The Monkey (2025) Horror comedy a world away from the Stephen King short story
“The monkey that likes killing our family, it’s back”
“Not three months later, Aunt Ida had sent him up into the attic to get the boxes of Christmas decorations, and as he crawled around looking for them, getting the knees of his pants dusty, he had suddenly come face to face with it again, and his wonder and terror had been so great that he had to bite sharply into the side of his hand to keep from screaming…or fainting dead away. There it was, grinning its toothy grin, cymbals poised a foot apart and ready to clap, leaning nonchalantly back against one corner of a Ralston-Purina carton as if waiting for a bus, seeming to say: Thought you got rid of me, didn’t you? But I’m not that easy to get rid of, Hal. I like you, Hal. We were made for each other, just a boy and his pet monkey, a couple of good old buddies. And somewhere south of here there’s a stupid old Italian rag man lying in the clawfoot tub with his eyeballs bulging and his dentures half popped out of his mouth, his screaming mouth, a rag-man who smells like a burnt out Exide battery. He was saving me for his grandson, Hal, he put me on the bathroom shelf with his soap and his razor and his Burma-Shave and the Philco radio he listened to the Brooklyn Dodgers on, and I started to clap, and one of my cymbals hit that old radio and into the tub it went, and then I came to you, Hal, I worked my way along the country roads at night and the moonlight shone off my teeth at three in the morning and I left many people dead at many scenes. I came to you, Hal, I’m your Christmas present, so wind me up, who’s dead? Is it Bill? It is Uncle Will? Is it you, Hal? Is it you?”
Excerpt from “The Monkey” (1990) by Stephen King.
1999 sure was a strange year. 4 horrific deaths. 3 funerals, one of which ended with a heartbroken family of 3 dancing to their heart’s content, and another ensuring a bullying older brother would never take off his suit as he knew, deep down in his heart, that another funeral would soon follow in the pun intended wake of the one before. And it did. His Uncle this time, mashed to smithereens by a rampaging stampede of horses and whilst the older of the twin brothers went to yet another funeral with a younger twin brother he abused and bullied in line with the bullying inflicted upon him by the worst of the worst of his local school, the torment continued, a stoner-like Priest way out of his depth conducted funeral after funeral, an Elvis look-alike for an Uncle arrived (before his departure in a bloody puddle under the weight of a marauding mass of wild horses) and despite being chopped up, limb from bloody limb and dumped down a well, it was all still the fault of a damn monkey playing the drums to the fairground anthem “Oh I do like to be beside the seaside”.
Confused? Well 25 years later and despite being estranged as brothers and free of a serial killing monkey with a penchant for playing the drums, someone is still winding the key located in the back of that damn monkey, and the killings (and gory blood letting) shows no signs of abating. Aunt Ida. Poor old Aunt Ida. She succumbed first, her head in a fiery blaze before brutally impaling herself on a For Sale sign. Then there was the electrocution at the swimming pool, limbs flying in all directions. Or was it first the poor soul bloodily torn to shreds by his own lawnmower as a neighbour, soaked to the skin in the poor man’s blood, cracked open another beer? The sales lady? Wow. Whatever happened to her fingers? Perhaps we should ask Hal, but then again, perhaps we shouldn’t. He’s been through enough. Someone was steamed to death. There was a poison snake hiding in a golf hole, a pretend policeman and a face full of wasps, and then there was the bowling ball, a kid’s dream turned adult nightmare, and it was all still the fault of a damn monkey playing the drums to the fairground anthem “Oh I do like to be beside the seaside”.
Flying in the face of conventional wisdom but let’s face facts, there’s no better way to fly, I wasn’t as impressed with The Monkey as I hoped I’d be. Having read the short story a couple of times and then a third time before finally watching the film, coupled with my beautiful son’s excitement at a film he adored at the cinema and director Osgood Perkins offering last year of Longlegs being one of my ten favourite films of the year, I really hoped I’d like this film more. Two viewings so far and whilst I liked it far more second time around, I still don’t love it anywhere near as much as Longlegs and found the film a little tiresome after poor old Aunt Ida set her head on fire before impaling herself on the For Sale sign around the 35 minute mark. That said, Theo James is excellent in his dual role of the adult Shelburn twins Hal and Bill, Elijah Wood hilariously ridiculous in his albeit brief cameo role, and director Perkins is a dead ringer for Elvis in his cameo role as the doomed to die a bloody death by horses, Uncle Chip.
My disappointment isn’t linked to the book or the boring trope of the book always being better than the film or television series. The short story is TAME compared to the blood splatter comedy horror provided here by Osgood Perkins and perhaps with a third viewing my love will grow.
But I’m a difficult to please fan of horror films, you should know that by now.
“Oh! I do like to be beside the seaside!
I do like to be beside the sea!
Oh I do like to stroll along the Prom, Prom, Prom!
Where the brass bands play, “Tiddely-om-pom-pom!”
Thanks for reading. I hope this message in a bottle in The Matrix finds you well, prospering, and the right way up in an upside down world.
Whilst you’re here I may as well brag about the release of my trilogy of recently self-published books. Beautiful covers eh! As the title(s) would suggest, this is my life at the movies or at least from 1980 to 2024, and in volume 1 you’ll find 80 spoiler free appraisals of movies from debut filmmakers, 91 of the very best films appraised with love and absent of spoilers from 1990–2024 in volume 2, and in volume 3 you’ll find career “specials” on Paul Thomas Anderson and Quentin Tarantino together with the very best of the rest and another 87 spoiler free film reviews from 2001–2024.
All available in hardback and paperback and here are some handy links:
"A Life at the Movies Vol.1" - link to Amazon
"A Life at the Movies Vol.2" - link to Amazon
"A Life at the Movies Vol.3" - link to Amazon