Fast reviews for busy people! Watch as I review three movies in less time than it takes to do a high five! Have a look as I race against the clock to tell you about “The Monkey’s” damn dirty ape, the family story “The Unbreakable Boy” and the Canadian drama “Morningside.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I join the CTV NewsChannel to talk about “The Monkey’s” damn dirty ape, the family story “The Unbreakable Boy” and the Canadian drama “Morningside.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I join the Bell Media Radio Network national night time show “Shane Hewitt and the Night Shift” for “Booze & Reviews!” This week I go ape for “The Monkey” and suggest some drinks that’ll make you go bananas!
Listen as we monkey around on Booze & Reviews HERE!
Find out why “Spider-Man” star Tom Holland wasn’t able to buy his own brand of non-alcoholic beer HERE!
SYNOPSIS: In “The Monkey,” a new horror comedy based on Stephen King’s 1980 short story of the same name, a vintage toy monkey brings murder and mayhem into the lives of twin brothers Hal and Bill, both played by Theo James.
CAST: Theo James, Tatiana Maslany, Elijah Wood, Christian Convery, Colin O’Brien, Rohan Campbell, and Sarah Levy. Directed by Osgood Perkins.
REVIEW: An inanimate object horror film about the randomness of life and death, “The Monkey” feels like an old-fashioned Stephen King movie. It’s a little rough-and-tumble, meanspirited and it delivers a series of practical splatter gags in great big gory blasts.
There’s even a callback to one of King’s favorite psychopaths.
It’s the story of an organ grinder monkey toy—Wait! Don’t call it a toy! It’s evil incarnate! “It’s basically the devil,” says Hal.—who, with grinning rictus of terror, bangs on a drum like he’s Charlie Watts. As he taps away people die in increasingly terrible ways. From fishhook trauma and aneurisms to immolation and canon fire, the monkey is indiscriminate in choosing his victims or how they will perish. Think “Final Destination,” minus the monkey, and you’ll get the idea.
Try as they might, the twins can’t stop the monkey from dancing to his own drum. “We know it couldn’t be destroyed,” says Hal, “but we hoped it could be controlled.”
As the body count rises, they soon realize that won’t be possible.
Director Osgood Perkins channels his inner Sam “Evil Dead” Raimi, combining old school splatter with very dark humor. It makes for a giddy goodtime, especially as the kills get more and more slapsticky and outlandish.
“The Monkey” does feel stretched from its short story origins to feature film, but Perkins keeps the energy up and the storytelling efficient enough to warrant its 97-minute runtime.
