King Kong

An overall disappointment, although I really never had my hopes up in the first place.  It’s hard to get excited for a remake, where you know pretty much everything that’s going to happen.  Certainly this is an improvement over the original in every conceivable way… except one.  It’s too damn long.  Everything takes about 40% to longer to happen than it does in the original.  In some cases, this is for the benefit of additional character development.  But it’s not enough.  I still didn’t care about the characters, I was simply bored with them.  The special effects are impressive (mostly… the photographed elements didn’t blend well at all with the CGI during the brontosaurus stampede), but so what?  The story just isn’t enough to sustain a 3-hour film.

The various homages to the original film are clever, the acting is good, and the effects are convincing.  Unfortunately, it all adds up to something a little bit dull.  Rating: 7

IMDb