“The Monkey,” not to be confused with the other ape-featuring film released last month, “Better Man,” expands on Stephen King’s short story from the “Skeleton Crew” collection. Despite my expectations of being repulsed by an overabundance of deaths, I felt that I watched an outright chaotic and comedic movie that just so happened to contain lots of vicious killings.
Director Oz Perkins, whose previous horror film “Longlengs” rose to mainstream popularity, furthers his entry into the horror genre with his expansion of King’s 1980 short story. His latest feature tells the story of Hal and Bill Shelburn (Theo James), who, as children, discover a wind-up monkey with a mind of its own. 25 years later, the monkey begins a killing spree as the film follows Hal’s journey to find the monkey and put an end to it.
Going into this movie, the concept of a killer toy monkey is laughable, but Perkins cleverly plays into that idea and incorporates a lot of humor to create a unique and subversive balance of comedy and horror. Regardless of how funny the movie may be, it is shockingly gory right off the bat without compromise and only gets more violent as the movie goes on. “The Monkey” doesn’t hold back on how zany the murders become, and the audience couldn’t help laughing at the carnage that unfolded. The use of sound is crucial as it balances the precise scale between the tones of comedy and horror — especially the tune that plays when death is about to strike at the hands of the toy monkey. I remained tense with fear throughout the screening while also trying not to laugh.
The impressive performance of the actors granted the movie its element of tender seriousness along with its humorous nature. My experience with Theo James is limited to his “Divergent” days, but I was pleasantly surprised to see him balance his two contrastingly different characters: Hal and Bill. In his portrayal, the contrast was clear of the seemingly weaker Hal against the more sullen, sadistic Bill. The same can be said for the younger counterparts (Christian Convery), who build the foundations from which James’s characters develop. However, a personal favorite was Tatiana Maslany, who plays their mother and brings a softness and ease that is seen earlier in the movie before it takes a dreary turn for the worse with misery and violence.
This is definitely a movie to see with a crowd, alone or with friends, but experiencing this in a packed cinema was a peak experience. There were a lot of jumpscares prompting screams, but also a lot of shared laughter in that theater. It was certainly not as scary as marketed, but the direction of the movie is jarring with how it misdirects every feeling of expected terror into splendid fun. While the film garnered mixed reviews online, disliking this movie purely because of its unconventionality towards horror isn’t sufficient to go against the whole creation of this movie. I think it is just meant to be a campy horror about a senseless murdering toy monkey, and I don’t think I would have it any other way.
