**** King Kong: Take 3

After directing the “Lord of the Rings” movies, Peter Jackson finally got his chance to direct his remake of King Kong. Basically we end up with a rehash of the original with a plot stretched to over three hours long and smattered with a large glob of computer-generated graphics. Still, in the end we get a pretty good movie.

People want to make movie. People go to island. Girl gets sacrificed by natives to giant gorilla. Gorilla starts to like girl. Girl starts to like gorilla. Gorilla gets captured. Gorilla put on display in New York. Gorilla escapes and climbs tall building. Gorilla gets shot down. You know, the usual. The story is actually quite a bit deeper than that and there is a number of sub-plots and plenty of character interactions to be had. Sometimes they quote the original word-for-word, other times they come up with original stuff. Essentially though you have the same basic movie, but with more exposition.

What they do right is give the movie a rather epic feel. It’s an adventure, but an adventure mentally as well as physically. It’s set to some rather beautiful backdrops such the wonderfully rendered Skull Island and the painstakingly recreated 1930’s New York City, but in the spotlight is what is going through the minds of the characters. It starts with hope as characters decide that this trip good be the one to unlock their dreams. Then we get love and friendship as the characters get to know each other on the boat ride. We are then hit with awe and wonder as Skull Island is revealed, a mysterious and ancient place partially submerged under the ocean (apparently they built the wall when the sea level was lower). We are then hit with fear and panic as the natives prove not to be borderline-friendly like the original movie, but instead downright nasty in every way. Then we go on the emotional roller-coaster ride as the relationship of leading lady and giant ape develops wordlessly. We are also taken with increasing desperation as the island proves to be ever more dangerous then previously thought. Mixed emotions abound as Kong is captured, put on display, and ultimately escapes. In a last stand for what the movie is about, Kong climbs to the highest point, roars in defiance, and meets his demise. From great danger was pulled a wonderful thing, and now that thing is gone. The emotions are hit hard along the movies course, sometimes the nice emotions and sometimes an exercise of emotional suffering. Of course perhaps this movie could be called overly emotional. The one thing it tends to be deficient in is classic mindless entertainment. You are so distracted by where your feelings go that you forget your suppose to be munching popcorn and feeling happy about yourself. Sometimes you wonder why they don’t just burst into song and sing from the heart, other times you get so depressed you feel like curling up in the corner and crying, and when you leave the movie you realize that perhaps they went a little over-board with this movie.

So what can save this well-crafted yet emotionally extreme movie? Why giant computer-generated creatures of course! This movie is chock full of fantastic exercises in biological animation. Stampeding brontosaurus herds, battles between beast and man (with guns), the classic log scene done right, attacks from giant iguana-like dinosaurs, and a giant horde of giant bats all grace this movie. You also get one of the most disgustingly disturbing trippy nightmarish attack of giant bugs ever put on screen (a nod to the original Kong, where this scene was taken out for being to gruesome). Of course, though, the scene that wins the “tears of joy” award goes to the Kong vs. Tyrannosaurus fight. In this version, the King of Kongs faces up against not one, not two, but three big bad carnosuars. One of the best giant monster fight scenes I have witnessed. Now of course there is some bad to this good, and that would be the blatant unrealistic quality to the whole movie. The creatures seen are a little on the cartoony side, probably on purpose but this artistic choice is kind of distracting. You have some nods to old-school dinosaur designs, like the three fingers on the Rexes and the robust saurapods, but one annoying reference to classic movies is how everything is dead-set on eating people. The island is full of man-eating monsters to the point of absurdity, and each and every one will stop whatever they are doing to take a snap at someone. It doesn’t matter if they are in mortal danger or caught up with a more important activity, in fact there is one scene where one of the dinosaurs has caught and half-way eaten another dinosaur and despite not needing food and having a giant gorilla in it’s way, the dino still charges forward to eat the leading lady. I know dinosaurs had small brains and all, but this is just plain stupid on the part of the movie itself. There are of course plenty of other things that irk the scientific side of me: the excessive mix of giant bug types, the impossible ecology, the tremendous load-baring ice, the fact that nobody is every hot or cold, and of course the indestructibility of female characters in the face of G-forces created by swinging in the arm of a giant ape.

Despite it’s rather large flaws, this is still a great movie. It’s emotionally powerful, well put together, filled with all the trappings necessary, and has a number of rather great bits. For the most part, you wont notice the three hours go by. It’s chock full of great stuff, and ends up being a rather nice blend of classic styling and modern story telling.

Great, well-crafted plot

Beautiful scenery melded with great creature effects

A number of well-made sub-plots to really get into the characters’ minds

Emotionally powerful

Great fight scene with Kong and dinosaurs

Perhaps overly emotional

Excessively unrealistic and implausible

What does everything and everyone have against these people anyways?

OK boys, hop up into those planes and shoot the giant gorilla, and his girlfriend too!

Oh no we are in a crisis! We’re saved! Oh no we are in a crisis! We’re saved! Oh no we are in a crisis! We’re saved! Oh no…

Credits