Less than a year after breaking out to mainstream popularity with the devilish procedural Longlegs, writer/director Oz Perkins’ follow-up The Monkey couldn’t feel more of a tonal 180 while remaining in the same genre. This time around, the son of horror royalty—his father being original Psycho Anthony Perkins—is adapting the short story of the same name from the icon himself, Stephen King, with the additional help of modern horror maestro James Wan as a producer. The end result is a mostly funny splatterfest that, unfortunately, like a lot of King stories, can’t fully maintain the momentum all the way to the finish line.
The first half of The Monkey takes place in 1999 and centers on twin brothers Hal and Bill Shelburn, both played by Christian Convery. The identical pair couldn’t be more different: Hal is an awkward nerd, and Bill is an arrogant bully. In the film’s opening scene, we see their father, Petey (Adam Scott in a brief cameo), hurriedly attempting to get rid of a creepy-looking, drum-wielding toy monkey.
Turns out the toy’s got a curse: When someone turns the key on its back, and the monkey finishes its song, someone dies in a gruesome freak accident. Think Annabelle meets Final Destination.
“The Monkey—both the toy and the film as a whole—has a blasé, “shit happens” attitude towards death that I found refreshing in the early half.”
Regardless, we don’t see Petey again after this scene, having seemingly abandoned the twins and their mother, Lois (Tatiana Maslany). The twins come across the monkey and witness its effects first-hand, seeing their babysitter get decapitated that same day. As the monkey starts killing the people around them and attempts to destroy it all fail, the brothers pledge to find a way to get rid of the cursed toy once and for all.
The Monkey—both the toy and the film as a whole—has a blasé, “shit happens” attitude towards death that I found refreshing in the early half. The toy picks its target completely at random, the only one safe being the person who turns the key. It doesn’t factor in age, morality, or affiliation. Anybody can get it, from random bystanders to family members. Even when Hal tries to find some method behind the madness (at one point, trying to direct the curse to someone), he comes up short.
Like death in real life, it’ll happen to everyone, and sometimes it just comes down to bad luck. That attempt to find a deeper meaning behind a close one’s death is something that clearly meant a lot to Perkins, whose mother, Berry Berenson, died in the 9/11 attacks. In fact, the film’s strongest emotional points are those mother-son bonding moments between Maslany and Convery, who both give great performances.
As for the deaths themselves, they’re all gleefully over the top, running the gamut from decapitations, impalements, tramplings and electrocutions. Most of them are equal parts hilarious and really mean, especially one involving a golf hole that had me in tears.
“The Monkey becomes a family drama tackling the endlessly repeated horror topic of generational trauma, except here, it’s more dull than anything.”
After the twins seal away the monkey in a well, the film jumps to the present day, where we see the twins as adults, now played by Theo James. Hal starts to repeat his father’s traits, seeing his son Petey (Colin O’Brien) only once a year in fear that he could be a potential victim. Sure enough, it’s during a father-son road trip that the curse starts acting up again. Unfortunately, this second half is where the movie really started to lose me as the momentum grinds to a halt.
The Monkey becomes a family drama tackling the endlessly repeated horror topic of generational trauma, except here, it’s more dull than anything. An oft-repeated criticism of King’s stories is that he doesn’t know how to write good endings. I felt the same about Longlegs (a movie I liked overall), so it was funny to see Perkins essentially double down on the same issue.
It felt like The Monkey didn’t know where to go after a certain point. It tries to establish a sudden antagonist, but that also falls flat. Even the ending itself gave me a general feeling of “That’s it?”. While Theo James does give a great dual performance (as well as narration all throughout the film), the way Bill is written feels like he comes from a completely different movie than the one I just watched just a few minutes prior, becoming a full cartoon at multiple points. Even the deaths start feeling repetitive; there are only so many times you can resort to exploding bodies before even that starts getting old.
With how much I loved The Monkey’s first half, it’s a bummer that it couldn’t sustain itself in the second. That being said, the film does work best as a decent Final Destination-esque appetizer before the franchise’s big return later this year.
