King Kong (2005)

Originally Reviewed

Wednesday January 25, 2006

King Kong, a well known film character that ranks among the popularity of Godzilla in terms of remakes. I've never seen any of the prior versions of the giant ape, so I have nothing with which to base any comparison on, which in many occasions is good. Going into this film I knew it would be visually breathtaking, and in that aspect it did not disappoint, what concerned me the most was how was the story going to be affected by being stretched out with a three hour run-time.

King Kong is set in New York, 1933, film maker Carl Denham (Jack Black) is trying to procure more funds to embark on a film project like no other, the downside is his investors have lost interest in his rants and raves and have decided to sell off the footage he has to cover some of their losses. Carl over hears this and decides to take his footage and make a run for it, then finds out his leading actress quit, now he must find someone and fast! He runs into Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts), a vaudeville actress who was down on her luck, with no one to turn to. Carl is able to convince Ann to join the film with mention of the films' screen writer the highly esteemed Jack Driscoll (Adrien Brody).

Off they go on their journey to Singapore...well that's at least what Carl tells everyone, the truth is they will be heading straight into uncharted territory where no man has gone before, no not the Final Frontier, the mysterious Skull Island! Next in line for our adventurers includes: surviving a near death collision into a wall blanketed by fog, barely escaping a surprise attack by half-dead natives, followed by rampages by dinosaurs, giant bugs and of course...KONG!

Ultimately Ann is captured by the natives and given as a sacrifice to Kong, by the time Jack discovers she has been captured it's too late for them to rescue her. With Kong loose in the vast mysterious jungle the rescue party tramples through the creature ridden abyss, needing their own rescue party more than Ann. While the party tries to survive, Ann is building an unusual relationship with her hairy captor. Is Kong really a horrendous beast or is he a gentle giant?

First thing to know when going to see this film, do not be expecting the caliber of The Lord of the Rings. Yes the film was directed by Peter Jackson, and yes it is over three hours long, but story wise King Kong fails to reach the spectacle heights of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. The film's weakest point is the beginning 45 minutes where we are introduced to the cast of characters and given some brief background information and plot setup. The beginning is not at all boring but it is relatively long and slow compared to the fast paced middle and conclusion.

Speed and suspense quickly intercede once the intrepid adventures finally set foot on the island in which the whole middle of the film takes place, consisting of around an hour and a half of time. This is where the natives on the island come in and scared the crap out of me! The first native you see in the film reminded me so much of Samara from The Ring!  I thought, that evil child followed poor Naomi around everywhere! Well turns out all the natives are freakishly deformed, blind, wrinkled and overall disgusting; of course that is what happens when you turn cannibal!

The whole sacrifice idea confused me, because you never see Kong actually eat anyone, but later on you get a glimpse of the remains of previous sacrifices to him. That whole idea really didn't connect well, and I thought apes were vegetarians!  As always Naomi did a great job of showing both fear and sympathy towards such a giant beast that technically wasn't there, that takes some talent. Even so I felt there were almost too many scenes of her and the ape looking at each other, I got the emotional bond between the two of them but it didn't need to take up 30 minutes of total screen time.

The dinosaur scenes were entertaining, and a little "a la" Jurassic Park, I found the whole stampede sequence to be a little unbelievable with the men running and dodging the huge feet crashing down above them, as well as the sequence where the whole group tumbled on top of each other like a row of dominoes! The T-Rex scenes were pretty amazing though, and came out to look very realistic.

In terms of the other actors, Jack Black did a really good job.  While I never expected him to do badly, this was a different role and genre for him. One of the most enjoyable characters of the film had to have been Andy Circus who played the ships cook; he provided much of the comic relief and was very enjoyable. He also was the stand in for Kong, as he was for Gollum in The Lord of the Rings so that way there was actually someone for the actors to act to.

In the end, King Kong is a really good film. The story was not deep enough to warrant three hours, especially since less than two hours actually had dialogue. I think this was a big reason for Kong getting snubbed at the Oscars; ultimately it was more action sequences than dramatic story telling. The scenes and the special effects were very impressive, Kong look extremely life like that it was completely believable. Near the end of the film when they capture Kong and transport him back to New York you actually begin to feel sympathy for him, I would have liked to know how they managed to fit him on that boat though.

King Kong definitely packs a punch and offers a little bit of everything, comedy, drama, suspense, action, adventure, and romance. While not the best film of 2005, this film is definitely worth the watch, even for the entire three hours. But a reminder to Peter Jackson... the longer a film is doesn't make it a better film, of course maybe I shouldn't be talking with this being my longest review!

8/10