Written by Louie Fecou
What you have to understand about films such as Kong, is that you already probably know what it’s all about before the film begins. Even if you manage to avoid reviews, trailers and tv interviews, you still should know pretty much what Kong: Skull Island will involve. Essentially there are a group of interested parties that travel to Skull Island to encounter Kong, and the various inhabitants that reside there, ensuing in a series of scary and exciting adventures along the way. So if you go to see Kong, even with that small amount of unavoidable information, then you shouldn’t really expect anything else. In fact anything else you get, and there is a few directorial surprises, should be a bonus.
Kong is a monster movie, and the monsters they show are very well rendered. It’s a lot scarier than you may expect, and there are some nasty moments that left the younger members of the audience that I saw it with shocked and amazed. There’s a definite homage to Cannibal Holocaust in there that perhaps only me and Mark Kermode noticed, and there are nods to Vietnam movies including Platoon and Apocalypse Now, these nods to other genres, and the style and tone of the film, elevate the film for older viewers like myself, and let’s face it , this is a film aimed at a younger audience.
The cast are all there doing the “acting” thing,Samuel L Jackson is his usual un hinged villainous self, playing Preston Packard, the military mind that takes Kong on as a personal vendetta, Tom Hiddleston is our intrepid hero, but fails to convince here, good as he is, he’s just too British and never really shines, Brie Larson is the female lead and as such has to have a scene where the giant monkey falls for her and the rest of the cast go through the motions hoping their character makes it to the end of the script in case they do a Kong 2, which they will probably do if the box office hits the right targets.
The real stars are the monsters of the movie, we have giant spiders, bone headed lizards and huge wildebeests that all look great. The action sequences are well put together and like I said already, what more do you expect from this kind of film?
There’s a couple of funny lines, some nice sets and the finale is what we wanted to see. The downside of course, is I feel we’ve seen it done before, there’s no great reveals here. Although we see Kong very early on, I often felt he was underused, and deserved more screen time. It’s a romp, it has it’s moments and it’s well made, i’m not sure what else you can say about this type of movie. I won’t be returning for a second viewing any time soon, but if you have the night off and fancy a flick, you could do worse.
Rating: 5 out of 10
