Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		2.5

The Monkey's Paw Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 29, 2014

That old adage “be careful what you wish for” probably predated British author W.W. Jacobs’ 1902 short story The Monkey’s Paw, but that tale has come to exemplify the phrase, to the point where the very title of the piece has become a sort of shorthand for unintended consequences and those who deign to play with the vagaries of fate. There have been a rather astounding number of adaptations of Jacobs’ spooky saga through the intervening century-plus since its appearance, including everything from plays to operas to films to, yes, an episode in The Simpsons’ annual Halloween fête “Treehouse of Horror”. Though many tend to forget this particular element of the original story, there’s actually a subtext concerning British Imperialism running just beneath the surface of what would seem to be a horror tale. In Jacobs’ original version, the dreaded monkey’s paw is a relic from far off India, where of course the British ruled—or at least attempted to rule—for decades. In fact the man who initially has the monkey’s paw in Jacobs’ version is a soldier just returned from India, where the implication is that things have not gone totally splendidly in the so-called Jewel in the Crown. Once the paw matriculates into the hands of the couple at the core of Jacobs’ story, things only go from bad to worse, but one of Jacobs’ salient plot points—bringing the dead back to life through a well intentioned if ultimately unworkable wish—has remained part and parcel of Monkey’s Paw lore throughout many, perhaps even most, of the adaptations which have followed, including this 2013 offering which comes courtesy of Chiller Films and which received a brief theatrical release in tandem with a Video On Demand debut in the weeks leading up to Halloween time last year. This is a thoroughly Americanized version, though, and one localized to New Orleans, a place which any black magic lover will know has provided a suitably dank and moody locale for other supernaturally themed horror films like Angel Heart.

Unfortunately the writing and direction of The Monkey’s Paw is nowhere near as evocative as in Angel Heart, and the film simply limps along on some rather curious horror tropes that divorce it from its source material and make it something akin to a zombie serial killer thriller (the fact that director Brett Simmons decries even the mere mention of “zombies” in the featurette included on this Blu-ray seems to indicate this might be a touchy subject for the filmmakers). The putative hero here is a working stiff named Jake Tilton (C.J. Thomason), who goes out for drinks with his buddy Tony Cobb (Stephen Lang, evidently picking up a paycheck) after a hard day at the factory. The inevitably alluring monkey’s paw soon shows up, and Jake makes an impulsive wish which is of course granted, but which ultimately leads to Cobb’s death. Jake’s second wish is for his friend to revive, which (of course) also happens, but with devastating and supposedly unexpected consequences.

There are several problems with this Monkey’s Paw, including a “round robin” plot device that keeps the “terror” of the paw active, while never really organically woven into the overall story. But even more than that, any version of this venerable tale requires a well intentioned but kind of clueless hero that finds himself caught up in forces that he neither understands nor can control. Here, Jake is kind of a loser from the get go, and some of his decisions (including at least one of his wishes) are so preposterous (especially after some backstory is divulged) as to be downright ludicrous. It's therefore hard to connect with Jake on any emotional level, since he's not exactly a paradigm of morality to begin with, something that may keep most audience members at arm's length from caring very much whether Jake makes it through the gauntlet alive or dead. When the supposed "hero" doesn't offer a hook for the audience, there's a very real and present danger that everything surrounding that character will assume more importance almost by default, and that is indeed what happens here.

What therefore drives this version—to intermittently effective results—is the “quest” that the zombiefied Cobb goes on in order to retrieve the ostensibly missing paw and thereby get his chance at having a wish come true. It’s a kind of silly artifice that leaves the ostensible main character Jake spending most of the film reacting to Cobb’s murderous ways. While the film has the requisite amount of gruesome violence, there’s a certain tonally dissociative quality here that keeps the events depicted from ever working up much momentum. Part of this may in fact be due to Jake’s kind of passive qualities, but sharper screenwriting might have helped deliver a more frightening version of the tale. What’s left is an occasionally moody piece that features Lang chewing the scenery with a fair amount of élan.

The Monkey's Paw Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Monkey's Paw is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Scream Factory (an imprint of Shout! Factory) with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Despite being of recent vintage, this is a surprisingly murky and soft looking presentation that is further hobbled by frequent low contrast. Most of the film takes place in shrouded environments, leading to a deficit in shadow detail. When brightly lit scenes show up, fine detail is actually quite good and colors appear accurate. There are some nicely evocative tweaks that were done in the DI stage here, including a kind of sepia toned prelude that nicely sets up the dangers of the monkey's paw.

The Monkey's Paw Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Monkey's Paw features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix that offers some good immersion in scenes like a sudden car crash or some gunfire, but which tends to retreat (and/or advance, as the case may be) to the front channels for the more omnipresent dialogue scenes. Fidelity is fine and dynamic range is quite wide, and the track has no issues to report.

The Monkey's Paw Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer (1080p; 1:44)


• Making The Monkey's Paw (1080i; 4:47) is a typical EPK with the requisite interviews and snippets from the film.


• Audio Commentary with Director Brett Simmons, Cinematographer Scott Winig, and Actor C.J. Thomason. This is a pretty enjoyable commentary which deals both with some technical issues (like color grading and tweaking the image quality) and anecdotal (like filming in New Orleans shortly after Katrina hit).

The Monkey's Paw Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Genre enthusiasts may find enough here, if just barely, to warrant checking out this latest iteration of W.W. Jacobs' seemingly immortal tale, but there a general whiff of missed opportunities wafting through this outing. Jake is not an especially likable hero, and that makes Cobb the focus of much of the film. The mystery surrounding Cobb's killing spree never really ties into the supernatural horror of the paw itself, leaving this whole enterprise feeling kind of half baked or in fact vivisected. The Blu-ray presentation is generally fine, though the video is not as sharp and well detailed as some might hope for from a 2013 release.