The performance of the ape may be wonderfully sensitive and physiologically accurate, but that’s not what the thread is about. You’re confusing performance for special effects.
Jerky motion, thumbprints, inaccurate dinosaurs, and simplistic two dimensional matte paintings, the visual effects do not stand up well today; nobody would be convinced of their believability these days.
I’m aware of that, what I’m saying is that regardless of how poorly it holds up by an absolute measure today, it still holds up much better than any of the dozens of “guy in a rubber suit” attempts that have come since.
I woulda agreed with you, until I saw an outtake from Gorillas in the Mist, and one of the gorillas stood up and took off his suit.
Both Pepper Mill and I went “Damn!” We had no notion that had been anything but a real gorilla.
Most gorillas in film were the old-style “never mistake it for the real thing” Charles Gemora-type gorilla.
Rick Baker has done LOTS of truly amazing gorilla and ape suits over the years. But in most cases, it
s pretty clearly indicated by the film that that’s NOT a real ape. But for GitM there was no warning that some of those gorillas were guys in suits, and you didn’t notice them. You CAN do a good “ape in a suit” nowadays.
By the way, nobody loves the original Willis O’Brien King Kong than me, and while I do think many of the effects in Kong have held up well (see my comments above), I recognize the limitations on the animation effects. They’re still great effects, but they wouldn’t hold their own in a film today – and that’s partly a measure of our own growing visual sophistication.
But I see no poibnt in running down Peter Jackson’s new King Kong. The effects are DAMNED good, and the creatures have plenty of personality.
You want bad Kong? Go see the 1976 Dino de Laurentiis tragedy. They squandered what good effects they had (Rick Baker contributed some superb mask work, and Carlo Rambaldi’s articulated mechanical hands beat the hell out of the ones used in 1933) by diluting it with awful and uninspired effects work, blue-screen, and a ludicrous Full Sized model, not to mention an awful screen story and script (I hate Lorenzo Semple, Jr.) The film has nothing to recommend it.
The galley battle in Ben-Hur was well done for its day, as was the chariot race and the recreation of ancient Rome.
Another great Ape performance of a guy in a suit is in Buddy, a film with Rene Russo.
An Open Letter To The SDMB Ray Harryhausen Fan Club: 
I can agree that his stop-motion work was top notch for what it was. And a scene, or a film, with all stop-motion creatures, would probably be more watchable for me. But any time that his beasties are thrown in the same scene with human actors, it’s completely jarring to me - far more so than when humans interact with painted (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?) or CGI (Gollum from LotR) creatures. The jerkiness of the movements, the egregious difference in resolution…all of it just screams “CHEESE!” to me.
Can we agree to disagree? Hey…put down those stop-motion torches and pitchforks!
Sincerely,
OneCentStamp
“Release the Kraken!”
I t’ink it’s wunna dem, whatchcallit, psychomalogical t’ings.
My usual impulse is to subtract years…
There is one scene, where Jessica Lange is drugged, the gates are opened, and she is chained on the platform to be sacrificed to Kong. The direction, photography, sound mix, and editing are all superior to the 1933 version. John Guillermin directed one of the best post-MGM Tarzan movies (not to mention Shaft in Africa), so he had experience with scenes like that.