The Eighth Wonder of the World.....not this time: King Kong 2005

8/30/13, King Kong, Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing, Best Visual Effects, 2005

First things first: there is no reason in the universe that this movie needed to be three hours, this was not some epic that covered 150 years of history, had multiple complex characters or even a complex plot line. Seriously, Peter Jackson needs an editor, and not someone to make sure there is continuity in the scenes or that the story is cohesive, someone to look and go 'Dude, seriously, 20 minutes of stampeding velociraptors is way too much'. I think most people are familiar with King Kong and the story of the great ape and the beautiful blonde and their romp through New York City, so I am not going to recap the plot here. If you have never heard of or seen King Kong, you should start with the best and the original from 1933 (bonus, it's only 100 minutes and it is on the AFI's list of best 100 films). There is something that is so nostalgic for me with the original, including the special effects, which seem almost as prehistoric as Skull Island, but endearing nonetheless. King Kong 2005 spends forty-five minutes setting up the voyage to Skull Island, introducing us to actress Ann Darrow played by Naomi Watts, Jack Driscoll, a playwright played by Adrien Brody, and Jack Black as single-minded movie director Carl Denham. As we are all used to from a Peter Jackson film, the movie is visually stunning, things are bigger, brighter, and I'm sure if I had a high-def television, it would have been like the dinosaurs and giant bug-things were in my living room, and that is probably the reason the movie won the award for Best Visual Effects. Honestly, I didn't hate the movie, I hated the fact that it was freaking long, okay, and there were parts that seemed utterly ridiculous, but if you're watching a movie about a giant ape, I'm not sure that you watch it with the seriousness of Hamlet. There was a 40 minutes period (it may have been shorter, but it didn't feel like that) where it was special effect after special effect, creature after creature, and it was overkill). A few moments after she met Kong, I felt badly for Naomi Watts who did a lot of screaming and flopping around, and I thought this must have been good practice for her role in The Impossible (and she was great in that). Hats off (again) to Andy Serkis who played King Kong through motion capture technology, and he was incredible; if his name is familiar, Serkis brought the personality-challenged Smeagle/Golum to life in The Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit, as well as other roles where he is not actually on stage. He's amazing. There has been discussion that roles like this should be under consideration for Best Actor/Best Supporting Actor, and I totally agree. He brings a humanity to Kong that could have been lost. There isn't anything too scary or inappropriate, so I think kids who like these kinds of movies (Journey to the Center of the Earth, The Mummy, etc.) would enjoy this (you can skip the first 45 minutes in the interest of not boring them to tears). But please, watch the original first.