Kong

Peter Jackson's King Kong is a favorite of mine. I actually *gasp* prefer it to the original 1933 film. The biggest criticism of the film is that it is too long. I get that. It is too long. I don't mind the length, however. I like how Jackson turned the story of the Eight Wonder into an epic. That said it can still do with a bit of trimming.

This edit, however, is not just the result of a bit of trimming. There is a lot of cutting here. I knew before I even watched this edit that I wasn't going to like this nearly as much as the theatrical version and, guess what, I didn't. I'm someone who's big on characterization, and I really appreciated the scenes in the original cut focusing on that. Well, those scenes are gone here. It's bare bones character development and, while it works, we miss out on all the subtleties of the different relationships. As such, I didn't completely buy Jack's attachment to Ann, and Ann's attachment to the titular beast.

But the story moves so fast that it doesn't really matter. While I enjoy the theatrical version much better, I'm quite fond of this version too. TMBTM turned the movie into a fun, mysterious, and rip-roaring 108 minute adventure, and that's pretty cool.

Well, this was a great edit. Nicely paced, seamlessly edited... achieved everything it set out to do. Well done.

This was a fun edit.

I enjoyed the original film immensely the first time I watched it. Sadly, it didn't have the same charm for me when I tried to re-watch it. Upon subsequent viewings, I found the film tedious and overlong.

This edit removes most of those problems. We jump straight in to the meet of the production, the characters all feel a bit more alive and, when the movie is over, I do not feel I have wasted my time.


TMBTM delivers some of the best edits I've seen, and while this one is far more straightforward than some of his other efforts, it is still a wonderful thing to behold.

August 16, 2011

Great edit. It makes this movie watchable for me now, especially as an homage to the original. As others have mentioned, this edit really shows just how superficial and bloated the PJ version is. As much as TMBTM cut, quite frankly, even more could have been cut. I could have done without one of the search party monster scenes entirely.

One thing that would have been nice to have more of is some bonding time on Skull Island with Kong and Naomi Watts. I never fully buy into their strong connection, but as a fun eye candy movie done in the style of old Hollywood I am able to suspend my disbelief. Plus Naomi Watts helps to sell it with her graceful beauty and always amazing acting performance. Because I can only imagine what lengths I might personally go to in order to be with her and keep her safe, I can almost imagine myself as the big blundering ape. This is the level at which Kong works for me. TMBTM mostly captures this feeling. At the end with the line, “No, it was beauty killed the beast,” I am left a satisfied viewer. I turn off the TV contemplatively thinking God, ain’t that the truth.

9/10

October 11, 2010

(NOTE: Forgive me, I’m blatantly copying boom23′s review style. ^_^() )

Prologue:

I’m a giant monster fan. I adore King Kong, Godzilla, and all the rest – to me, they’re awesome fun! While I loved Peter Jackson’s take on King Kong, I’ve always felt he let himself indulge too much. I mean, seriously, there’s no reason he had to take three hours to tell a story that originally took only 100 minutes! When I discovered Fanedit.org, King Kong ’05 was one of the first films I thought of taking a crack at. So, as you’d imagine, finding The Man Behind the Mask’s attempt at reigning this bad boy in caught my eye: Kong ’05, in the same runtime as the original? His intentions were great, so I decided to take a look.

The Edit:

The first problem we ran into was the beginning.

While everyone agrees that Mr. Jackson took WAY too long getting to Skull Island, I feel this edit goes in the opposite direction: we get there WAY TOO FAST. The whole first act feels rushed now: we meet Carl, we meet Ann, and they leave New York in what felt like the blink of an eye. While I had no issue with the early Jack Black scenes that were cut (and removing the lame pretext for Adrien Brody joining the expedition was a great decision), at least part of Naomi Watt’s original introduction should have been retained – as it stands, I’m left wondering why I should care at all about her when Jack Black is obviously the main character now. This problem continues onto the ship portion. Again, while many of the cuts were good (removing the slo-mo “S-K-U-L-L…” nonsense was great and totally unmissed), I felt as if some important character development was missing. I still wasn’t sure why I should care about Ann Darrow, and the romantic subplot was so subdued/subtle it was easy to miss if you weren’t looking for at. I don’t recall Jack and Ann ever actually speaking to each other on the ship at all…it makes their interest in each other seem rather forced, when the original didn’t seem nearly as awkward.

Where this edit really picks up is on the island: almost all of the changes were for the better, although considering how much of a rush we were to get to Skull Island there is a substantial lack of either Kong or the dinosaurs once we get there. While I understand wanting to remove the Vaudeville scene (great job with that, by the way), the result ended up being Kong literally sitting around doing nothing for what felt like an eternity. Also, and this probably only for me ’cause I LOVED the original version, the T-Rex fight felt a bit too short (although, you did a good job cutting it up – I didn’t notice anything missing, I just felt it). On the other hand, I LOVE what you did with the Spider Pit scene: now it’s perfect!

The best overall was probably the final New York sequence. Nothing cut was missed, the new inclusions were great, and the shorter final battle didn’t feel any different – hell, I almost forgot that it was originally much longer!

Editing: 8 out of 10 (overall good choices, but the first act feels rushed and main characters aren’t developed enough.)
Entertainment: 6 out of 10 (As bloated as PJ’s cut is, I overall enjoyed the original more – the theatrical cut is 9 out of 10 for me.)

Video:

Excellent. I didn’t notice any pixelation or artifacts.

10 out of 10

Audio:

Overall, the quality is great. A few times I noticed the score change suddenly, though it was lessen by good use of audio transitions. Not really a fault of yours, there’s only so much that can be done, right?

9 out of 10

DVD:

Nice new menu and good bonus features! ^_^

10 out of 10

FINAL RESULT: 7 out of 10

I’m sorry, but rushing the first act so much just hurt the whole film for me and seriously lessened the entertainment value. A good try and worth watching, though it’s not replacing Peter Jackson’s cut just yet.