Wow, KING KONG is a wonderful, epic..chick flick! Who knew?!

Cafe Society
1

This is not really a review, I don’t do reviews. It’s just some general thoughts.

SPOILERS, though who doesn’t know the gist of the story?

I loved this movie! I expected action, adventure, chills and thrills, and got all that, but what I didn’t expect was that it was a chick flick at heart, and oh boy does it have a big heart. A big, beautiful, Kong-sized heart.

It makes sense, since two of the three writers were women, but I still didn’t expect for my husband and I to be in such tears at the end.

There are 3 parts to the movie, and three love stories here.

Part 1 is getting to know Ann Darrow and her hardscrabble life, and how she ends up desperate enough to take on the role in the movie Carl Denham is supposedly making. It’s also about getting to know how Carl Denham gets into the fix he’s in, to where he has to practically kidnap the writer and lie to nearly everyone around him, in order to get his picture finished. How they all end up on a ship at sea, headed to a spooky island, was fascinating to me. Lots of people don’t like this opening setup, but I did. I liked knowing a little bit about these two people, and how their lives collided to set off a tragic chain of events. I also loved the New York circa 1933 sets, stylized but not sanitized. You’re shown the tent cities and bread lines, people living in their cars and hungry people. The Depression is not glossed over. It’s practically an extra character, because people did things during the Depression that they might not have otherwise.

A not completely believable love story between Adrien Brody and Naomi Watts is the first love story, in the last half of part 1 of the movie. It was ok, not too terribly mushy, but not too terribly compelling either. For such beautiful people (and oh my oh my, are they gorgeous), they didn’t have much chemistry. That’s just about the only major nit I’d pick in the movie. I love Adrien Brody, so it hurts to say he might have been miscast. However, while their love story didn’t work, his determination to go save Ann when time came worked.

Part 2 brings us to Skull Island, a beautifully-realized jungle nightmare. After Ann is kidnapped by the natives as a sacrifice to Kong, the movie switches back and forth between Ann/Kong and Everyone looking for Ann/their nightmares.

The second love story begins in this second part of the movie, and is the love (or at least caring) that forms between Ann Darrow and King Kong, which is completely believeable and so full of chemistry that it drips from the screen. There’s none of that kinda creepy-oogy sexual tension either. This is like the love between a beloved pet and its owner, only take away the owner part and make the pet really really BIG. Kong isn’t sentient, but he’s capable of love the way a big neglected, abused dog is still capable of love somewhere in the back of his brain, and Kong falls hard for Ann. Kong isn’t a good guy. He kills many with as much feeling as we’d squash cockroaches. To him people are little annoying bugs, nothing more, nothing less. He’s not being deliberately evil when he kills, even when he kills in anger. Humans just don’t mean anything to him. Ann comes to mean something to him. She’s terrified of him at first, then she amuses him, then she looks to him to protect her, then she cares about him. It’s probably been several decades since any living thing cared about him or showed him kindness. Kong is old. He’s the last of his species, and his lair area is littered with the bones and skulls of long-dead relatives. Of course he’s going to fall in love with her. Still, you always got the idea that Kong could have killed Ann at any second, just by accident, not on purpose. One flick of his finger could have sent her flying off a cliff. Their relationship was never mushy until the very end, and by then the mush pays off in genuine emotion.

Part 3 of the movie takes place back in New York, and leads to the iconic climax. The love story between Ann and Kong continues and is near perfect, especially when the two spend some time in the calm before the awful storm on a frozen lake in Central Park. I was able to look past the fact that Ann was wearing a sleeveless silk dress in mid-winter and didn’t even look cold, just because everything else worked so well.

The third love story is seen in every shot and frame of the movie. That’s Peter Jackson’s life-long love for King Kong, and love of films and making films, and the love of all the cast, crew, production people, animators, everyone involved who shared Jackson’s delight, if not in the original Kong, then in the sheer effort and fun of making movies. Special props to Andy Serkis and the people responsible for Kong himself.

Two of these three love stories make this movie one of the year’s best films. Is it flawless? Heck no, and you can bet people will be coming out of the woodwork dying to share how “disappointed” they were or picking nits to absolute death because they can’t just sit back and enjoy the cinematic gift that’s been given to them. No film is flawless and this one is no exception, but it has more heart and soul and love poured into it than just about any other blockbuster/epic film/monster movie ever made. I’m not saying it’s the best, but it’s very very VERY VERY good, and one OF the best.

Go see it on the big screen, really, please. Theaters were MADE for movies like this. The heart will still be there on DVD, but it’ll just look a lot smaller. Not to mention Naomi Watts’s beautiful, expressive eyes.

2

…I was just starting to post a review thread when you bet me too it… :frowning:

I’ll post some more thoughts later, but I agree, this is a stunning movie. Jack Black is terrific as Carl: just the right mix of menace, humour and wide eyed zeal. Brody was decent, Lumpy was terrific (loved the accent!), Bruce Baxter was both heroic and cowardly, the Captain just-scary-enough, Jimmy was neat, and Kong? Kong was COOL. Kong rocked my world. Kong needs his own spin-off TV series: two hours was nowhere near enough screentime.

And Ann? :: sigh :: I fell in love with her in the opening frames: her entrance was surprising and most unexpected: Ann Darrow displayed talent, and she burrowed her way into my heart from her first moments on film.

There was so much that was right with this film that I won’t bother with what was wrong, because there wasn’t much. Like Equipoise, I found the Jack/Ann :: sigh :: relationship to be “off”, they met and fell in love a bit too quickly for me. But apart from this, everything else is grand. Ignore the nitpicking critics: I didn’t find the movie too long, I didn’t think the Bronto stampede contained “bad” special effects, I don’t think that Jack Black was miscast, and I didn’t find that the opening “dragged”.

As a Kiwi though, I found a few things jumped out in ways that only Kiwi’s would notice. Most of the extras and background characters were either Shortland Street regulars, or classic Kiwi actors or entertainers. Unfortunately I missed Ray Woolf on the bridge of the Venture, and basketball commentator John Dybvig as a Policeman. Watching the newly renovated Auckland Civic Theatre get trashed was brilliant. Revisiting the Sumartran Rat Monkeys was another great, subtle nod.

And there are many nods to the original film, which if your a fan, are much more exciting to see on the big screen than for me to talk about here. There is so much too see here guys, Equipoise is right: this film demands to be seen on the big screen.

“I’m sitting…on top…of the world…”

3

I so want to see the movie, but the end always makes me cry. I’m always hoping that Kong gets his girl and they live happliy ever after.

::sigh::

4

With some names changed, it sounds like the initial Titanic reviews. So Peter Jackson has made a chick flick for boys, just like James Cameron. Good for him.

5

I enjoyed the film very much. Action and romance- whatta combination. Not only do you have King Kong fighting dinosaurs and going ape in New York City, but you also have him skating with Ann on a frozen pond, enjoying a sunset, and (in my favorite scene) being entertained by Ann’s Vaudeville acts.
There were some clever references made to the original King Kong:

While Denham is looking for a replacement for his lead actress that can fit in the costumes they already have, they mention that “Fay’s a size 4,” but they can’t get her since she’s doing a picture for RKO. The scene where Darrow and Baxter are filming a scene for Denham’s movie has politically incorrect script dialogue taken directly from the original film (“Women are a nuisance”). And I may be wrong, but it sounded like the music for the King Kong Broadway show came directly from Max Steiner’s original soundtrack- the tribal theme sounded familiar.

Peter Jackson has taken this movie and made it his own, improving on the classic Cooper-Schoesdack film and bringing it into the 21st century while still keeping it in the 1930s. This is the best film I’ve seen this year. Although it’s a really dumb cliche, I must say that Kong truly is the king.

6

I loved it.

My sister, who I had to drag along when no-one else would come with me, cried for probably the last hour of the movie.

7

I thought I was the only one who noticed that in the hold of the Venture, as no review or commentary made mention of it. It cracked me up.

mobo85, if you watch to the end of the credits, you’ll see that they acknowledge taking some of the underscore from the 1933 version.

8

I saw it twice yesterday. I caught the first sceening in the morning (theater nearly empty), and then my girlfriend came home from work and said “I want to see King Kong!”. Okay, no problem!

I have to say that I got a little weepy at times:Jackson did a brilliant job with the Kong/Darrow chemistry. The CGI stuff is, for the most part, fantastic (the initial dino chase, though–meh). I sort of groaned the first time I saw the Central Park scene, but it worked for me the second time. Go figure.

Naomi Watts shines as Ann. Who knew she could juggle? I didn’t have any problems with Jack Black–he was surprisingly restrained, probably a good thing. Adrian Brody, who I didn’t think would’ve been “right” for the roll, ended up being a perfect Jack Driscoll.

I’d go see it again. 8/10

9

I loved it. Everything I wanted to say has already been said except that the king kong versus dinosaur scene is bad ass. That’s in my top five all time action sequences for sure.

Normally I would feel bad for the humans that die at the hands of Kong and I did to a certain extent but you can hardly blame kong. People are threatening him so he fights back. it’s hardly his fault he’s a thousand times bigger than those he’s fighting. It really is just a big misunderstanding. Mr. Brody is trying to save the woman he loves from someone he thinks is going to hurt her (who isn’t) and King Kong doesn’t realise that these people care about Ann too. He just sees them as a threat so he disposes of them much the same way we would dispose of, I don’t know, a scorpion or something.

As far as I’m concered Peter Jackson is the man.

10

I wasn’t disappointed - and thought the film was worth the price of admission. But I’ll start with a nitpick: Unless we’re all mailed free passes, I fail to see how this film was ‘given to us’. It’s a remake - and in remakes, you’d better be able to dazzle the viewer to the point they don’t mind seeing a rehashed plot they know the outcome of.

Agreed. I don’t recall ever seeing a Central Park Hooverville on the screen, a nice touch. The attention to detail was impressive.

To me, whether it’s a ‘boy loves Lassie’, ‘Velvet loves her horse’ or ‘scientist loves his dolphins’ story, it rarely - if ever - comes off as believable on screen. When it’s a girl falling in love with a 30’ man-eating ape, it becomes completely implausable.

11

I’m glad you guys like it. I was beginning to get a little worried - the last two reviews I heard (San Francisco Chronicle’s and local TV news) were rather negative.

I’m off to see it on Christmas day, after a breakfast of dim sum.

12

Oh, don’t be such a pill. King Kong has always been that way (except every time he’s been approached between 1934 and now) and that people are saying it’s heartbreaking just means that it’s been done properly.

People shoebox King Kong as a monster movie, just because it has a two-storey gorilla in it. It’s a tragic love story. With a two-storey gorilla. Always has been.

I can’t wait to see it, but so far it sounds like exactly what I’ve been anticipating with glee based on affinity with the original and confidence that Peter Jackson can hit the right emotional notes in a story that people tend to underestimate as fluffy fantasy.

I’m so fecking stoked.

13

I saw it at a late showing last night and I dug it too. I enjoyed the build up the fleshed out characters on the boat. My favorite was the pretty boy actor who went from coward to hero.

I loved everything on the island, especially the T-Rex fight and the bug pit (No one understands bug phobias like PJ).

The two shots that got the waterworks going for me?

Kong thumping chest at the sunrise to say “beautiful,” and Kong finally slipping quietly off the top of the building.

Two Kong sized thumbs up here and I think it’s safe to say that the movies have their first real master of the CGI era.

14

Be warned, I’m not boxing any SPOILERS here so read with caution.

I really enjoyed it too. However, lemme start with my criticisms.

  1. Adrien Brody was horribly miscast. Just awful. He’s a fine actor, though I never understood that Oscar, and he didn’t stink up the screen or anything, but I never felt even the slightest bit of interest in his romance with Ann. His supposed galant, heroic drive to save Ann from Kong and not leave her felt so limp. I never felt any desperation on his part. Also the nuggets of comic relief his character was supposed to have didn’t work at all.

  2. The movie was a bit too long. Typically I love long epic films and usually argue that I like getting more for my money. However this was one of the rare cases where the movie would have been helped by trimming it down. The bulk of the prologue where they describe the Depression and show the hard times Ann was in were unneeded and added little to the context of the Kong story. There was nothing wrong with it, but it just was window dressing. It’s like Jackson decided to do a period piece and therefore felt compelled to include a lot of period scenes. Some of the jungle scenes could have been snipped down as well, the group was getting chased and attacked every minute when they were together, then Jack’s going off alone to get Ann was glossed over in 30 seconds. I felt like that stuff would have been best saved for the Extended Edition DVD release.

  3. Some of the SFx were gratuitous and felt clunky. I agree that the Brontosaurus chase was pretty mediocre. The CGI wasn’t great, the physics of it felt wrong, and there were just too many improbable strokes of luck allowing the stars to survive. They run among the legs of the Brontos, get caught up in a giant tumble, and evade the Raptors without anyone getting hurt? Then they simply slide out from the mass of bodies and thats it? Ugh. The Bat attack on Kong felt strange too. It seemed that they were common in his cave so why did they decide to attack him at that time? It felt like they were forcing a deus ex machina to help Ann and Jack get away.

  4. Why the hell didn’t Jack take a gun when he went off alone? :rolleyes:

And now here’s the things that I liked.

  1. The T-Rex battle was frigging awesome! I was totally caught up in it, and was on the edge of my seat throughout. Very well done. Even though parts of it felt contrived, it just worked in all its outlandishness. The T-Rexes looked spectacular and menacing and Kong’s fighting of them was thrilling. I loved how he kept juggling ann from hand to foot to hand while fighting them. I loved when Ann made the choice to back up behind Kong prior to the last fight. I loved when Kong killed the last one by ripping it’s Jaws apart. Simply wicked.

  2. Kong looked and moved wonderfully. Andy Serkis need some special recognition for his skills. I loved how Kong wasn’t too heavily anthropomophized and retained just the right amount of apeishness. For all the size and animal realism they managed to also impart tremendous emotion to him, both in body language and facial expressions. That’s probably what made the love story work so incredibly well. They didn’t humanize him too much, but they allowed him to have the type of expressions people tend to see in their pets. They wear they emotions on their sleeves and we can read them readily. The CGI guys nailed that aspect. Kong’s facial expressions and the subtlety of the character was really phenominal. Excellent stuff.

  3. Jack Black was excellent as Denham. I, along with everyone else, was a little worried that he’d somehow over do it. But he was perfectly cast. I really liked the way he protrayed the character. It’s a credit to both Black and Jackson’s directing ability that this important character was done as well as he was. In many ways the character is a cartoon, a characiture of the wild-eyed showman with no feeling, but it was carried of in a way which you accepted and believed. Stellar stuff.

  4. Naomi Watts did a really nice job. I’m not a big fan of hers, for some reason she’s always felt really flat and bland to me. In this role she did a good job and made you care about her and Kong. In some ways her plainness worked for her in the role. She fell into the time period better than some of the more popular actresses of this generation with their exaggerated sexuality. In mean could you have bought Angelina Jolie as a 30’s starlet? Didn’t think so.

  5. The top of the Empire State Building scene was pretty damn cool. Even though everyone knew it was coming, it had me on the edge of my seat. I really felt the height and parts of it had be gripping my theater seat. The overhead pan they did was really jarring like one of those great IMAX movies. I loved the way he fell at the end, just slowly letting go instead of some grandiose death. The interaction between Ann and Kong when they both knew it was nearly over was really sweet and compelling. I really don’t think it could have been done better.

All in all, I really loved the movie despite its relatively minor flaws. I’d give it an 8.5 out of 10.

15

The big ape dies!

Sorry, had to get that out of the way. :wink:

I saw this last night. PJ is certainly at the top of his game. I thought it was a very good movie, especially considering that I knew the story going in. That was kind of a problem for me though. I knew it was not going to end happily and that took some of the enjoyment away.

I was sad pretty much from the time Kong took Ann back to his mountain and we see the bones of the other giant apes. It hit home that there is no possible happy ending for Kong. Even if he stays on the island, his last days are going to be a lonely fight for survival. Who wants spend their last days and die alone? :frowning:

On to the good stuff…

Kong looked super! Kong’s movements and mannerisms were outstanding. Andy Serkis rules! As someone else mentioned, Kong’s battle with the dinosaurs was great, especially at the end when he finally got to take out his frustrations one on one.

I was most worried about the casting of Adrian Brody. He is a good actor, but he was type cast in my mind. He turned out to be very good in the role, although I do agree that there didn’t seem to be a lot of chemistry with him and Naomi Watts. Speaking of Naomi, I fell in love with Ann, plain and simple. I can’t think of anything to say about her role that would be higher praise. Jack Black was great for his role too. The rest of the characters were pretty much stereotypes, but were also well cast.

My GF disliked Carl’s (Jack Black) last line. I think it was “beauty killed the beast” or something close to that. My GF’s comment was, “no, you did, asshole.” I found Carl’s line to be pretty cringe worthy taken at face value. Not quite a, “NOOoooo…” (see Star Wars Ep. 3), but pretty bad. I think there was more to it though. True, Kong died believing he was protecting Ann, but it also showed that after all the deaths, Carl just didn’t get it. There was no redemption for his character.

I strongly agree with the OP’s feeling on the third love story, the love between PJ and the subject. It was very obvious through the entire movie. Maybe it could have used some more editing, but I don’t mind indulging PJ at all with this movie.

I have another comment about something I observed at our theater, but I think I’ll wait to see if anyone else comments.

Anyway, I’ll end this by saying it was a very good movie, but I hope PJ picks a movie with a happier ending next time!

16

Is she aware that it’s a direct quote from the 1933 movie and one of its most memorable lines? I can’t imagine Jackson making a King Kong movie without finishing with that.

17

I’m no film geek, and I’m sure someone who knows for certain will either confirm or refute this, but that line was taken directly from the original film. If it felt a little out of place or overdone that’s why.

18

“'Twas beauty that killed the beast”

I wish the DVD version would contain an alternate happy ending. Like Ann and Kong walking away together, hand in…uh…ankle in hand. :smiley:

19

That certainly explains it. Although I wouldn’t doubt that both of us have at least seen parts of the 1933 version, I also know that neither of us remembered that line being used. We were both familiar with the story from the 70’s version of the movie.

I do still stand by my belief that Carl (at least in PJ’s movie) doesn’t get it. By that I mean he never seems to have true remorse about the consequences of his actions.

One other thing I was wondering about. At the end did anyone else get a vibe that Ann was thinking about jumping before Jack showed up? (again, in PJ’s movie)

20

To nitpick your nitpick, Kong was 25 feet tall, and never actually ate anybody.