For King Kong I had expectations as big as the ape himself, I mean you have academy award winning actors, an academy awarding winning director and a Kong-sized budget, it’s hard to believe I could be let down, but I was. Let’s start with the positive; Peter Jackson has proven once again he is one of the most gifted filmmakers of his time. He can film action sequences with remarkable vision that also has you on the edge of your seat. The actors were perfectly cast in every role from Kong himself down to the sea crew on the ship. The cinematography beautifully captures the imaginary world of Skull Island. Where I felt the film was lacking was in story. The movie I felt started off very well with the introduction of the characters including Carl Denham (Jack Black, who added his own flavor to his role) an overzealous filmmaker who decides he must shoot his next film on the worst location site known to man. However the producers funding Carl’s film decide to cut him off because of his crazy notion to film on an undiscovered island. So Carl takes matters into his own hands and with the help of his trusty assistant Preston (Colin Hanks, who fits into this role perfectly) they are able to leave with the ship provided to them before the film company knows what hit them. First though Carl had to find himself a leading lady, enter Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts, who was my favorite thing about this movie) a starving actress with strong morals, a girlish crush on Jack Driscoll the films scriptwriter (Adrien Brody) and an inkling for adventure. They all set sail on a somewhat rundown ship and no one is aware of their destination except for Carl Denham. Okay it all sounds good up until now right??? Well once they get to the island the movie begins to drag with long drawn out action scenes of Kong fighting Ann, Kong fighting Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs fighting the crew trying to rescue Ann from Kong. It’s one action sequence after another which does build tension but also leaves the story seriously lacking. The parts of the movie that I found the most entertaining were between Ann and Kong, which unfortunately didn’t offer up a lot of dialog for the visually impaired. However, Naomi Watts was absolutely mesmerizing you could see everything she was feeling through her expressions, her desperate need to communicate with this beast and eventually her understanding of him. Those tender moments I believe are the most beautiful to watch. Overall I would say the good outweighed the bad but this film could have definitely been shorter! I wouldn’t recommend this to the visually impaired since most of it is action scenes and even with MoPix the most you would get out of it is “Kong is chasing the dinosaur” ROAR ROAR “ Kong is fighting the dinosaur” ROAR ROAR and so on.
(Universal)
Starring: Naomi Watts, Adrien Brody, Jack Black and Colin Hanks
