The Monkey (2025)

No fucking way?! Two, count ‘em two movie posts in a row. We’ll see if that’s the case for the next post. I’m enjoying a long weekend right now, coming off of a work week that felt like it went by pretty quickly. In the time between this and my last post, I finished Ninja Gaiden 2 Black (2025) and Season 1 of The Sopranos (1999-2007). NG2B was a pretty damn good time and, after finishing it a couple of days ago, I already started a new playthrough on a higher difficulty. I’ll probably also look into emulating its predecessor, Ninja Gaiden Black (2004), and the original Ninja Gaiden 2 (2008), since there are differences between the original and the rerelease. As for The Sopranos, I enjoyed season 1 and will be continuing with the series before moving onto Twin Peaks (1990-1991). Basically, I’m giving myself enough of a buffer for Season 3 of Invincible (2021-) to finish so I can then “procure” it for my home server. 

Anyhow, yesterday I went to see the latest film from director Osgood Perkins, The Monkey (2025) with friends. This movie was on my radar since my friends linked me to the initial trailer. I really enjoyed Osgood Perkins’ previous horror flick, Longlegs (2024), calling it one of my favorites from last year. As such, I'm down for pretty much any movie he and his team puts out. The theater of choice for this showtime was Cinemark 16 at Victorville, CA. I did want to see this at The Frida Cinema in Santa Ana, CA, but another friend’s aversion to driving far and a wee bit of miscommunication left us with Cinemark. Next time perhaps. Anyhow this particular screening, I think, has been the most packed I’ve been to this year so far. Aside from my friends and I, there were some couples and small groups, along with a large row of friends that proved to be a fun audience to watch the movie with. However, sitting to my left was a mother with her young kid. The mom herself was respectful enough, but the kid was pretty talkative and tried to use his mom’s phone during the movie. In addition, this kid and some other theatergoers in the auditorium were engaging in a pet peeve of mine when going to the movie theater, especially a horror movie. I hate it when mfs would be loud during the quieter dialogue or exposition parts of a horror flick. These people think that when nothing scary or “exciting” is happening it’s time to talk, check their phone, or crinkle all the plastic or paper bags for their snacks. Moving away from that rant, a lot of the trailers that played before the film were the same trailers I’ve been seeing for a few weeks now, but new ones (to me) did pop up. Mickey 17 (2025), starring Robert Pattinson, looks like a good time; the man has pretty good taste on what movies and people he wants to work with, so I’ll be down to watch this when it comes out. Since The Monkey has been released by Neon, we of course get trailers to upcoming movies produced and/or distributed by them. Together (2025) looks to be a body horror vehicle for Dave Franco and Alison Brie. I’m always down for body horror, so I look forward to when it comes out later this summer. Moreover, Hell of a Summer (2025) presents itself as a slasher comedy starring, as well as directed & written by, Billy Bryk and Finn Wolfhard of Ghostbusters and Stranger Things fame respectively. Finally we got a literal trailer for Osgood Perkins’ next project, Keeper (2025), after credits for The Monkey wrapped up. 

The Monkey is a horror-comedy, based on the 1980 short story of the same name by Stephen King. It centers around twin brothers, named Bill and Hal, who are being raised by their single mother Lois (Tatiana Maslany) after their father ran off. The two boys discover a toy windup monkey in a closet containing their father’s remaining belongings. As a result of winding up the monkey, gruesome deaths occur, leading them to throw it away and attempt to move on from their lives. However decades later, the Monkey mysteriously reamerges. Now I mention that the movie is a horror-comedy, it definitely leans more on the comedy side. Personally, I do not mind but perhaps some horror fans, particularly those that enjoyed the creepier more unsettling moments in Longlegs, may be disappointed in the tone of this film. The main throughline of this movie is that death is uncertain and can often come up as a surprise with little to no rhyme, reason, or thematic meaning. As such, the movie posits that as a species blessed and cursed with the awareness of inevitable end, we should try to enjoy life as best as we can and not put so much stock in death. That in mind, it should come as no surprise that the gruesome deaths displayed throughout the movie, brought to the screen with great visual and makeup effects, are done in such an over the top fashion. It reminds me of Evil Dead II (1987) with how tongue & cheek and ridiculous some of these deaths are. Speaking of Evil Dead II, if you liked that bit where Bruce Campbell as Ash traps his possessed hand in a bucket and lays Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms on top, you’ll likely appreciate the rest of the visual humor throughout this film. 

The writing also contributes to the laughs as well. One of my friends explained that often when the film has characters deliver exposition or seem to have an emotional moment, you’ll find that a lot of the characters are just saying some insane shit relative to the context of the situation. Of course, this film features plenty of actors in this film having fun with these kooky characters. The aforementioned Tatiana Maslany as Lois delivers the main theme of the film through an out-of-pocket speech she gives to the younger Bill and Hal (both played by Christian Convery). On the subject of Convery, it wasn’t until writing this that I learned he played both younger versions of the twin brothers. I walked out of the film thinking, “Wow the kid playing younger Hal did a great job, but the actor for younger Bill wasn’t as good”. Well now I look foolish, but I still think he did a good job overall. I suppose I just prefer his portrayal of younger Hal over younger Bill. Speaking of dual roles, I enjoyed Theo James as the older versions of Hal & Bill. It’s sort of the inverse here where I prefer James’ more over-the-top performance as older Bill over the more comparatively grounded Hal (not to say watching older Hal was a bore). I also like to give my roses to Tess Degenstein and Rohan Campbell as Real Estate Agent Barbara and Punk Rocker Ricky respectively. Both characters I felt were entertaining, with Degenstein’s in particular contributing to one of my favorite scenes in the film.

As for what in this film may not work as well, I would again say that, if you really enjoyed Longlegs, you may be let down in this movie as a follow-up, at least tonally speaking. Longlegs is a serial killer thriller, but also a supernatural and occultist horror with levity, glam, & punk rock thrown in? The movie is definitely a vibe-piece to be sure with visually trippy and disturbing sequences. By comparison, The Monkey looks much more straightforward which helps to make it more accessible to audiences, but perhaps may alienate fans hoping the film would get a little more freaky with it. Honestly, it wasn’t until a dream sequence later in the film that I remembered that this film and Longlegs share the same director. Moreover, I mentioned the film’s main theme being how to deal with the spontaneity of death, which is indeed developed well and becomes fascinating when you understand this theme to be autobiographical to Osgood Perkins. However, I noticed a few other motifs in this film that I’m not entirely sure to be developed themes or just extra details that allude to Perkins’ personal life. Most of the people we see involved with the toy monkey have absent or “deadbeat” fathers and testy, at the very least, relationships with their siblings. It was something I noticed and wondered if the film would do a little more with that, but ultimately did not seem to be as developed as the aforementioned main theme. 

Overall, I’m going to say The Monkey is a Best Movie Ever. I normally avoid watching trailers to movies I’m interested in, unless I see them in a theater (as was the case here). The Monkey looked to be over-the-top and funny and it certainly delivered on that front. When it comes towards my favorite horror films, I tend to have an affinity for horror-comedies so I did not mind the direction this film took. That being said, I am now in the mood for more conventionally scary horror, especially since Wolf Man (2025) sucked. I’ll be on-call for this coming week, so I’m not sure if I’ll have another movie post. We’ll just have to wait and see. Good night.