April 1, 2006
Review Corner
I'm not a real man. I function as one and like a lot of the same things men do. Of course my grooming habits are not good enough for me to consider being gay. But some malformed, truncated Y-chromosome makes it impossible for me to enjoy action films.
Taking this into account, I have to provide a mixed review of Peter Jackson's "King Kong." I went to Redbox early yesterday and was very happy to find it in stock. The first 90 minutes were extremely good. Great narrative choice, compelling characters, solid acting. I was ready to give out some stars. A girl, a guy, a gorilla, a good movie.
Stephen King, in one of his non-fiction books, Danse Macabre, says that the problem with making a horror movie is that the director ultimately has to show his hand: let us see the monster. Jackson handles this with aplomb (movie reviewers get to use words like "aplomb"). Quick cuts of the beast from the POV of the blonde in his hand -- more good stuff.
Then, however, we get an hour of special effects and fight scenes. Some idiot put an hour of "Jurassic Park" in this perfectly good movie, Dinosaur fights dinosaur, Dinosaur chases human, big bugs are shot off humans with tommy-guns, Gorilla fights dinosaur, big bats chase people. The effects are splendid but YAWN! the storyline doesn't move an inch the whole time.
Then more action scenes back in New York, then an ending we've seen 100 times but was done very well. I like Jackson and I like the style of this film too much to pan it, but I can only give it three stars although parts of it are five star quality.