‘The Monkey’ review: The sinister silliness of Stephen King

Longlegs writer/director Osgood Perkins goes from slow-burn chills to blood-drenched thrills with the ridiculousness of The Monkey.

When you see the phrase “Based on a story by Stephen King” on a movie poster, you get an idea of what you’re about to watch. 9 times out of 10, it’ll be a creepy thriller with supernatural elements at play and a retro aesthetic in the background (and it’ll take place in Maine). King’s works have been adapted so many times in such similar ways, it almost warrants parody. If you’ve seen too much of James Bond, you need an Austin Powers to shake things up. That’s not to say that The Monkey, the latest adaptation of a King story, is some kind of goofy romp meant to please a crowd. But for how ridiculous writer/director Osgood Perkins (Longlegs) takes the tropes of King’s writing in movie form, you have to ask; is he laughing with Stephen King, or at Stephen King?

The Monkey is a short story of King’s, first published in 1980 as an insert included with an issue of the Gallery porn magazine. It’s no Letter to Penthouse, though: it follows twin brothers Bill and Hal (Christian Convery), one douchey and one dorky. The boys live with their single swinging mother (Tatiana Maslany) while the only remnants of their father are some assorted knickknacks, including a mysterious wind-up toy monkey. Whenever someone starts it up, deadly consequences occur and the boys vow to hide it from the world. Years later, grownup Hal (Theo James) hears from his distant twin that mysterious deaths have started to occur in their old hometown. Fearing the mechanical monstrosity is back, Hal and his son Petey (Colin O’Brien) try tracking down the monkey before it causes fatal harm to them and others.

King of…comedy?

Let me be blunt: The Monkey is (so far) the funniest movie of 2025. You might not think that from the creepy trailers or the plot description or even the image above this paragraph, but Perkins and co. are clearly trying to entertain the sickos of the world here. The adaptation has the bones of a typical King tale: background references from times past, kids and adults with stinted maturity cycles, unexplained horrors and quests to make them stop. What Perkins does with The Monkey is fill-in those stock elements with hilarious, sometimes head-scratching extremes.

The movie starts in 1999, but swinger parties from the 70s are still happening and preteen Bill talks like a late-2000s edge lord using random profanities like basic conversation. Even when it enters “present day,” the cinematography and costume design makes The Monkey look like a lost B-movie from the late-70s/early-80s. Perkins himself even shows up in one scene sporting mutton chops like he just got off the set of Soul Train. As for the aforementioned “horrors,” Perkins has a ball playing with buckets of blood and goofy set pieces. It’s a shame Warner Bros. has a new Final Destination movie on the way because The Monkey beat it to the punch with surprise kills in quirky (and occasionally ridiculous) scenarios.

Monkeying around

Rest assured, these aren’t knocks against the movie. In fact, its brazen approach to King’s character archetypes and violent scares are so over-the-top that it comes back to around to being funny. It’s almost a shortened riff on King’s It, what with a childhood terror returning in adulthood to help lead characters into maturity. Whereas It was sprawling and unwieldy, The Monkey cuts out all the fat of vast lore and creeping dread to get to the gore and shock value. One trademark element from past Perkins movies brought here is bleakness, but even that’s done with a wink. “Everybody dies, and that’s life” is basically the catchphrase of The Monkey, and it’s hard not to imagine a comedic drumroll following that statement.

James is probably the handsomest King insert to ever be in one of his adaptations, but he’s a decent choice. He’s got a fine narrator voice with a dry delivery fit for being the straight man in all the madness. Between the twin roles, he’s better at being Hal with his awkward stressed energy that’d fit well in a Coen brothers movie. It’s a shame Maslany isn’t in the movie more, as she has fun being the blunt, grounding force keeping Hal and Bill from falling into insanity. Other side characters pop-in to add to the ridiculousness, from Rohan Campbell (Halloween Ends) looking like a roadie from Metallica’s early days to Elijah Wood in a quick cameo as the most obnoxious self-help guru.

The bottom line.

We may never know the true intent of The Monkey, but its cavalier attitude towards taste (and tone) make it all the more fun to watch. Its terror is more ludicrous than looming, but Perkins’s keen eye for creepy visuals balances well with the bursts of blood. As for the King translation, maybe The Monkey is a well-intentioned love letter to the author’s core concepts? We’ll never know, and we really don’t need to when a horror film is this committed to putting on a show.

The Monkey hits theaters everywhere on February 21. Watch the trailer here.

Images courtesy of Neon. Read more reviews by Jon Winkler here.