Peter Jackson's latest effort is another attempt at raucous comedy in the same vein as Lord of the Rings. He pulls his usual stunt of making each scene at least fifteen times longer than needed, giving the whole film a running time which seems to exceed the Earth's lifespan. Plus, of course, every scene is packed with his customary amateurish special effects, the likes of which can be enjoyed in most Saturday morning cartoon shows.
The film is set in 1933 for no good reason, although
conceivably it could be allow Jackson to allow a character to make a brilliant
joke about Faye Wray being unavailable for a part (yeah because she would have
the sense not to appear in this crapfest). Jackson's been planning this project
since he was nine apparently, and with comic gems like this it's easy to see
why. It starts off pretty slowly though, in New York City. The lovely Naomi
Watts is a struggling actress. The loss of her job, and her impending
starvation with only a mad old fool for company raise a few smiles, but it's
once she's talked into joining a motley crew of degenerates in a round the
world boat race that the laughs really start to flow. There she meets Jack
Driscoll, some sort of abomination with a large nose, who's mostly kept locked
up in a cage. Their inevitable romance is played entirely for laughs, with good
effect. Less funny is the twisted Orson Welles impression by Jack Black as Carl
Denham. A pity, because Black's normally such a natural at comedy. The captain
of the ship is a mad German, a sort of Mr Magoo who just does stupid things
like steering his ship straight into a cliff. It's while the ship is grinding
over the rocks that Jackson pulls off some blue screen humour *, of which there
is a great deal more later. The actors stand on a boat, which is obviously made
to appear like a studio set, while behind them, a horrifically crude CGI
background appears showing cliffs and crashing waves. It's sidesplitting
stuff.
Anyway, quite by chance they arrive at a strange island, previously
undiscovered despite appearing to be the size of Tasmania. Needless to say,
it's populated by a large selection of travelling circus freaks, who keep
inexplicably disappearing (presumably every time they have to meet a circus
engagement). They're very much from the Itchy and Scratchy school of comedy- a
favourite wheeze of theirs being to bash out peoples brains with their pointy
clubs. Oh and there's also a big gorilla on the island, and a load of plastic
dinosaurs, which look a lot like the ones I bought from Woolworths for £1.
Poor Naomi is captured by the gorilla, and Jackson now sets up a love triangle
involving them and old hawknose (dude! cuckolded by a fifty foot ape- that's
gotta suck).
The next fifty or so hours of the film are spent with Denham and Driscoll
looking for Naomi. They are accompanied by an endless stream of armed
sailor/soldiers from the boat. This is a classic gag as it's such a small boat
- it's like the joke where hundreds of clowns get out of a tiny car. Early on
in their jungle adventure, Jackson tries to stage some of his biggest comic
setpieces. The first and arguably finest, is when the humans are trampled on by
hundreds of rampaging brontosaurs (I think). Only the gag is - practically none
of them die! Instead, we are treated to hours of hilariously bad effects as the
cartoon-like dinosaurs keep trying to stomp on the humans, but at the last
millisecond, oh no! they miss by a fraction of a millimetre, or are distracted
by a precisely timed raptor attack. I can imagine the animators high-fiving
each other and masturbating furiously as they produced this footage. Soon after
this, the gorilla (who has the somewhat silly name King Kong) goes all kung fu
on three T Rexes, finishing with the much imitated ripping-off-the-jaw move.
This is pretty funny, but I feel Jackson could have taken things further by
having Kong playing the bongos on a couple of T Rex skulls.
But anyway. The name King Kong appears to be a crude attempt at sarcasm. Kong
really isn't King of anything much. The stupid gorilla spends most of his time
beating off vicious bats and being chomped on by gangs of T Rex. But he doesn't
care, because he has the love of the beautiful (as we are hilariously reminded
every 10 seconds) Naomi. They're ready to spend the rest of their lives
together watching the sunset or gazing lovingly into each other's eyes - but
those damn dirty humans (especially bignose - chap just doesn't know when he's
beaten) want her back. Also Driscoll has the hilarious idea of capturing Kong
and making a fortune through displaying him back in the USA. It seems that, on
an island full of dinosaurs, the most valuable animal is in fact the
oversized gorilla. Okaaaaay. Oh by the way, Jackson has fun with the humans
trekking through the jungle, by repeatedly getting them into 100% guaranteed
fatal situations, only to be rescued at the last second by Captain Senile and
his jolly infinite bunch of buccaneers. I think this stunt is pulled about 6 or
7 times - and Peter, it just keeps on getting funnier each time!
But I digress. They get Kong onto the boat, and arrive back in New York, ready for Crapfest Part III: Destruction in Toytown. Brody is in the doghouse for assisting in the capture of Naomi's monstrous lover. Now, exactly how they get Kong onto the boat is not explained. I like to think they fashioned a vast pair of water skis from the cartilage in Brody's nose, and somehow talked the simian into skiing behind the boat all the way to North America. Any other explanation just doesn't make any sense. Of course, Kong escapes from the theatre in New York, and trashes the town yadda yadda yadda, but this is just background fluff. The film is building up to its comic finale. The lovers are reunited, and enjoy a fabulous date together. They go iceskating in Central Park (always a favourite) and the glorious evening culminates in watching the sun go down from the top of the Empire State Building. Sad to say, those eeeevil humans have other ideas, and, well I won't spoil the ending. OK I will - they shoot the crap out of Kong, who dies in the most manipulative and stupid way imaginable. Jackson seems to think that the audience should be upset. Oh no, the hideous murderous 50 foot gorilla who killed scores of humans is now himself dead - oh woe is me, that sort of thing. Unless the cinema-going audience actually consists of murderous 50 foot gorillas, then this is unlikely to be their reaction. But I'll tell you what does work - Naomi Watts standing atop the Empire State Building in a silk dress. In winter. Her hair bouncing as it is tousled by a light wind. Pure comic genius.
Well, all in all, this would have been an all time great comedy, but for one small problem. It's complete crap. 1 star for Naomi Watts' pert nipples, which I have to admit are quite lovely.
1887 minutes, 2.35 : 1
The Players:
Naomi Watts as Ann Darrow, an annoyance
Jack 'look how miscast I am!' Black as Carl Denham, a snivelling
fatso
Adrien 'hawknose' Brody as Jack Driscoll, an extremely boring character with an
extremely large nose
plus an assortment of instantly forgettable nobodies, some of whom may in fact
be related to Tom Hanks
written by Ed in December 2005
*might in fact be green screen humour. Am I bovvered? Either way it's damn funny.