King Kong (2005 film)



Peter Jackson's take on King Kong, released in 2005.

This film returns to the story as propounded in 1933: Depression-era filmmaker Carl Denham (Jack Black), dodging debt collectors, hires an out-of-work Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts) and quickly leaves on an expedition to find a certain uncharted island...

Jackson's film diverges from the original by providing more of Denham's and Ann's respective back stories. Further, "Jack Driscoll" is changed from the ship's first mate to a playwright, and a narcissistic Hollywood actor is added for comic relief. The natives are much more brutal than past portrayals. And, as with the 1976 film, a good deal of attention is paid to the unusual "romance" between the girl and the primate.

Interestingly, the 2005 version of the film makes a show of Denham filming scenes and dialog lifted from the original 1933 movie.


 * Adaptation Expansion: Considerable: Peter Jackson's version was 87 minutes longer than the original, or a full 101 minutes longer in its extended cut – basically, twice as long.
 * Changed My Mind, Kid: Snooty actor Bruce Baxter, faced with the perils of Skull Island, gives up on rescuing Ann, only to return later Just in Time for a Big Damn Heroes moment.
 * Climbing Climax
 * Creepy Centipedes: Jackson's remake is infamous for various horrific giant centipedes.
 * Fallen-On-Hard-Times Job: Ann Darrow's one unlucky break away from going the burlesque chorus-girl route.
 * Flanderization: The 2005 film goes out of its way to remove every positive character trait Carl Denham had in 1933, and replace them with something negative.
 * Foot Focus: Both the '33 and '05 versions had Ann barefoot for most of the time on the island, but only the latter had repeated closeups of her muddy bare feet.
 * Gory Discretion Shot: It's very difficult to see during the 2005 film's fight with the final Vastatosaurus rex, but Kong actually bites the rex's tongue off, then spits it out and resumes fighting. The film covers it up by cutting from a close-up view to a mid-range shot from an obscured angle so fast it's nigh on impossible to spot. Look closely in this clip, though, about 48 seconds in.
 * From the same clip: The scene also switches briefly to Anne's shocked face as Kong crushes the vastatosaur's head like a peanut.
 * Hollywood Evolution: Evolutionary biology and ecosystems don't work that way. Creatures trapped on an island tend to select for smaller size, not larger – and yet if you read the natural history of Skull Island or watch the relevant documentary on the DVD, that's exactly the opposite of how the film makers designed the animals. Also, with that many apex predators in such a tiny area (the vastatosaurs, the raptors, not to mention the various giant arthropods), the island would've been devoid of life in no time as the ecosystem fell apart. It is implied in the film (and explicitly said in the "Natural History" tie-in book) that the island used to be much larger and was sinking into the sea/breaking apart. Still, for animals that large, the break-up would have to have been of a very large land mass and would have had to only been happening for a very short period of time, geologically speaking, which makes it something of a Voodoo Shark.
 * Improbable Aiming Skills: Right after the Everybody's Dead, Dave scene, the men are attacked by massive, oversized insects. As one man is covered in giant bugs, another fires a Thompson sub-machine gun full-auto at him from only a few feet away and manages to hit nothing but bugs.
 * Last of His Kind: It is implied that Kong is the last giant ape on Skull Island: the most telling evidence is a shot of him entering his cave and walking past multiple skeletons of giant gorillas. This loneliness, along with the hostility of Skull Island's environment, accounts for both his ferocity and his need for company, which Ann Darrow supplies.
 * Furthermore, as stated in the background materials, Skull Island's entire ecosystem is dying because the island is submerging due to geological activity. Those V. rex that Kong killed, for instance, may just have been the last three members of their entire species.


 * Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: Not whole worlds, but Carl Denham's tendency to unintentionally destroy the things he loves is Lampshaded.
 * "Mister Sandman" Sequence
 * Mundane Made Awesome: The scene where Skull Island is being typed.
 * Mythology Gag:
 * A reference to an actress, "Fay", who is working on a film over at "RKO".
 * Large chunks of the original dialogue are lifted verbatim from the 1933 film, sometimes as near-parody (the original's banter between Jack and Ann is used as Denham films his two actors)
 * Kong's stage show in New York includes an elaborate (and inaccurate) depiction of the native sacrifice ritual, which is remarkably similar to the depiction of the actual ritual seen in the 1933 film. And the music for the entire sequence is a new performance of the original's score.
 * Rewriting Jack into the role of the writer gets spun into a gag as Ann initially mistakes another character for him. Bonus points for having the scene turn immediately into a Right Behind Me moment.
 * The fight between Kong and the last Vastatosaurus rex is practically move-for-move the same as the last half of the fight between Kong and the Tyrannosaurus rex in the original, right down to Kong playing with the dinosaur's head after killing it and then roaring and beating his chest triumphantly.
 * Never Trust a Trailer: In the trailer, Denham is heard saying, "Scream, Ann! Scream for your life!" as one homage to the 1933 original. That part never made it into the final cut.
 * No Endor Holocaust: In the remake at least, it appears no-one ever bothers to tell Ann Darrow about the twenty or so guys who died horrible, horrible deaths trying to save her. Either that or she's the most callous bitch of all time.
 * One-Scene Wonder: His scene was cut, but the sergeant who's about lead an attack on Kong in New York is one of the film's most awesome fellows.
 * Pacing Problems: A common criticism of the 2005 movie, which clocks in at 188 min (201 in the extended version). It takes over an hour before we see the titular ape.
 * To be fair, that was probably done on purpose, as Peter Jackson stated that King Kong was the film that made him want to go into film-making, and wanted as faithful an adaptation as possible. In the 1933 film, which was about 90 minutes long, Kong wasn't first shown until 45 minutes in, about halfway through the movie.
 * Papa Silverback: If you're a Vastatosaurus, don't even think about sneaking a nibble from Kong's new surrogate child, Ann.
 * Serkis Folk: Quite literal: Andy Serkis provides both vocalizations and Motion Capture for Kong. He also plays the ship's cook.
 * Spared by the Adaptation: In the FPS video game based on the film, Hayes has a much larger role as The Lancer, and survives the events of the game. Meanwhile Preston, who survived in the film, has no significant role in the game other than getting eaten by the first V-Rex fairly early on.
 * There's also the unlockable bonus ending in which Kong survives, due to Jack and Captain Englehardt swooping in to save him in a bi-plane.
 * Stock Scream: One sailor does a Wilhelm scream during the brontosaur stampede as he is knocked off the cliff.
 * Super-Persistent Predator: The vastatosaurs. One of them spots Ann and decides to give chase -- despite having just eaten a large reptilian Komodo-dragon thing. And then two more join in. Every time they're given a chance to go for Kong instead of Ann, they go for Ann anyway. And then the last one keeps going after Kong kills the other two...
 * Possibly Justified Trope. Given the sheer amount of competition for food as a result of the...bizarre ecosystem discussed above, it's possible the eat-everything-in-sight instinct is high on the list of priorities.
 * And the raptors in the apatosaur stampede scene keep trying to get a bit of human instead of, you know, getting away from the stampede.
 * well the raptors are shown to be pretty agile, the only one that got killed(at least on-screen) was due to a human knocking it down. Also what is easier to kill, a 100-ton super-size dinosaur that can kill you with its foot, or an easy human?