Movie Review: 'The Monkey' is an Instant Horror Classic

The Monkey

Directed by Osgood Perkins

Written by Osgood Perkins

Starring Theo James, Tatiana Maslany, Christian Convery

Release Date February 21st, 2025

Published February 21st, 2025

The Monkey stars Theo James as a pair of characters, twin brothers, Hal and Bill Schelburn. Despite being twins, the brothers have never been close. Bill is a bully and Hal is meek and mild. The two share a loving and attentive mother, Lois (Tatiana Maslany), and a father that neither got to know very well. Petey Shelburn (Adam Scott) was a pilot who disappeared quite often, always returning with odd gifts for his sons that he would store in a closet with nebulous plans to actually give these gifts one day, until Petey simply never came home.

While cleaning out dad’s closet, the boys find one of his many gifts, a mechanical monkey with crazy eyes and a drum. Turning the key in the back of the monkey is the start of a horrifying curse. The monkey is some kind of evil entity and when the key is turned, someone dies... horribly. The monkey also cannot be destroyed. In a pre-credits sequence we watch as the monkey is destroyed by flamethrower only to show up a few minutes later, fully intact and in the hands of Hal and Bill.

The plot of The Monkey kicks into gear when Hal tries to use the monkey to kill his bullying brother. Unfortunately, though the monkey does like to keep the deaths close to home where Hal and Bill can be fully traumatized by them, the monkey does not take requests. When Bill and Hal’s beloved mom dies in horrific fashion, right in front of Bill, it sets off a years long bitterness between the brothers that will lead to an incalculable body count in a small town in Maine where the monkey resides for years.

And that’s all of the plot description I want to do for The Monkey. You need to see this one for yourself to understand the various layers of dark humor combined with inventive gore, and heart stopping tension as the camera trains on the malevolent monkey’s face, it’s twirling mechanical drumstick, and the utterly terrifying and unpredictable Rube Goldberg meets Final Destination violence that is about to occur. A few standout sequences, for those with a strong stomach, include a Beni Hana style chain restaurant, an electrified swimming pool, and a bowling ball that recalls a horror meme from the forgotten 80s flick Deadly Friend.

What makes The Monkey so much fun is how Oz Perkins took something so silly and made it scary using the tools of filmmaking. The film’s opening sequence is a brilliant exercise in setting the stage. A man covered in blood tries to sell the mechanical monkey at a pawn shop. A skeptical pawn shop owner isn’t interested in the monkey, seeing the paw up in the air, he assumes it must be broken or stuck. The man covered in blood however, knows very well that the monkey is not broken, it’s biding its time while deciding who to kill next and how. Once we know what happens when the monkey plays the drums, we are on the edge of our seats every time the monkey rattles to life.

If you don’t have a dark sense of humor or you can’t stand blood and guts gore, The Monkey is not for you. But, if you like a subversive dark comedy with wildly inventive ways to mangle the human body, The Monkey is the movie for you. And there is more to the movie than merely gore, this isn’t the Terrifier franchise, The Monkey has a few deeper ideas buried beneath the pitch black comedy and bright red blood. But, I will leave you to find meaning in The Monkey for yourself. I will only say that I found the film to be a full meal in terms of filmmaking, humor, scares, and story.

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