Katie Walsh Tribune News Service
Oz Perkins is working some things out. The "Longlegs" filmmaker is the horror darling of the moment, but he also has a very famous, and very tragic, family history that he's not afraid to face head-on in his work.
He's said that "Longlegs" is a movie about his mother, the late actor Berry Berenson (who died during the 9/11 attacks, aboard American Airlines Flight 11), and the narratives that mothers spin for their children. "I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House," a tale about uncovering dark secrets at the end of someone's life, could ostensibly be about Perkins' father, the actor Anthony Perkins (who died of AIDS-related complications in 1992), made famous in Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho."
Perkins' latest film, "The Monkey," based on a Stephen King short story, is about how siblings might handle generational trauma, family curses and the horrific randomness of death. Do you attempt to wrest control over forces that are larger than life? Or do you simply accept it and attempt to live with it as best you can?
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Indeed, "The Monkey" is a horror movie about trauma, but you've never seen one so gleefully gory, so devilishly black-humored; it is more likely to make you laugh in shock than quake in fear. Perkins isn't trying to scare you, and the suspense is driven by a feeling of a resigned "what now?" that can only come from enduring life's most unbelievable tragedies firsthand.
"The Monkey" is a horrific fable in King's signature style in that children endure terrifying events in the state of Maine, and a sense of unyielding sadness is streaked throughout this tale (Perkins balances that sorrow with dry humor). Twin brothers Hal and Bill (played as children by Christian Convery; Theo James as adults) find a wind-up toy monkey in the effects of their long-lost pilot father, who has abandoned them and their mother Lois (Tatiana Maslany). Bill winds the monkey up, it plays its drum, and then very, very bad things start happening, such as their babysitter dropping dead before their eyes. In an attempt to direct the monkey's ire at his bullying brother, Hal turns the monkey's key; soon they are orphans, living with their Aunt Ida and Uncle Chip (Perkins -- he saves the worst death for his own character).
The true curse of winding the monkey is that you'll never be harmed, it's just everyone around you who will, resulting in a life of isolation and loneliness; a secretive cloud of shame hanging over Hal and Bill in adulthood. They are estranged, Hal leading a small, quiet life, working at a convenience store and seeing his son Petey (Colin O'Brien) for only one week a year in order to protect him, becoming the kind of absentee father he once had. Bill is an eccentric recluse, obsessed with controlling the monkey, attempting to use its random wrath for his own personal revenge.
Like all of Perkins' films, "The Monkey" is elegantly and beautifully made: cinematographer Nico Aguilar mixes various color temperatures of light including fluorescent, neon, lamplight and cold winter daylight to deliver a textured and evocative look to Danny Vermette's meticulous production design. Perkins has a knack for extracting excellent performances, or perhaps just giving an actor space to experiment and flourish; James delivers two surprising and wholly distinct turns as Hal and Bill (Convery is also great in the dual role), defying his heartthrob looks to embody the downtrodden and dorky Hal and unhinged Bill to the fullest.
The message is clear: "everybody dies," as Lois tells her boys, and that's something we have to learn to live with. Generational trauma can be contained if it is acknowledged. The randomness of death is not something anyone can control. Executed with panache, "The Monkey" is a droll and stylish expression of these sentiments, yet there is still something about this gory fable that feels a bit like an exercise, rather than an epic. It's too glib to fully penetrate, but sometimes, all you can do is laugh in the face of death, and Perkins invites us to do so in this viscera-spattered romp through a sickeningly inventive carousal of life's greatest absurdities.
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