"The Monkey" (2025)

Perkins followed “Longlegs” up quickly with an adaptation of a well-known Steven King story, “The Monkey.” In this extensively changed, elongaded, and padded out gore-fest, we get what most consider a comedy with a couple jump scares.

Twin brothers inherit a cursed toy from their absent father, a monkey doll that winds up, plays a drum, and kills someone every time it plays. Don’t look for more explanation than that. This is not that kind of story. It is a study of the inevitability of death and its meaninglessness. Unfortunately, it also seems to be an attempt at an argument for the meaninglessness of life as well.

There is a particularly unfortunate scene where a priest, who appears to be a High School sophomore, delivers a eulogy at a funeral. He does not even attempt to give meaning to what has happened. The straw-man argument here is that even a religious professional has no idea what life is about. Not in a case of a well thought out attempt being countered, but rather no attempt at giving any though to life or death at all. This scene is immediately followed up with the films thesis, delivered by the mom of the twins:

“Everybody dies. Some of us peacefully and in our sleep, and some of us... horribly. And that's life.”

Some would say there is so much more to life than that. Some would say that death is ultimately the enemy, and that there is hope beyond death, meaning beyond ourselves, and purpose in life. Not this film. It’s comedy is a mix of slap-stick so over the top that it goes past Blake Edwards’s claim that comedy was pain taken to the extreme into a space that is no longer funny—and shoking statements that elicit uncomfortable laughs at the shock value of it all.

The set production and artistic vision of it all is flawless. The Monkey prop is perfection itself. And, as always, Perkins does a great job of creating discomfort and dread. However, when one stops to think about the mechanics of the story it quickly falls apart. This is no “Final Destination” where you see what death is doing and can dread its approach. It is all just “supernatural” in the end. This is ironic considering that the film’s these is that there is no meaning, greater design, or purpose to life. We even get a glimpse of the supernatural, personified, angel of death at the end of the film, tying the events back to a twisted interpretation of biblical Revelation that is mentioned multiple time in the film.

Brian Tallerico, in his review for Roger Ebert, says the following:

“…Perkins keeps upping the ante on his film’s comedic brand of insanity. Fires, beheadings, a well-placed shotgun–it’s almost like death has a sense of humor in this movie. That could be because Perkins realized that the best way to stop crying is to laugh in the face of the Grim Reaper.”

I prefer to think that the best way to stop crying at death is not to laugh at it, but to see past it to genuine hope. I wish the film had given the priest’s argument more realistically; offered something more than sarcasm in the face of suffering.