King Kong (Widescreen Edition)

I grew up loving the early ape films King Kong (1933) and Mighty Joe Young (1949). King Kong is a classic retelling of the Beauty and the Beast story and the original was groundbreaking in its use of special effects. Remaking a classic will always attract harsh critics.

For me, a lover both of classic films and of modern science fiction, I place King Kong (2005) among the best films I have seen in years. In the cinema, this was a true spectacle to behold. The action and CGI special effects were astounding. Peter Jackson took a fairly sparse story and fleshed it out. I appreciated the longer back-story to the characters in New York prior to the sea voyage to Skull Island.

The exposure of themes relating to racism, animal and ecological abuse, and treatment of women was obvious, but not preachy. Despite this being an action film, these themes seemed to me as large as Kong was himself.

Jackson tweaked the storyline a bit and improved on the original. The introduction of the writer (Brody) as love interest instead of the ship captain made more sense and was simply a better story. With the original film, I was quite moved as a kid when Kong died. With this version, I was at least as moved or more as an adult. The relationship with Kong and Ann was portrayed better. I believed that they had made a bond with each other. The moment of Kong's demise is one of the most touching moments I have seen in a film in years.

Finally, James Newton Howard's soundtrack is quite moving, with beautiful, stirring melodies befitting this grand film. Worth listening to in its own right. I would have liked to watch the film with an isolated music score. Unfortunately, this was not included as an option on any edition so far.

Editions:
Two-Disc Special Edition (2006)
For the collector, this included the Production Diaries and several bonus features. A must-have if you love this film and want more background information.

3-Disc Deluxe Extended Edition (2006)
There is no overlap to what is on the 2-disc version, so this was a worthwhile second purchase for me. I enjoyed seeing the deleted scenes. The slightly longer (13 min.) version was intereresting to see. I especially wanted the audio commentary track. No regrets here for having bought both the 2-disc and 3-disc versions, because they each offered different material.

No matter how many times I watch this movie, I love it every time. I really like Naomi Watts, she gives a most affective performance, her eyes tell the audience everything she's feeling.I also follow Adrien Brody's career. The special affects were simply amazing. The DVD came quickly in the mail, much quicker than I expected, in fact, and it was in excellent condition. His prices were much more than reasonable. I would order from this dealer in the future, certainly.

This is pure Peter Jackson entertainment, some humour, tons of amazing SFX shots, an amazing story, (Although written by someone else, there are little bits added in.) The only thing I didn't like about this film is the fact that he added in about half an hour at the beggining which, although fun to watch and had good character development, was forgettable and was insignifigant to the story. In a magazine I read a review stating that this movie was only intended to be two hours, at the end Peter [Jackson] saw that it was three hours, and he wondered how he ended up with it. Well, that extra half hour at the beggining might have assisted in it.

OK, so the sotry goes that a young actress, Ann Darrow, is looking for a movie or stage she can act at. So, this movie guy askes her if she'd like to go to Skull Island to shoot a film. So they go to Skull Island (How can anyone go to Skull Island? Isn't the name kinda like a warning to stay away?) and find a band of canibalistic natives that really freak me out and take Ann as a sacrfifice. So, a big gorilla named Kong (Or King Kong) comes and takes her away. The rest mainly consistes of getting Ann back and some totally wicked three way T-Rex fights, giant bugs and a brontosaurs stampede involving raptors, or Baryonix, I cant tell, in the mix.

This movie is going to win an oscar for SFX (five bucks says so.) and may win best film of the year. I just can't say how great this film is! But, if sitting through a three hour film isnt your thing, go look at Zathura or Brokeback Mountain, you'll get a kick out of those. Five stars, Bar none.

If you liked this movie you'd also like: Godzilla: Final Wars, Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Alien Quadrilogy, Jarhead, Zathura, Brokeback Mountain, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.