Sadly, this movie represents great opportunity that was missed. Peter Jackson obviously has the talent and the love for the original to make a truly definitive "King Kong" remake. Unfortunately, while this movie has many flashes of pure brilliance, it ultimately fails to become anything more than a time capsule, like the 1976 version. Perhaps if he had kept the running time down to around 120-150 minutes, Jackson would have eliminated all the unnecessary elements that bog this story down, but as it is, this is a brilliant two-hour movie padded out to three hours' running time.
The main problem is that too many sequences go on too long, and go from exciting to ludicrous. This happens again and again and again, from the brontosaurus stampede, to the tyrannosaurus fight, to the giant insects in the "spider pit" who somehow get shot off of Jack Driscoll's body with a tommy gun without giving him so much as a scratch. It happens in the non-monster scenes, too; the first time Ann Darrow does her vaudeville routine for Kong, it's cute. The second time, it made me groan.
And speaking of Darrow, while it was obviously Jackson's intention to show how much she cared for Kong (once she stopped being terrified), their whole 'relationship' seemed very forced. One minute she's running desperately away from Kong, then he saves her life, and suddenly he can do no wrong. The whole thing seemed forced -- brought on by the demands of the script, rather than the character herself -- both because the transformation happened too quickly and completely, and because of the be incredibly vicious way he treated her earlier in the film. In the original film, it's obvious that Kong means Darrow no good, but it's not blatant. Once he takes her to his cave and starts undressing her, it's easy for us to forget that he's probably killed dozens of sacrificial women before her.
In this movie, Jackson makes this quite explicit, by having Kong take Darrow to a boneyard littered with the skeletons of his previous victims. That, combined with the truly brutal way he treats her at first (running at full speed with her in his fist... it's a wonder she wasn't crushed to pulp) made too hard for me to accept the transformation that comes later.
Also, unfortunately, I feel that the special effects were, in the end, something of a failure. As with other aspects of the film, they suffer from excess, e.g., in the brontosaurus stampede, when there are just one too many "nick of time" escapes. In the end of that sequence, as the characters run in front of a virtual wall of dinos who are stumbling all over each other, the effect was, ironically, a lot like a rear-projection shot. The special effects and the live action had become so disconnected from each other that the entire false reality was destroyed.
My other big complaint about the special effects is that in too many CGI shots, the "camera" is moving all over the place while the animated characters move within the frame. Far too many CGI movies use this trick, and they all wind up looking the same as a result. In the original movie, obviously, the limitations of the technology required that the camera remain still for most effects shots, but that also had the desirable effect of giving the viewer time to soak it all in. In these new shots, the camera keeps moving so much that you don't really get a chance to see what's happening on screen. Used sparingly, that technique can add to the suspense of an action scene, but overused, it's just frustrating and annoying and serves to take the viewer OUT of the picture, because we are not given the option (which we would surely use in real life) to simply "stand still" and observe the action.
It's a shame, too, because this movie contains many flashes of pure brilliance. The scene where the crew encounters the natives is genuinely scary, as is the spider pit sequence, before it becomes ridiculous. If anyone was capable of making a Kong remake that deserved to be spoken of in the same breath as the original, it was probably Peter Jackson. With a little more self-control, this movie could have been it. As it is, my main impression when the movie finished was of the many over-the-top sequences, and not of the sense of wonder that the film should have produced.
The main problem is that too many sequences go on too long, and go from exciting to ludicrous. This happens again and again and again, from the brontosaurus stampede, to the tyrannosaurus fight, to the giant insects in the "spider pit" who somehow get shot off of Jack Driscoll's body with a tommy gun without giving him so much as a scratch. It happens in the non-monster scenes, too; the first time Ann Darrow does her vaudeville routine for Kong, it's cute. The second time, it made me groan.
And speaking of Darrow, while it was obviously Jackson's intention to show how much she cared for Kong (once she stopped being terrified), their whole 'relationship' seemed very forced. One minute she's running desperately away from Kong, then he saves her life, and suddenly he can do no wrong. The whole thing seemed forced -- brought on by the demands of the script, rather than the character herself -- both because the transformation happened too quickly and completely, and because of the be incredibly vicious way he treated her earlier in the film. In the original film, it's obvious that Kong means Darrow no good, but it's not blatant. Once he takes her to his cave and starts undressing her, it's easy for us to forget that he's probably killed dozens of sacrificial women before her.
In this movie, Jackson makes this quite explicit, by having Kong take Darrow to a boneyard littered with the skeletons of his previous victims. That, combined with the truly brutal way he treats her at first (running at full speed with her in his fist... it's a wonder she wasn't crushed to pulp) made too hard for me to accept the transformation that comes later.
Also, unfortunately, I feel that the special effects were, in the end, something of a failure. As with other aspects of the film, they suffer from excess, e.g., in the brontosaurus stampede, when there are just one too many "nick of time" escapes. In the end of that sequence, as the characters run in front of a virtual wall of dinos who are stumbling all over each other, the effect was, ironically, a lot like a rear-projection shot. The special effects and the live action had become so disconnected from each other that the entire false reality was destroyed.
My other big complaint about the special effects is that in too many CGI shots, the "camera" is moving all over the place while the animated characters move within the frame. Far too many CGI movies use this trick, and they all wind up looking the same as a result. In the original movie, obviously, the limitations of the technology required that the camera remain still for most effects shots, but that also had the desirable effect of giving the viewer time to soak it all in. In these new shots, the camera keeps moving so much that you don't really get a chance to see what's happening on screen. Used sparingly, that technique can add to the suspense of an action scene, but overused, it's just frustrating and annoying and serves to take the viewer OUT of the picture, because we are not given the option (which we would surely use in real life) to simply "stand still" and observe the action.
It's a shame, too, because this movie contains many flashes of pure brilliance. The scene where the crew encounters the natives is genuinely scary, as is the spider pit sequence, before it becomes ridiculous. If anyone was capable of making a Kong remake that deserved to be spoken of in the same breath as the original, it was probably Peter Jackson. With a little more self-control, this movie could have been it. As it is, my main impression when the movie finished was of the many over-the-top sequences, and not of the sense of wonder that the film should have produced.