King Kong (1976)

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1. 

   Siskoid

   I'm not gonna take 1976's King Kong to task for its effects. I've watched too many Japanese kaiju films to be bothered by men in suits, and it's of its time just like the original stop-motion 1933 classic is, just like the 2005 mo-cap CG version is. It just so happens that stop-motion is a more impressive technique than blue screen and giant animatronic hands, and WETA's CG was more realistic. For what they had to work with, I think the effects are fine. If this Kong is a failure for me, it's just entirely different reasons. Updating the story to then (then) contemporary day is perfectly okay, as is the re-draft's ecological bent, but it means the film has to jump through a LOT of hoops to make an oil company that initially wants to drill Skull Island into producers of a giant ape show in the middle of New York, y'know? And to replace the Empire State Building with the World Trade Center? Besides making us feel a little queasy today, it just doesn't produce as iconic an image. As the finale concerns itself with gunfire and explosions and a lot of screaming, we lose a key piece of the puzzle. And what can we say about Jessica Lange's introduction here? Knowing her later work, she seems hopelessly miscast as a flighty, 70s new age, sexpot, wannabe actress who joins the expedition after a shipwreck where all hands were lost but she doesn't seem to care. All the characters are tropes, really, but hers is one you'd normally use as a gag done by a day player. Putting "Dwan" at the center of the film makes it all even more absurd. 4 years 4 months ago
2. 

   252

   The Lange/Bridges chemistry carried the film, but all in all it was a poor one. 6 years 10 months ago

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