Rider Reimagines Monkey Shines

Alternate title: Proof I Can Write About George A. Romero Movies Without Lapsing Into Zombie-speak

I caught Romero's 1988 flick Monkey Shines on IFC last night (for the first time since its video release) and it didn't disappoint. It had all the elements of a perfect film: quadriplegic sex, a killer monkey wielding matches and syringes, and John Pankow's enormous forehead.

But deep down inside my wooden cranium I wondered how it could be better. How could it be updated with current celebrities and state-of-the-art FX to really make that monkey shine?

For starters, I'd put Jason Statham in the wheelchair. He'd still be the quadriplegic hero who uses a mouth-tube to roll around his house, but I'd set the film in a future where he telepathically controls a pair of hologram arms for getting dressed. That way, when Yakuza cyborg-ninjas attack, Statham's "holarms" can defend him with a twisted-up shirt. Besides, his contract stipulates that clothing be used as a weapon in at least one scene.

Ella, the helper monkey who both loves and taunts him, will be played by Dakota Fanning. I'll use Lord of the Rings-like forced perspective and camera tricks to make her appear 18 inches tall. Nothing will make the audience cheer more than when Statham seizes little Dakota's neck with his teeth and chokes the life out of her as she gibbers and screeches. Fanning doesn't do her own stunts, so we'd have to use a Monchichi stand-in.

I'll change the epilogue to bring the Statham legend full circle: after his character's spinal surgery is a success, his girlfriend picks him up at the hospital (she's played by Angelina Jolie's CG doppelgänger in Beowulf but voiced by Doc Hammer as "Dr. Girlfriend"). She's driving a black Audi A8 or a BMW--depending on who offers more for product placement. It seems they're going to move to France, and he's going to call himself...Frank Martin! Never mind that it's set in 2021 and The Transporter took place in '02. It's Statham. Why question it?

After the credits roll, we'll fade back in on a rural Pennsylvania farmhouse, and a voice on the radio will say, "The dead are rising from their graves and eating the flesh of the living."

D'oh!

Operation: Oh No

"Happy 2009," he said to a man who wasn't there. He scurried away from the terminal, his humorless cackle echoing through the dark room.

It had been an hour since his wife had gone to bed. An hour since the new year had begun. An hour since he'd embarked on "Operation: Oh No."

The mission was proceeding better than expected. The pockets of his robe were already full, and he had begun loading more pilfered booty into his pajamas. They made a pleasant plastic-y grinding sound as he exited the east wing, as if his bed clothes were lined with LEGO blocks.

He gripped a nail file in one sweaty fist. The handle read "Revlon," but it may as well have read "Mjolnir," as, verily, it infused him with the power of a Norse god on this glorious quest.

He silently entered the pitch-black Palm Room, and spied another nearby computer terminal. No sooner had he begun to jab at the keyboard, than a creepy, impossibly loud whisper emanated from the darkness.

"What are you doing, George?"

"Whozat?!" he cried, leaping away from the computer. His nail file was lodged vertically in the keyboard. "Oh, Dick, it's just you."

The newcomer's grin--a frightening smirk, really--materialized out of the darkness like that of a fucked-up Cheshire Cat. He spoke in a whisper, but his lips didn't move. "Are you doing what I think you are?"

George patted his robe, the plastic bulge crunching. He turned back to the keyboard. "I'm'a give 'em a taste of their own medicine."

"I know it bothered you at the time, George, but the liberals will just say you copied Clin--"

"I couldn't type my middle initial for days, Dick," George said, popping the "O" key off and sliding it into his elephant pajama bottoms. "This'll learn 'em. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a lot of work to do in the Press Corps Office next door."

He felt a cold hand fall on his shoulder. It made him shiver. His balls tightened. "19 more days, George. You're jumping the gun."

"But-but we can do without that letter till then, Dick," he whined. "I wanna crawl in bed next to Laura tonight and tell her 'Mission accomplished.'"

"Prematurely?" asked the whisper.

"Aw, come on, Dick! I don't wanna put 'em all back!"

"I'm not saying you have to put them back...just leave the ones in the Oval Office."

George squinted, thinking. And thinking. And thinking some more. "Oh, right. I'll need it to pardon Scooter."

"And don't forget that 'surprise' involving bin Laden's 'capture' in two weeks."

George smiled at the horrible floating grin in the dark. "How could I forget?"

He went to the door, eager to continue his quest. When he turned to say good night, the floating grin was gone.

"Happy New Year," he said, this time to an empty room.

Rider wishes his readers a prosperous 2009. Here's hoping it's better than '08 and the previous eight.