Do you think there’s a difference in how the audience sees him versus how he sees himself? By the end of the film, we realize we have our own perception of him as well.
In Monster we see how every character perceives Steve, but we also see how Steve perceives himself. It’s so much more than trying to get people to like you-because we all do that-but trying to get people to believe that you’re a human being. I never really thought about what it looked like to have so much innocence and to be thinking about how people perceive you. I read the book right before I did this film. sat down with VICE to talk about starring in the film adaptation and how Steve isn’t very different from King and Bobo after all.ĭid you read the book as a child? What was your perception of how the book went? Ahead of the film’s release, Kelvin Harrison Jr. In a story rooted in public perception, which often says Black boys are guilty before they are innocent, Monster shows that sometimes the act of survival means you’re neither.
But the opportunities afforded to Harmon, like his upbringing and elite education, did little to shield him from winding up on trial for murder.īy the end of the film, Monster does what Myers doesn’t: it gives us the play-by-play of what actually happened that day.
The implication is to wonder how a boy as gifted and privileged as Harmon could get caught up with hustlers as ruthless as King and Bobo. Harmon’s parents own a brownstone and are so involved with his rigid Stuyvesant High School curriculum that they pop quiz him during breakfast. For a moment, the contrast between the characters feels like a bit of respectability politics. The most interesting part about watching Monster, rather than reading it, is to visually see how different Harmon’s life is in comparison to the men he’s on trial with.
The film deviates quite a bit from the book, but the differences don’t change that Steve’s fate rests in the hands of a judge and jury.