I Hate: Peter Jackson’s King Kong

  The original 1930s King Kong is an hour and a half, and even that feels like it’s dragging in some places. It’s a very thin concept; a giant monkey on an island. You certainly wouldn’t have thought that it needs to be three hours. Apparently Peter ‘I’m not going to edit any of my films’ Jackson thought otherwise.
  The film lumbers along for an hour before the angry ape appears, and even then the novelty wears off after about six minutes. Then you’re left watching a swirling vortex of CGI, with very little in the way of acting, dialogue or indeed, excitement. Somehow the dinosaurs aren’t half as convincing as those in Jurassic Park, and when you’re watching a herd of Apatosaurus tumble over each other in a scene of absolutely unimaginable chaos, it’s pretty apparent that Jackson, much like an aggressive gorilla, is just flinging huge lumps of shit at you and shouting in the hope that you will be impressed.
  It doesn’t help that the choice for the lead was Jack Black, a man who thinks he can act and make music but, in fact, can do neither. He adds to the utter tedium that is the incessant screaming of the Fay Wray character, and the scenes of supposed love between her and Kong, which are bizarre, void of emotion and stop the movie stone dead.
  You could pick holes in it all day, but the overwhelming problem is that it is so, so long and so, so boring. No one cares about every inch of the island, about Jack Black’s escapades in the city, about a ridiculously lengthy ice-skating scene or about every hair on Kong’s back. Peter Jackson: learn to edit your work.

Steve Jones, Film Editor