Prepare for “The Monkey” to Monkey Around

There’s a certain type of person who enjoys gore and comedy in a single movie, and there’s enough of that type of person that they make movies that combine the two genres, but not so many people that they make enough movies in that combination of genres. The Monkey is one of those rare gems for those people. Funny, gory, and clever.

The Ringing in my Ears

Much of the effort in this film was focused on the gore and horror aspects of the film, so those of you who expect something like that are going to have a great time. Anyone who expected this film to be a straight horror, you’re gonna be let down. The Monkey is clever and funny, with a great cacophony of goofy, gory, surprising kills. Exploding swimmers, heads on fire, bowling ball decapitations- these guys played a grisly round of mad libs, then went out and tacked a series of deaths onto a loose plot. Just blood splatter after blood splatter, explosions and gunshots and a series of cartoonish violence.

The film is full of goofy moments of sometimes dark humor, sometimes juvenile. The first time it happens is unexpected, but The Monkey does not let up until the very end. There’s a deluge of cameos, from Adam Scott to Elijah Wood to the director Osgood Perkins himself.

Cymbalism

Admittedly, there weren’t many moments of symbolism or metaphors in this film. There were the bones of a deeper plot in the film, smashed somewhere between the 30 minutes of child actors setting the background and the father-son bonding in the rest of the movie. I wouldn’t really ding the movie for that though, because if the point of the movie is to kill people in funny ways, then you just need a flimsy excuse.

If there was an issue with the movie, it would be that even though the first half an hour of The Monkey was full of just kids and their mom, played by Tatiana Maslany, there wasn’t enough Tatiana Maslany. Gosh that woman is such a great actress who just chews through scenes with pure talent and charisma. Love her. Need more of her.

In fact, I got thinking. What if we gender swapped everyone in the movie, gave Maslany the lead double role, and let her shine through the movie instead of generic white hunk (and I say this for comedic effect, Theo James’ acting was fine and he played a dork pretty well).

I thought that The Monkey was

GOOD

Especially if you like dark comedies with a ton of gore effects. I watched The Monkey on Hulu.

Wondering how my rating system works? Let me explain!