Cursed objects are nothing new in cinema, especially horror. In Talk to Me there was that weird hand statue. Christine had its eponymous car. The Evil Dead had the Necronomicon, the evil book capable of summoning the forces of darkness. Hell, even Rick and Morty had an episode entitled “Something Ricked This Way Comes”, pointing fun at this trope. So, when I saw that The Monkey was about a cursed toy, I wasn’t all that jazzed.

But then I saw the trailer…

The Monkey is a dark comedy based on Stephen King’s short story of the same name and directed by Osgood Perkins, fresh off the success of Longlegs. Starring Theo James and Tatiana Maslany, it tells the story of a toy monkey that causes the untimely deaths of people in the vicinity of its wrath when it’s activated.

Chaotic horror is my kind of sh*t, where everyone barely knows what’s happening, yet gruesome events play out all around them. Let me tell you: The Monkey is exactly the type of film I needed right now, but calling it good may be stretching the definition slightly. 

Story

Hal (Theo James) has done his best to isolate himself from meaningful relationships. Along with allowing the mother of his son, Petey, and his step-father (Elijah Wood) to take legal custody of him, he hasn’t seen his twin brother, Bill, in decades. And there’s a reason for that. It all started with a creepy toy monkey he and his brother found in his absent father’s things.

This is no ordinary monkey. 

Whenever this clockwork toy is wound up, a random person in the vicinity dies. Their childhood babysitter has a teppanyaki incident. A pawn shop owner is harpooned in the eye. Then there’s other stuff I won’t spoil but adds up to major childhood trauma. So, when Hal’s aunt is killed in a freak “accident”, he travels to his hometown to ensure the monkey toy he thought was long destroyed has not returned. 

Spoilers: it has, and it’s as murderous as ever. 

The Good

While it’s not exactly the same, The Monkey has a similar vibe to the Final Destination franchise. I love those movies. The methods of death in those films are so freaking creative, often emulating some kind of f*cked up Rube Goldberg machine. Substitute the looming presence of death with the looming presence of the cursed toy, and you’re halfway there. The Monkey was the perfect film to get me super pumped for the next instalment of Final Destination, releasing this year

The way characters are snuffed out is fantastic, providing a source of shock and awe… and also comedy. For as much as the anticipation for guts and gore kept me in suspense, some of these “accidents” are hilarious. More than that, the aftermath of those deaths made me chortle my ass off. THERE IS SO MUCH BLOOD AND VISCERA FLYING EVERYWHERE!!! I suppose we shouldn’t have expected anything less from a film produced by James Wan, right?

Tatiana Maslany and Adam Scott play Hal and Bill’s parents in flashbacks, and they’re both superb. Scott has a very small role in the opening, but his fear and anxiety in the presence of the monkey set the film up so well. Maslany also has a relatively small part, but she does everything from comedy, drama and horror so well and steals each scene she’s in. They’re both excellent.

The Not So Good

Something that I usually love in films is easter eggs. Being able to spot something that I recognise from the universe I’m immersed in gives me a burst of endorphins that can rarely be matched. However, The Monkey utilizes them in a way that takes you out of the movie. For example, The Monkey, being based on the works of Stephen King, throws a bunch of King of Horror references at you. When a character called Annie Wilkes (Misery) was introduced, I got excited and tried to follow her on screen, distracting me from the actual story. She was a throw-away and nothing more, so I was disappointed.

The ending is awesome. I mean the ENDING ending, the scene directly before the credits. How we got there, though, was underwhelming. The confrontation with the human antagonist of this movie is a wet fish. There’s some emotional stuff, but there isn’t that bombastic face-off that this film deserved. Most, if not all, of the deaths were so theatrical I was expecting something more from the dramatic moments that didn’t require explosive innards. 

Lastly, they could have done more with the supporting cast. Elijah Wood, who plays Petey’s stepfather, is obnoxious to a degree where you want to slap him in the face. He barely gets any screen time, and you don’t get to see his and Hal’s strained relationship develop as he becomes closer to his son. Aside from Hal and Petey and a couple of others, character interactions are fairly surface-level. 

Summary

The Monkey is entertaining in the same way as Final Destination. There is fun to be had with its creative death scenes and the chaotic energy of an external force causing them. I find these types of films comedic more than scary, and that’s exactly the right energy I was looking for. 

But, in the same breath, it has the same kind of quality as a Final Destination entry. There is something missing that could make The Monkey an objectively excellent film. I was expecting more from Osgood Perkins after the terrific Longlegs, which was a lot grittier and serious. However, I still very much enjoyed this movie.

It might just have to be filed under “guilty pleasure.”