desperate to maintain Ricci's love, which is perhaps the only good thing she has ever known and yet based on the cash that Theron brings in. It is very sad, the viewer empathizes with Theron, and yet feels repelled by the horror and confusion and murder.
Truly masterful. Recommended with enthusiasm.
 Bad September 14, 2008
Monster may have been a passable film had it been good art, or at least attempted to portray the true story of Aileen Wuornos. Instead, it fails miserably on both scores, content to have an ABC Afterschool Special like patina in its approach. I also, after viewing this film, know another reason why I wanted to not see it, and that's because after two years of this unjust and wasteful war of invasion President Bush launched in Iraq I did not want to be reminded that sometimes even the reactionary Right Wing Radicals can still be right about something; and that is only a deluded out of touch Hollywood Feminazi sympathizers could serve up such crap, and then fete it ceaselessly. This is one of those films and performances that in ten or so years people will cringe at as being one of the worst selections ever. Let me be the first to say it- Theron's award winning performance is one of the worst to ever win an Oscar- it is not deep, nor scary, and even lacks the essential redeeming silliness of a Hannibal Lecter or Freddy Krueger. This film is one of those that people are just agog at, and so at odds with the Hollywood machine and its fawning parade of acolyte critics, that no one has the guts to say it's terrible. And, worst of all, every time I think about the film, and Theron's performance, it slides down another notch in my mind, just like so-called feminists who see a hero in Aileen Wuornos. That said, the Monster referred to in the title of the film most aptly applies to the film itself. Avoid this tripe!
Monster Revealed August 25, 2008
Monster
Although not entirely accurate in this DVD's representation of Aileen Wournos, at least according to her final confession, it is a well-crafted movie; exciting, and always pushing the envelope. I liked it, and would recommend it to anyone interested in the sad life of Aileen Wournos. It is well-worth watching.
Hits like a sledgehammer!!! July 31, 2008
Blood and Rain
Blood for the Masses
Monster
Based on a true story.
Written and Directed by Patty Jenkins
Starring Charlize Theron as Eileen Wuornos
Christine Ricci
Revewed By
B.L.Morgan
Rating: 5 out of 5
The first statement I have to say about Monster is that I did not enjoy watching this excellent movie. Monster is harsh and grim and almost painful viewing. It is also a true story. That in itself is what makes this important picture hard to look at.
Life can be terribly harsh and the world was not kind to Eileen Wuornos.
Brutally abused as a child and cast out at a young age into an uncaring world she turned to a life of highway prostitution. Her life became a cycle of drug and alcohol abuse and selling her body to guys who frequently beat her because that's what got them off. She accepted it all and didn't care until she fell in love with another woman.
Charlize Theron's portrait of a woman who will do anything, including murder, to keep her one chance at love alive is gut wrenching. She became this damaged woman. Theron won The Best Actress Academy Award for her role in Monster. She deserved it. Eileen Wuornos cannot and should not be forgiven for the crimes she committed but this movie does make you understand the hows and whys of what happened in her life.
Monster was graphic and tense and emotionally draining. It was a highly uncomfortable one hour and forty-nine minutes that I spent watching this film. I will never watch Monster again but I'm glad I did see it the one time.
True Story of a Femal Serial Killer May 24, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Excellent movie about the real life actions of one of the few female serial killers. Very non-exploitative considering it's subject is a pair of lesbian lovers, one of which is an violent murderer. The characters are real, you can feel pity for them and their hard lives, but you also feel the very deserving sense of disgust that they earn for themselves. This reality is brought to the characters by the amazing acting of both Charlize Theron and Christina Ricci, with the infamous transformation of Theron who gain 20 lbs, wore fake teeth, and went sans makeup, bringing the "monster" of the film to life. If your interested in serial killers, true crime movies, or dramas dealing with ill-fated romances, then this is the movie for you...
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