I liked the original ape movie way back when -- what a classic. Never saw the more recent redux a few decades ago. This one I dragged my girlfriend to go see today despite her protests that The Family Stone would be a better choice.
Before I go further I think it's fair to say that I really enjoyed LOTR -- Jackson did a fantastic job. However...(yes, there is a 'however' in this comment...) this King Kong version plays way too long. I liked the jungles but after a while it just got to be overkill. And the entire thing -- from start to finish -- could have been trimmed a bit I think in order to pick up the pace.
Don't get me wrong: as far as the tone of the story it was great. Jackson makes you care about the great big ape. At the end you'll probably think, "Darn it, poor Kong, so misunderstood. I would have understood him. He could have lived in my backyard (or maybe my neighbors'...).
However, it was long. Way too long. I always look at it as a bad sign for a film when I start gripping my knee caps out of sheer impatience -- I want to speed it up.
So I think the pace could have been picked up a bit and preserved the quality of the tone. When it comes out on television in the very far future I'll probably zip it into my editor just to play around with it a bit, cut it up a little, see if I was right.
I'm still sold on Jackson though. I think he did a great job in making you care about a CG character. And that's a real important skill.
Before I go further I think it's fair to say that I really enjoyed LOTR -- Jackson did a fantastic job. However...(yes, there is a 'however' in this comment...) this King Kong version plays way too long. I liked the jungles but after a while it just got to be overkill. And the entire thing -- from start to finish -- could have been trimmed a bit I think in order to pick up the pace.
Don't get me wrong: as far as the tone of the story it was great. Jackson makes you care about the great big ape. At the end you'll probably think, "Darn it, poor Kong, so misunderstood. I would have understood him. He could have lived in my backyard (or maybe my neighbors'...).
However, it was long. Way too long. I always look at it as a bad sign for a film when I start gripping my knee caps out of sheer impatience -- I want to speed it up.
So I think the pace could have been picked up a bit and preserved the quality of the tone. When it comes out on television in the very far future I'll probably zip it into my editor just to play around with it a bit, cut it up a little, see if I was right.
I'm still sold on Jackson though. I think he did a great job in making you care about a CG character. And that's a real important skill.