Primate Never Earns Its Own Terror

Primate

★ ★

Primate is a horror film about a chimpanzee named Ben who gets bitten by a rabid mongoose in his enclosure within the Lambert family property in Hawaii. The bite leaves Ben infected with rabies, which is odd, given that Hawaii is rabies-free. The film has an interesting concept and some bloody, tension-driven horror scenes. Despite this, the plot is thin, and we aren’t given much time to get to know the characters to connect with them emotionally.

Ben was taken in by a linguist who has passed away, leaving her deaf veterinarian husband Adam (Troy Kotsur) and two daughters Lucy (Johnny Sequoyah) and Erin (Gia Hunter) to take care of him. Ben is part of the family—much more than a pet. He understands sign language and has a speaking board he can use to press buttons to communicate.

Try Kotsur as Adam and Gia Hunter as Erin
© 2026 Paramount Pictures

Lucy has been away at college and returns home with her friend Kate (Victoria Wyant). Erin isn’t happy with Lucy, because she feels abandoned by her. This feels like a common fallback when writers don’t know how to add drama to a family dynamic. The younger sibling often resents the older one for beginning the next chapter of life. It’s old-hat, falling flat and feeling forced here. This is the case with most of the drama among the characters—surface level conflict that fails to go deep.

At first, Ben is fine and plays with Lucy, Erin and Kate. He’s put back in his outside enclosure for the night where, a couple hours later, he mauls Doug (uncredited, played by Rob Delaney), one of his caretakers, to death. It’s a gruesome death scene that seems to be there only to prove Ben’s terrifying strength.

Gia Hunter as Erin, Victoria Wyant as Kate, Johnny Sequoyah as Lucy and Jess Alexander as Hannah
© 2026 Paramount Pictures

Through the course of the evening, into the waning hours of morning, Ben will escape his enclosure and terrorize Lucy and Erin and most of the friends they invite over for a party.

There are elements reminiscent of the film adaptation of Stephen King’s Cujo where a mother and son are trapped in their car by a violent, bloodthirsty rabid Saint Bernard. The tension and terror worked there, because we cared about the characters. The stakes were high—a mother had to keep her six-year-old son safe from the mad beast intent upon ripping the Ford Pinto apart to get to them.

Victoria Wyant as Kate and Johnny Sequoyah as Lucy
© 2026 Paramount Pictures

Primate replaces its central conflict with a gimmick, when it should have created an emotional engine to drive the film. Here, we don’t really get to know the characters. While we don’t want to see them die, the lack of emotional connection to them cheapened the horror. The more gruesome Ben’s attacks became, the more I was reminded I was only watching a movie. With a runtime of just under an hour-and-a-half, we could have used a little more script to relate to the victims.

It’s something horror films get wrong a lot, assuming terrifying, blood-soaked scenes are enough to keep us on the edge of our seats. That only works when we give a damn about who’s being ripped apart onscreen.

Despite all this, the film does deliver some tension in cleverly paced scenes. If the emotional connection were there, this would be a gripping thriller—ripped flesh and all. And while it’s never a good thing to remember you’re watching a movie while you’re watching one, Primate still reminds us that a chimpanzee is not to be trifled with.