THE MONKEY
HOT ON THE HEELS OF THE TERRIFYING LONGLEGS, OSGOOD PERKINS GOES BANANAS
STEPHEN KING’S THE MONKEY IS A SHORT story that forms part of his 1985 collection, Skeleton Crew. It tells the tale of a man who becomes convinced that a sinister childhood toy — a wind-up, cymbal-smashing monkey — is an unstoppable harbinger of death. It is dark, filled with foreboding and bleak as hell. Osgood Perkins’ adaptation might be dark — following Longlegs, that’s a fairly safe assumption — but according to the director himself, bleak as hell is not on the dance card. “It’s a redemptive, soulful comedy about the fact that everybody dies in the world,” he tells Empire. “If John Landis and Chuck Jones had a baby, you’d have this. It’s really sweet, sad, funny, shocking, gory, violent, ridiculous, cartoonish, poignant. I love it.”