Primate (2026)
Directed by Johannes Roberts
College student Lucy and her friends spend their vacation at her family's home in Hawaii, which includes her pet chimpanzee, Ben. However, when Ben contracts rabies after being bitten by a rabid animal, the group must fight for their lives in order to avoid the now-violent chimp.
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46 films that influenced Primate
What critics say influenced Primate
It's much more of the box office than biology, but from Cujo onwards the needs of story outweigh any requirement for accuracy.
Roberts has cited Cujo as major inspiration, and just as many dog lovers found that Stephen King adaptation emotionally distressing, chimp sympathizers will likely flinch at this grisly bout of monkey madness.
…similar to the way we look at the rabid canine in Cujo…
When Primate hits its stride, it channels the sweaty, heart-pounding energy of Cujo or The Birds, but with a glossy modern sheen.
The whole idea of being "trapped" may have worked well in the context of "Cujo," where a mother and her young son are stuck in a car while a rabid dog lurks about, but here it merely makes a ridiculous situation even more silly…
There are several parallels with Stephen King’s story Cujo, which also featured a rabid animal as the antagonist.
It’s a moment that recalls a similar scene in John Carpenter’s Halloween…
Ben smashing through a louvered closet door where Lucy and Kate hide seems direct homage to Jack Nicholson’s “Here’s Johnny!” moment from The Shining or Michael Myers destroying the flimsy closet shielding Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween.
There are plenty of visual horror franchise homages: “Alien,” “Jurassic Park” and “Halloween.” Jamie Lee Curtis’ Laurie Strode would kill for these closets.
Roberts’ homage to King’s Cujo, with lots of notes of Carpenter’s Halloween…
It'd be reductive to suggest that this was King Kong by way of Halloween…
…but Primate also does itself no favors by cribbing from Halloween, Scream, A Quiet Place, and other tired horror tropes.
…this feels like the “Gordy” scene from Nope was expanded into 90 minutes…
Audiences with sensitivity toward animals whose wild instincts have been stifled by human intervention might see this as a cross between James Marsh’s soulful Project Nim and the terrifying sitcom chimp incident in Jordan Peele’s Nope.
Primate is a bit like that memorably gruesome sequence in Nope (2022) stretched out to feature length…
As anyone who has seen "Nope" can tell you, chimps are vicious and unpredictable when they get older.
Just don’t take anyone still having traumatic flashbacks to Nope’s opening sequence.
If you’ve ever wanted a full-length feature version of the “Gordy’s Home” scene in Nope, Primate is the movie for you.
Unlike many horror films about primates, their narrative is not about a King Kong gigantic ape or intelligent apes that fight the good fight (Planet of the Apes).
Sure, we've had "Monkey Shines," "Link," and, of course, multiple non-horror films featuring "King Kong" (if you even count those), but a regular killer ape is surprisingly not a subject that many filmmakers have delved into.
It'd be reductive to suggest that this was King Kong by way of Halloween…
King Kong (2005)…
Everybody knows King Kong…
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Films like Link and Monkey Shines…
Primate makes Monkey Shines look tame by comparison…
Harking back to Richard Franklin’s Link and George A. Romero’s Monkey Shines, the main menace is a murdering monkey.
Sure, we've had "Monkey Shines," "Link," and, of course, multiple non-horror films featuring "King Kong" (if you even count those), but a regular killer ape is surprisingly not a subject that many filmmakers have delved into.
Nor serious and earnest like George A. Romero’s 1988 horror film Monkey Shines.
Monkey Shines…
The skillfully rebooted Planet of the Apes franchise has coaxed audiences to think of simian brethren as complex creatures with significant brain power, but Primate treats Ben strictly as a killing machine, as cunning as he is unrelenting.
Save for the existential terrors of the “Planet of the Apes” series and that one pivotal scene in Jordan Peele’s “Nope,” it would be difficult to scrounge up even one notable film that sees horror staring back at us with a heaving pant-hoot and an aggressive chest-pound.
Unlike many horror films about primates, their narrative is not about a King Kong gigantic ape or intelligent apes that fight the good fight (Planet of the Apes).
When Ben gets rabies, it is as if he is waking up to the infantilization and decided to start the “Planet of the Apes” franchise.
It won’t truly turn us into a planet of apes, but you could do a lot worse for a January horror film.
With that in mind, Primate probably has more similarities to Jaws than some would care to admit.
Primate probably has more similarities to Jaws than some would care to admit.
In terms of pure animal menace, he lands somewhere between the shark in Jaws and the raptors in Jurassic Park: intelligent, omnipresent, not quite as iconic, but just as primally unnerving.
Ben isn’t Jaws, hidden away in shadow…
…those who liked their Jaws derivatives a little more on the hairy, bipedal side…
Films like Link and Monkey Shines…
Sure, we've had "Monkey Shines," "Link," and, of course, multiple non-horror films featuring "King Kong" (if you even count those), but a regular killer ape is surprisingly not a subject that many filmmakers have delved into.
Harking back to Richard Franklin’s Link and George A. Romero’s Monkey Shines, the main menace is a murdering monkey.
I’m old enough to remember the 1986 Richard Franklin thriller, “Link,” which starred Elisabeth Shue and Terrence Stamp and is just like this movie, only with one teenager instead of a half dozen.
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In terms of pure animal menace, he lands somewhere between the shark in Jaws and the raptors in Jurassic Park: intelligent, omnipresent, not quite as iconic, but just as primally unnerving.
Now, I’m not saying Primate is Jurassic Park, by any means…
There are plenty of visual horror franchise homages: “Alien,” “Jurassic Park” and “Halloween.”
There is something beautiful about the motion capture experiences behind movies like Rise of the Planet of the Apes.
Rise of the Planet of the Apes…