“The Monkey” (2025) is a dark comedy horror film that follows brothers Hal and Bill as they deal with a toy monkey that has the power to cause gruesome deaths when the toy gets wound up. “The Monkey is based on a Stphen King short story of the same name from 1980.
Directed by Osgood Perkins, who has directed other horror films, “Longlegs” (2024) and “Gretel & Hansel” (2020). Osgood is the son of Anthony Perkins, who played Norman Bates in “Psycho” (1960).
Two twin brothers, Hal and Bill, find a wind-up monkey toy that had belonged to their father. They wind up the monkey and when it finishes drumming, nothing happens. They think nothing of it until later their babysitter is decapitated right in front of them.
The brothers soon realize the monkey’s powers and after fighting with each other, Hal winds up the monkey in hopes that it will kill Bill. To their horror, its their mother who winds up dying.
After the monkey causes another death, Hal and Bill decide to chain it up in a box and throw the box down a well to never unleash its horrific powers again. Years later Hal is now an adult but somehow the monkey has returned.
Hal now has a son to worry about so he sets out to meet up with his brother Bill to destroy the monkey once and for all. Several bloody and violent deaths occur before he can find the monkey and discover who is behind all the recent deaths.
Despite the gruesome deaths, the overall tone of the movie was very campy and funny. At almost every death in the movie the people in the theater, including me, were laughing.
The lead ups to the deaths were very entertaining to watch as well.
I was trying to piece together exactly how the people would die, and every time, I was surprised. There was always an unexpected twist that caused myself and many other people in the theater to jump when the final blow came.
Electrocution, set on fire, hit by a bus, exploding and bees. These are just a few of the ways people died in “The Monkey.” Each of these deaths were shocking to see play out in the film, but again they were also funny.
Christian Convery played the young versions of Hal and Bill, and Theo James played the adult versions of Hal and Bill. They were so good that until I was reading the cast list after I watched the movie, I thought they were actual twins playing the sets of brothers.
This is another testament to the visual effects team, as when the single actor interacted with themselves as the other brother, I couldn’t tell that any visual effects were happening.
The movie ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, leaving the fates of certain characters uncertain. This also leaves an opportunity for a sequel and if that happens, I will be the first in line to see it.