The Monkey’s Paw

Obsession

20/05/26

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Anyone familiar with WW Jacobs’ classic short story, The Monkey’s Paw, will have a fair idea of what to expect going into Curry Barker’s debut feature, Obsession – and if the film’s title is somewhat forgettable, this is nevertheless a nicely-made low-budget chiller, which manages to keep a few surprises tucked up its blood-spattered sleeve. 

Bear (Michael Johnston) lives alone in his late grandma’s house. Despite his dark good looks, he’s a bit of a loner – and the grisly demise of the cat that usually keeps him company suggests that the situation isn’t going to change any time soon. But Bear has a secret crush on Nikki (Inde Navarrette), a co-worker at the lowly musical instrument store where he earns a crust. He’s trying to work up the courage to ask her out, encouraged by another workmate, Ian (Cooper Tomlinson), but somehow Bear lacks the nerve to voice his true feelings to her.

And then, in a local curio shop, he buys a tacky little gizmo called a One-Wish Willow, intending to give it to Nikki as a silly birthday gift. The idea is to break the twig and wish aloud for your heart’s desire. In a moment of weakness, Bear uses the device to further his own aims, impulsively wishing that Nikki will love him more than anyone in the world . He soon comes to understand the old adage, ‘Be careful what you wish for.’  Because quite suddenly, Nicky does love him – obsessively, relentlessly, unpredictably – and she isn’t going to let anything stand in the way of her possessing him, heart and soul…

While it’s a familiar premise, Barker sets out his stall with skill, aided by two strong performances from the leads – particularly from Navarette, who can switch from sweet and shy to downright terrifying in the blink of an eye. Barker shot the film himself (he began his career making short online features) and has a great knack for capturing disturbing silhouettes. There are some adroitly-handled jump scares and I haven’t been so disturbed by a character’s grin since the Smile films.

There are also some interesting issues in the subtext: the way that couples influence each other; the jealousy that can be caused by other friendships; the awful void that can open up when a relationship has run its course and only one person is ready to make the break. Barker – who also wrote the screenplay – unleashes a whole series of tortuous events which build rapidly to carnage. I find myself thoroughly swept up in proceedings and am genuinely surprised when the final credits roll. One hour and forty-eight minutes have sped past seemingly in the blink of an eye.

Obsession makes another valuable addition to the crop of quirky horrors currently dominating the cineplexes – though I still think it would benefit from a more interesting title. One-Wish Willow, maybe?

4.4 stars

Philip Caveney 

The Monkey

23/02/25

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Director Osgood Perkins scored a palpable hit last year with Longlegs, a slow-burn horror that simmered with an overpowering sense of dread. So the news that he is helming an adaptation of Stephen King’s The Monkey (itself inspired by WW Jacobs’ classic short story, The Monkey’s Paw) leads me to expect that this will deliver more of the same. So I’m taken somewhat off-balance when the film promptly reveals itself as an absurd black comedy with lashings of gore. The result is never particularly scary, but it does prompt a surprising amount of incredulous laughter.

It begins in flashback, as the father of twin boys, Hal and Bill (both played by Christian Convery), attempts to gift an unwanted ‘toy’ to a thrift store, with unexpectedly gruesome results. The toy in question is the titular simian, a wind-up automaton that plays a drum to the tune of ‘I Do Like To Be Beside the Seaside.’ Once activated (by turning the key in its back), it has a nasty habit of ensuring that somebody in the immediate vicinity will get horrifically mangled, for no apparent reason other than it’s a nasty little pest who enjoys doing that kind of thing.

After their father ‘goes out for cigarettes and never returns,’ Hal and Bill grow up under the care of their understandably disturbed mum, Lois (Tatiana Maslany). One night, when searching through their absent father’s belongings, the boys discover the monkey in its box. Probably not a good idea to wind the key, you might think, but hey, kids will be kids…

By adulthood, the two brothers (now played by Theo James) have drifted apart. Hal is the father of a teenage boy, but after his marriage break-up, only gets to spend one night a year with Petey (Colin O’Brian) and – wouldn’t you know it – that one night is when the malevolent monkey chooses to make its timely reappearance…

There’s much I like about this film: Nico Aguilar’s dark, brooding cinematography is suitably eye-catching and the gnarly splatter effects – created by no less than sixteen people in the arts department – take a wonderfully Heath Robinson approach to the task of dissembling human bodies. Much of the resulting mayhem is entertaining. The monkey itself is an engaging creation, positively oozing menace in every shot. But not everything in the production is quite so positive.

While a host of interesting characters manage to pop up to deliver Perkins’ sparky dialogue, no sooner have they appeared than they’re being messily spread across the screen and the effect is that this feels like a film that’s almost entirely peopled by bit players (or players in bits?). Perkins himself cameos as ‘Uncle Chip’ but gifts with only one line of dialogue before he gets turned to mush, while Elijah Wood doesn’t fare much better as Petey’s stepfather, Ted, though – to be fair – he’s one of the few characters who actually survives. Furthermore, a sub-plot featuring a man called Thrasher (Rohan Campbell) is so clumsily inserted into the action that for a while it only serves to confuse me, particularly when the actor is also obliged to play two characters.

I’m clearly not the only one with misgivings. Half an hour into the screening, three viewers get up and march determinedly out of the auditorium. Those with a predilection for comedy in a deep shade of anthracite may (like me) laugh out loud at what they’re watching and will possibly revel in the WTF final scenes.

But The Monkey is a tricky little beast and one thing is for sure: it won’t be for everyone.

3.7 stars

Philip Caveney