KING KONG
****1/2 out of *****

A new interpretation of The Thinker.

Genres
Action
Adventure
Giant Monsters

2005
Directed by
Peter Jackson
Written by
Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson (Screenplay)
Merian C. Cooper, Edgar Wallace (Story)
Cast
Naomi Watts .... Ann Darrow
Jack Black .... Carl Denham
Adrien Brody .... Jack Driscoll
Thomas Kretschmann .... Captain Englehorn
Colin Hanks .... Preston
Andy Serkis .... Kong/Lumpy
Evan Parke .... Hayes
Jamie Bell .... Jimmy
Lobo Chan  .... Choy
John Sumner .... Herb
Craig Hall .... Mike
Kyle Chandler .... Bruce Baxter

Lord of the Rings made Peter Jackson. OK, so he held a minor cult status in the world and little more than that in New Zealand, but LOTR skyrocketed him into the Hollywood stratosphere. The films have earned multiple Academy Awards and truck loads of others; millions have seen the films and bought the merchandise. It was a series that already had an in-built fan base and also managed to generate many more.

It is a hard task following up one of the biggest trilogies in motion picture history, Peter Jackson you could say had this monkey on his back. Many people will be familiar with the fact that Jackson and partner Fran Walsh were at one time developing King Kong for Universal Pictures before he began work on The Lord of the Rings, however forces outside his control led to the project being dropped. The original Jackson script is available online to curious fans, a script that seems to have very little of Jackson’s unique voice and reads much like a script guided perhaps by studio influence. It’s an interesting snap shot into what could have been. After the huge success of Rings, Jackson could write any ticket he wanted. Ranked by many as the “most powerful man in Hollywood” Jackson went back to his beloved Kong, rewriting the script into the film he truly wanted to see.

By now, just about everyone with access to the Internet and TV, who has even the most minor interest in this film would know that Jackson has been a fan of Kong since childhood. Having seen the film on television, his imagination was immediately captured. This was the film that inspired Jackson to become a filmmaker. Making Kong would not be easy: budgeted at an enormous $207+ million dollars, the world would see Jackson eventually wear himself out (as seen on the excellent production diaries hosted on the Kong fan site www.kongisking.net and now currently available on DVD). The pressure was monumental, and all this time Jackson kept one thing in mind, to make the movie he wanted to see. This somewhat selfish philosophy kept the director grounded and focused throughout the gruelling production. And the result is breathtaking!

This version of King Kong is set in depression era 1933 New York. And tells the story of an intrepid film producer Carl Denham (Jack Black) who has seen better days with his film studio, his latest project is very nearly taken away from him when he decides to continue making the film at the behest of the studio. He steals the film reels and embarks on a ship journey to an uncharted island to complete what he hopes will be his greatest picture. With him are the lead cast Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts) and Bruce Baxter (Kyle Chandler) along with famed play write Jack Driscoll (Adrien Brody) who writes pages of the script during the sea voyage.

Having landed on the uncharted Skull Island, the film crew are greeted by a tribe of islanders that take a liking to the blonde bombshell Ann and kidnap her to be offered to the mighty Kong. From then on it is a mission to save the actress from the clutches of the beast. I will not bore you with more about the plot since many people are already familiar with it, and those that are not will likely be surprised by it, so for now let’s take a closer look at the film.

Running at just over 3 hours, King Kong doesn’t allow a moment of boredom. The first act primarily does what every first act should do, it introduces the characters and sets up the story, however in this version of Kong we get much more character depth for the key players than the original had given us, the first act mainly focuses on Darrow’s struggling actress during the depression and Denham’s passionate and law-breaking filmmaker, we meet Driscoll a half way through the first act and don’t really learn much about him until the second along with most of the Venture boat crew, a wise move considering crowding too many character moments in the first act would have weakened the film’s pace and would have felt incredibly rushed to get intros out of the way as soon as possible. The story’s pace early in the film is nicely executed allowing enough time for the audience to get to know the characters and also keep the story moving and taking the action onto the ship the S.S. Venture that takes our intrepid crew to Skull Island.

Once on the ship the journey begins, a few scenes taken from the original Kong make a welcomed appearance here, including Denham shooting parts of the film on the boat, but it is once they are on Skull Island (and so begins our second act) that the adventure truly takes hold. Skull Island is exactly how it should be, bordering the beaches are jagged and unwelcoming rocks, the island has a decrepit feel of death and rot. The jungle is dangerous and populated with all manner of exotic beasts and insects, and of course the natives are truly a vision, so frightful you’re more than likely to be, well…afraid. I’ve heard people comment that the natives were portrayed as too evil and scary: well how would the film have ended up if our adventurers were greeted by joyous drum melodies and grass skirted ladies handing out wreaths? It is easy to simply say that sure they need to be that way in order to kidnap Darrow and offer her to Kong, but on a deeper level, these natives live in a world of death, sacrifice and the almighty Kong, their religion and beliefs seem to stem from this, so it is no wonder why they behave the way they do. I’m no anthropologist but that’s what I got out them, in any case the Skull Island moments of the film are filled to the brim with one exiting action set piece after the next, from the insanely edge of your seat brontosaurus stampede to the depths of the chasm where our heroes are attacked by all manner of creepy crawly nasties, a scene that will make your skin crawl (in fact at the screening I attended someone in the back shrieked).

All the while I was thinking, Jackson’s expending his entire bag of tricks too soon…I should not have even doubted his talent, because our final act, running amok in New York was pure audio-visual sensory overload, all the way to the final moments at the top of the Empire State Building, Jackson even managed to throw in a scene that was truly romantic and sweet between Kong and Darrow in a way that didn’t bring up any creepy connotations.

One cannot discuss the merits of this film without talking CGI. The true marvel of this film was Kong himself, the character is so complex in his emotional performance yet simple on such a primal level, a balancing act Andy Serkis managed to maintain perfectly (he also had 132 sensors attached to his face so that his every facial expression could be captured, which also helped in breathing life into the beast). I suppose all that time spent in Rwanda studying the gorillas in the wild aided in his performance, because what I saw on that screen was a real fucking gorilla! Additionally the wizards at Weta created a convincing beast, the level of detail is astounding and is a sure fire candidate for the best visual effects Oscars next year. I was however a little disappointed in some of the film’s other effects, while it’s clear that the majority of work and attention to detail was relegated to Kong it’s a shame that other effects in the film had to suffer. There a few moments were the blue/green screen composites didn’t look all that convincing, many times there were edge blurs around actor’s heads especially in front of sky backgrounds. I also felt that the velociraptors in the brontosaurus stampede looked a little cartoon-like and not as vicious as they should have.

These minor quibbles aside, it’s the story that is ultimately engaging about this film, the cast all lend fine performances especially Black who is one of the break-through performances of this film. Jackson and crew have created an amazing adventure film with real heart and depth that will please die hard Kong fans and I’m sure create many new ones (as long as they’re not like these). It is easy to see that everyone involved in this film really loved what they were doing as it’s clearly translated on screen.

So…what are you waiting for? Go see this movie now. 

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