“The Monkey” is in theaters now.
“Longlegs” director Osgood Perkins adapts a Stephen King short story, collected for eternity in “Skeleton Crew,” which stars Theo James as twin brothers who have a complicated with a wind-up monkey that causes the unfortunate (and often quite spectacular) death of those around them. But can they break the curse before the monkey dooms us all?
And while “The Monkey” is excellent, continuing a wonderful streak of A+ genre movies this year that has also included “Companion” and “Heart Eyes,” there might be one lingering question. Only this time, it’s not about the ending – it’s about the beginning.
Let’s get into the scene that opens the movie, complete with commentary from Perkins. Spoilers beware, of course, especially if you fear that reading about a movie before you’ve seen it will result in a hilariously unexpected death.
So we aren’t talking about the ending?
No. You’ve seen the billboards. You know the ending. Everybody dies.
Everybody?
Well, almost everybody.
Then let’s talk about the beginning.
“The Monkey” starts with a man, played by Adam Scott, who is frantically entering a pawn shop. The pawn shop owner looks at the man, who is covered in blood. Scott says not to worry, it’s not his blood. The reason Scott is there is that he is trying to get rid of the titular monkey – a big, bulky statue of a hideous monkey with a drum. Scott warns the shop owner not to turn the key in the monkey’s back – horrible things will happen. Inevitably, the key is turned and something horrible does happen. The shop owner is impaled with a harpoon. As the harpoon retracts, it takes along the man’s intestines. Scott burns down the pawn shop. But it doesn’t get rid of the monkey.
In terms of setting the table for what is to come, this does an impeccable job.
What’s the question, exactly?
Well, Scott never returns to the movie. It was unclear, exactly, when the incident took place. Is this a previous owner of the monkey or somebody after the events of the movie has ended, trying to rid themselves of the cursed object?
Let’s have Osgood Perkins explain.
As Perkins explains, Scott is playing the dad of the twins, played in adulthood by Theo James. “That’s the airline pilot dad, whose uniform is hanging up in the closet. He says, ‘I thought my boys would like this, but let me tell you, man, they will not.’ This was Captain Capt. Petey Shelburn,” Perkins said. “He’s had the monkey for a bit. It’s done some bad things. He’s covered in blood. ‘It’s not my blood, it’s someone else’s blood.’ And he’s trying to banish it back to whatever hell it comes from.”
Immediately after the pawn shop incident, the boys’ dad disappears, leaving his wife (played wonderfully by Tatiana Maslany) to raise the kids.
Is there anymore lore we should be aware of?
No! And purposefully so.
“The idea around that was just to set the rules,” Perkins explained. “I wanted to have no mythology. There’s no mythology in this movie, so we just set the rules, what we can expect, how the monkey operates, and to establish the humor in a little, in a little fun punch line vignette, like a little rim shot.” Ba-doom-cha!
Anything else we should know?
Just that the rest of the movie is just as messed up.
“The Monkey” is in theaters now.
