The Monkey

Perkins consciously assumes the sense of chaos to shape a story that, by unexpectedly combining the 'indie' sensibility with that of the bloodiest 'blockbuster', offers results as uneven as they are striking. [Full review in Spanish]

If you’re willing to dig past The Monkey’s blood and guts, you’ll find a thoughtful inquiry into the very different lives of people depending on their response and disposition toward the random, inordinate, and callous suffering around us.

The film, shot in oily gloom by Nico Aguilar, sets out to dispatch every passerby in fashions that would appal Caligula. Good old-fashioned disgusting fun. I had a blast.

This is a riot of a film and I pretty much enjoyed every moment of it.

Perkins’s film never explains how the monkey migrates so much, but follows it from pillar to post on an equal-opportunity killing spree. As spectacle, it’s garish.

A horror film can’t survive on kills alone, and the narrative of The Monkey — for all the movie’s craft and pedigree — is the worst thing a horror saga can be: boring.

The Monkey is gob-stoppingly hilarious to behold and filled with existential thoughts about life and death. Even though The Monkey is brimming with bloody carnage and festive annihilation, it struck me as a very personal film.

...the movie turns out to be a dark, harsh, dry, completely absurd comedy. Much more immersed, for example, in the world of The Twilight Zone than in the world of Longlegs, but it is very easy to watch, very entertaining...[Full review in Spanish]

The Monkey can’t overcome its messy storytelling to deliver on its potent themes. Disappointing.

In a break from his quietly moody horror movies, filmmaker Osgood Perkins embraces strange, cockeyed humor and gleefully excessive gore for this inventive yet odd Stephen King adaptation.