Going into Primate, you could already sense it aping—buh dum tssh—off of two recent chimp stories: Gordy the killer chimp from Jordan Peele’s Nope; and Chimp Crazy, Netflix’s follow-up to the smash hit docuseries Tiger King. Between the series and the movie, killer chimps have been launched back into our collective consciousness.
Unfortunately, Primate doesn’t seem to understand the core elements of what makes this setup compelling. Nope used Gordy vaguely, but hinted at themes of humanity reducing living things to entertainment value and messing with dangerous animals we don’t fully understand in pursuit of spectacle.
Chimp Crazy introduced us to the insanity of the world of people who keep chimps as pets, who treat these powerful animals like children, even as they grow into extremely dangerous adults. There’s something broken in many of these people, with the chimps almost serving as a replacement for a family member, and seemingly no way to make them understand the risks.
Yeah, Primate doesn’t touch any of that. Instead, we are introduced to a generic teen group led by Lucy (Johnny Sequoyah), who happens to be returning to a home with a pet chimp, Ben. Her mother, a linguistics researcher, brought Ben to the home, but she died of cancer last year. Also, her little sister Erin is mad at her for being away from home. Also, her father is a successful writer who happens to be deaf. Thankfully, this character is played by the terrific Troy Kotsur, who you may remember as the father in CODA. He is the best part of this movie for the little he is in it; his main role is to be away from the events as they unfold.
With daddy away, Lucy’s friend Kate suggests they have a house party, bringing along her own friend Hannah, whom Lucy seems to dislike, and Lucy’s childhood friend/secret crush Brad.
Oops, turns out Ben was bitten by a Mongoose, but that’s OK because, as the film tells us, there’s no rabies in Hawaii. That’s a true fact, which helps to explain the early-movie lackadaisical nature of Ben’s bite. But it also turns out Ben does actually have rabies, and that is never really explained.
What you need to understand is that this is about as standard a slasher flick as you can get. Color by numbers stuff. Except the slasher happens to be a chimp. What doesn’t factor in is anything interesting about the family’s relationship to this chimp, or the specific trauma of seeing a longtime member of the family go suddenly psycho killer.
This is a sleek-looking film with a beautiful cliffside Oahu house for its set pieces. But it rests in this boring valley between the best versions of itself. It could have explored the aforementioned themes and joined the ranks of recent “elevated” slashers, or it could have leaned into campy schlock and made us root for the chimp.
Instead, we kind of are rooting for the teens, I guess? At least the two sisters, given that the family is fresh off a separate trauma. But we aren’t really rooting for them because they are particularly endearing as characters. But they’re not annoying or bad enough to relish in the gory kills here either. The only two characters that almost accomplish this feat are two fratty guys who show up midway through looking to score, and I didn’t even think they quite mustered up enough ill will for what happens to them.
There’s also the issue of pinning this all on rabies, which does make animals act aggressively, but also disoriented—not psychopathic.
What this movie does at least have going for it is that Ben is a scary presence, thanks in part to being mostly a practical effect of a man in a suit rather than a CGI monstrosity. It just hardly mattered when the characters opposite him felt like empty shells only there for fodder.
If all you’re looking for are gory kill set-pieces, there will be a few enjoyments for you here. Otherwise, this is one you can skip.
