King Kong

[gambit]

So has Peter Jackson made a movie less than 3 hours long? Anyway, every good thing you've heard about this movie is true. Damn, what a movie.

[the mongoose]

Cool. I got's me a free ticket and I'll check it out this weekend. :)

[b.miller]

yeah just go in knowing it's 3 hours long and that it's King Kong and you will have a good time.

[grady]

And it takes a while for the ride to start, so you sit through some mundane jungle safari stuff for a bit as the roller coaster car cranks slowing up the steep hill only to hit the peak and the drop down speeding you through the rest of the ride...er...film.

[mark3]

Some really nasty creatures on that island... Yikes! :eek:

[gambit]

Some really nasty creatures on that island... Yikes! :eek:No shit! Those worm things? Fuck!

[stimpee]

Well, as they say in Pulp Fiction, here in Holland you can buy beer in the cinema and there's a nice interval of 10-15mins in the middle to stretch your legs (and get more beer) so King Kong should be manageable!

[cured]

this is opera, people...you know the story and just want to see how it is executed. Have a feeling this will be one of those tear jerker movies. From what critics are saying, it's a very well-done movie. Random posters on other boards are saying it's good and some others said it was a yawnfest.

I will likely check this out on the weekend...Peter Jackson is probably the only epic-level director/producer I have stock in right now.

[gambit]

Yeah, I think this movie could've cut out abut 30 minutes of footage and still been a great movie. I can definitely attribute the "yawnfest" comments to that.

[Animal Boything]

I liked it too. It was in all ways a great movie. The special effects were ridiculously good. The battle at the top of the Empire State Building was better than I possibly could have imagined. I think it ranks among the best action scenes ever put on film!

[//\/\/]

stupidly over the top - very silly - very exciting - ludicrous - great cast - good nods to the original (and hearts of darkness) - beautiful leading lady - good monsters - love stories are rather unbelievable, the skating scene makes you want to puke (almost ruins the film) - the skyscraper scene is very vertiginous. as cured rightly says, we know what's going to happen, girls gets left for big monkey, big monkey falls for girl, big monkey loses girl, girl and big monkey end up in new york, big monkey escapes and finds girl, gets shot by biplanes and falls off empire state building. but the way the story's told is excellent.

[chuck]

I was fortunate enough to get to attend the premiere here in Wellington - even got to walk the red carpet and drank champagne with Dan Carter. A top evening out and a really proud moment for me as I watched my wife's name go up in the credits!!

At the end of the day - it's a movie about a big bloody ape and how he connects with this beautiful blonde.

Simple story - but what a hell of ride it is - the action scenes are by turns, a rush, terrifying, nauseating, and yes, a little OTT at times.

The camera work is wonderful - the production design on Skull Island and the New York sets is beautiful. I know some of the guys who worked on the miniatures unit - and it was amazing to see their work, knowing the hours that went into it.

I loved how there were whole sections of the movie, with no script, it was all non-verbal communication between Ann and Kong - and yet so much was said. So many movies have to say something to be anything - but this is so carefully crafted - this relationship between two very unlikely beings.

Downers: Length. I think I understand how PJ was trying to build a connection and reasons for the characters being in this story - but seeing they all get dealt too pretty quickly on Skull Island it's a bit pointless imho. You could have easily cut 45 minutes from that first hour - and the ice-scapades in New York, and still had a fantastic film.

Some of the CGI work was a bit rushed - but overall, that's nit-picking.

On the whole - I loved it - although I'm biased. You can argue that it's overblown Hollywood excess - but at the end of the day, this is a man's vision and homage to the one movie that inspired him to follow his dream. PJ has had the good fortune to be able to do this on the back of LOTR - and any studio would have given him blank cheque to complete this one.

More power to him. Well done and congrats to all involved.





Dear mr jackson:

Can I have my wife back now please. at least for christmas. I know you've got an extended dvd you need her for, but it'd be nice to see her for the holidays.:)

regards,

chuck kong

[chuck]

girls gets left for big monkey, big monkey falls for girl, big monkey loses girl, girl and big monkey end up in new york, big monkey escapes and finds girl, gets shot by biplanes and falls off empire state building.

that's a regular night out on the toon for you innit Ian??

;):D

[darktrain]

yall are some cold hearted grinches. that iceskating scene was beautiful:(

[Animal Boything]

yall are some cold hearted grinches. that iceskating scene was beautiful:(Agreed, not only was it beautiful but it added meaning to the whole NY section of the story... It was Kong's one peaceful moment in her world. The whole beginning was solid too... If any scene was unnecessary it was the fight with the bugs, and even that was cool enough to be tolerable. The movie didn't feel long to me.

[Stephen]

Well, as they say in Pulp Fiction, here in Holland you can buy beer in the cinema and there's a nice interval of 10-15mins in the middle to stretch your legs (and get more beer) so King Kong should be manageable!
Not only in Clogland, but also here in the heart of the midlands. I got to nip out at halftime for a fag and a Leffe. Top shit baby!

http://www.theelectric.co.uk/

If you ever come to Birmingham, go to The Electric. It's ace.

[//\/\/]

that's a regular night out on the toon for you innit Ian??

;):D

apart from the new york bit - the gorilla usually falls off the tyne bridge after one broon ale too many :D

[//\/\/]

Agreed, not only was it beautiful but it added meaning to the whole NY section of the story... It was Kong's one peaceful moment in her world.

bleurgh - made me want to puke my popcorn - skating and having fun in a city where everybody was looking for them? it was the whole woman/gorilla thing that i thought was overplayed really - i mean - what was she thinking, exactly? falling for a fucking huge monster ape? where did she see it going, do you think? save that sort of syrup for disney, purrrrlease... :rolleyes:

[gambit]

bleurgh - made me want to puke my popcorn - skating and having fun in a city where everybody was looking for them? it was the whole woman/gorilla thing that i thought was overplayed really - i mean - what was she thinking, exactly? falling for a fucking huge monster ape? where did she see it going, do you think? save that sort of syrup for disney, purrrrlease... :rolleyes:I kinda looked at it as an owner-pet relationship thing. Obviously, she wasn't going to do anything with Kong--it's not physically possible. But maybe she just wanted to be friends. You know how emotional the ladies get. ;)

[jOHN rODRIGUEZ]

. . . and I still cried, knowing all along what would come in the end . . .

Now THAT'S damn good cinema.

[lukeyd]

bleurgh - made me want to puke my popcorn - skating and having fun in a city where everybody was looking for them? it was the whole woman/gorilla thing that i thought was overplayed really - i mean - what was she thinking, exactly? falling for a fucking huge monster ape? where did she see it going, do you think? save that sort of syrup for disney, purrrrlease... :rolleyes:riiiiiiiggghhht. if you removed the whole woman/gorilla thing, where has the movie gone?

watched this last night, complete with annoying kid right next to my ear talking at full volume at quiet bits (grrrrrr). i think we have come to be spoiled by special effects courtesy of mr jackson. i agree with chuck that some of the cgi looked a bit rushed, but was sitting there casually watching a 30 foot ape chase a taxi, smashing the front of theatres as he goes..... and i sat up and realised OMG THIS IS F-ING AMAZING

bit with bugs - awesome (apart from ridiculously accurate shooting from a tommy gun). fighting t-rexs = BADASS. chasing after random blond women, and then subsequently tossing them aside = hilariously slapstick

[Leon]

riiiiiiiggghhht. if you removed the whole woman/gorilla thing, where has the movie gone?

bit with bugs - awesome (apart from ridiculously accurate shooting from a tommy gun). fighting t-rexs = BADASS. chasing after random blond women, and then subsequently tossing them aside = hilariously slapstick

heh, word :D

I thought the movie was awesome. Aside from a big fucking monkey and an unknown island, the movie is redicilously over the top. But keeping that in mind, it really is a movie movie, and it's fucking great. It could have been shorter, but the "slow" start didn't really bother me. All of the jungle stuff is amazing, also the city scenes are great, with the old cars and stuff.

[//\/\/]

if you removed the whole woman/gorilla thing, where has the movie gone?

away from bestiality? :p

[chuck]

having survived a stag weekend on the toon, one could also argue that removing woman/gorilla equations would totally ruin a bloody good laugh.

:)

[myrrh]

So has Peter Jackson made a movie less than 3 hours long?

Meet the Feebles. (I only mention that because it is the first Jackson movie I ever saw, and it was forever burned into my brain because it is so insane. It had a serious effect on my three year stunt as a puppeteer.)

Anyway, I loved King Kong. I don't know if I will go out and buy the super extended DVD like with LOTR, though. I think that the movie will loose a lot on the small screen. I nearly got vertigo when the camera was panning around the Empire State building!

I forgot that your wife was working on the movie Chuck! You should have dropped her name here, for us to peep in the credits. Pass the word for a job well done!:)

[chuck]

her name is Karen, and she took my last name, which is Kong.

cue: much mirth, and constantly being asked "is that for real?" when she was meeting people as part of the production. thankfully her email wasn't kkong...

even the security at stone street still give me grief every time I walk/drive in.... it's only been 18 months.

"oh... it's Mr. Kong.. hehehehe"

she's one of the accounts team - they get listed pretty early in the credit roll - she's staying on to work on the extended DVD. god knows what PJ is going to extend it with! there is rumors of a 3-D version... which would really mess your eyes up, and you'd definitely not want to have eaten before hand.

[King of Snake]

Saw this over the weekend with Stimpee. I loved it! They really nailed Kong and made him a living thing even surpassing their work on Gollum.
It didn't feel like such a long movie, but some scenes could definitely have been cut a bit shorter, and yeah some things are a bit too over the top even for a movie about a giant gorilla (how many slow-shutterspeed shots of fire, skulls and shaking native people in trance with their eyes turned to white do we have to see really? I get the picture already!! ;))

oh, and you gotta love the gruesome death of Andy Serkis :D (as the cook, not the gorilla)