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Rating: Country: USA Release Date: March 28, 2006 Distributor: Universal Director: · Peter Jackson Cast: · Naomi Watts · Jack Black · Adrien Brody · Andy Serkis Related Sites: ·IMDb: King Kong (2005) ·Cinema Spider: King Kong
Grade: C+
Whenever I hear a classic film is getting a remake, I have one image immediately come to mind: Dino DiLaurentis's fantastic flop of "King Kong". However, Peter Jackson had just finished making millions of dollars with his "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, so it was safe to assume he had the backing to do the film right. And to his credit, he did much of it right, beginning with keeping the plot set in the 1930s rather than trying to bring the story into the modern day.
He also, however, did much of it wrong.
The basic story of Kong remains much the same as the 1933 original: a fame-seeker, a starlet, a mysterious island; a giant ape, a sacrifice, and a battle atop the Empire State Building that became scene of iconic glory.
In Jackson's version, filmmaker Carl Denham (Jack Black) has lost funding for his projects. But before his bosses can officially pull the plug on him, he speeds off to the boat he has waiting and has it take off for the location of a mysterious place -- Skull Island. In tow, he takes an action hero actor and a down-on-her-luck vaudeville actress (Naomi Watts) named Ann Darrow, neither of whom know their actual destination.
One hour and some odd minutes into the film, we get our first glimpse of Kong, as well as our first looks at some horrendously bad CGI work. The small boat that Denham takes from the Venture to land on Skull Island looks like it was cut and pasted on top of some animated water. At times the boat doesn't even appear to be in the water. When Kong grabs Ann from the altar where the natives have tied her up, we encounter mildly awkward CGI, but even worse illogic. Darrow is suspended -- nearly as much as our disbelief is expected to be -- from ropes that she has struggled against and found impossible to break. Kong grabs her around her waist, yanks, and the ropes break. Not her arms, which one would expect to pop off at the shoulders, but the ropes. He runs with her through the jungle, bouncing her multiple times off the ground as he clambers away, and she's still in one piece when he gets to his nest. Rii-iight.
The CGI department has done some fantastic work in this film when it comes to rendering Kong (given facial visualizations by Andy Serkis who did the same for Gollum in "Lord of the Rings"). The same for the dinosaurs. But when it comes to marrying actors into the action, the movie falls further into unbelievability -- and that's a stretch for a movie about a 25-foot ape living on an island that time forgot! Denham and company get caught up in a dinosaur stampede where they're actually running alongside and under the dinos. Again, the CGI sometimes looks like the humans end up occupying the same place as a dinosaur leg, but it's all happening so fast it appears to be a jumble.
Gorilla My Dreams: Kong and Ann share a quiet moment
atop the Empire State Building before the biplanes arrive.
The film ends with the classic line, "It was beauty killed the beast." I've heard from some moviegoers that this was as cornball an ending as could be created -- many of whom were too young to realize this was the epitaph for the original film. Yet in that version, the line had meaning. In this one, Jack Black's character of Carl Denham is so unlikable, so venal and greedy, and such a habitual liar, that even when he's given an opportunity to deliver a dramatic line, he can't be taken seriously. This line, given by his assistant who's come to see Denham for the slime he is, would have carried the weight far better.
This particular release of the DVD is a single disc with only one preview for "Wish You Were Here" and one two-minute featurette, "The Volkswagen Touareg & King Kong", which is a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the commercial for the vehicle that was an "official member" of the King Kong film crew. There is a two-disc edition also available with more bonus features -- with rumors circulating of a boxed set coming down the line with extra scenes incorporated into it.
This disc is presented in anamorphic widescreen 2.35:1. The audio cannot be changed from the English 5.1 version, although there are optional subtitles in English, French and Spanish.
