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The first thing to be clear about is that the Kong
of Skull Island is not the King Kong
we know and love. This is not the Merian C. Cooper King Kong of 1933, or even, the Dino De Laurentiis King Kong of 1976, or even Peter Jackson’s
interminable King Kong of 2005.
This is Kaiju Kong; a character firmly rooted in
the Japanese monster universe of King Kong
vs. Godzilla (1962). Its closest cinematic relative is the 2014 version of Godzilla which shares a unifying myth
about the atomic bomb tests in the Pacific in the 1950s, namely that they weren’t
testing weapons they were trying to kill something.
As such it has none of the tropes of those earlier
movies but director Jordan Vogt-Roberts is smart enough to reference them. The
opening sound effects echo the climax of the 1933 version, there is a nod to
Kong’s adolescent lust for Fay Wray, and of course he goes mano a mano with as
many dinosaurs as you can shake a stick at. And, I must confess, I found it
great fun.
The late Richard Schickel, who sadly died
recently, was my gatekeeper to the world of film criticism. I devoured his
stuff in Time magazine and there is
one phrase of his in particular which sticks in my mind. He was discussing Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
(1984) and he said at one point something to the effect that you can’t blame a
theme park for not being a cathedral. And he was right; Temple of Doom was what it was and Kong: Skull Island is what it is.
It’s a bit short on nuanced character and
sophisticated motivation. On the other hand, it is about a 200-foot ape so what
were you expecting. There is a place for everything in the cinematic universe, Moonlight is your cathedral and an
exquisite one it is, but Skull Island
is definitely a theme park and a thrilling one at that.
Vogt-Roberts does a remarkable job for someone
making their feature debut. Within three minutes we have met Kong, within 25
minutes Kong has destroyed an entire troop of air cavalry in spectacular
fashion. Contrast this with Jackson’s version where, an hour into the movie we
are still in New York; one reason why I always think of this film as ‘Show me
the monkey’. You must give the people what they paid for and this is exactly
what this movie does.
The plot is rudimentary. Set in 1973 a Special
Forces unit from Vietnam led by Samuel L. Jackson, is tasked with escorting
scientists led by John Goodman to a mysterious island which has recently been
discovered in the South Pacific. Don’t ask why, trust me it’s not important.
And we can throw into the mix feisty photojournalist
Brie Larsson and enigmatic SAS man Tom Hiddleston.
The film is not subtle and neither are the scientists.
They drop bombs to take seismic readings and within moments not only are they
facing up to Kong, but also the creepy lizardy dinosaur things which inhabit
the island. In this version, Kong is the good guy, the only one who can save
the islanders from these monsters, a fact vouchsafed by John C. Reilly as a
World War 2 survivor and best thing in the picture. Kong is also used to
deliver a little eco-subtext about species diversity.
As I said, no one is coming to this film for the
script or the performances although it must be said the latter make the best of
the former thanks to some proper grown-up actors like Jackson, Goodman and
Reilly. What they want are monsters and lots of them and the film delivers;
there’s Kong, the lizardy things, giant spiders, an enormous gnu-like creature
and there are also ants that make a noise like birds. We never see those although
I desperately wanted to; obviously, a creature too far for the FX team.
The film is relentless, the effects and the
production values are marvellous, and the action is non-stop and if you are
twelve years old you will think you have died and gone to heaven. I was about twelve
when I saw the 1933 version for the first time and that’s pretty much how I
felt.
But Vogt-Roberts is a smart director. He knows
this is a generic movie so he uses the genre tropes to inform it; there are
bits here from Apocalypse Now, Predator,
Platoon, and the King Kong legend too. There’s even,
remarkably, a musical turn from Dame Vera Lynn.
I know Kong:
Skull Island is not a classic piece of cinema. It’s not a cathedral, it’s a
theme park but it’s an exciting one. And Kong’s next outing is against Godzilla
in 2020.
*Gets comfy. Reaches for popcorn.
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