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Re: "twice as long as it should have been"

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In Reply to: terrible, terrible movie. twice as long as it should have been posted by Mali on December 24, 2005 at 15:18:01:

Totally agree. This kind of excess is everywhere to be found in the film. Why there had to be 50 brontosaures when two or three would have done just fine, and produced a much more credible scene ... why there had to be two or three phases of the insect scene, and so many types, when, again, judiously picking the most effective elements and throwing out the rest would have allowed the film to move along at a much more effective pace (there's a word I'll come back to) ... why there had to be so much ado about the ship arriving at Skull Island when all Jackson had to do was get us on shore ... these are questions the new KK left MANY of us asking.
It almost seemed at times as though the teacher had left the room and the special effects cut-up went crazy ... or that, as I mentioned in an earlier post, that Jackson tried to eclipse almost every special effects blockbuster he could find, as though putting a viable new version of King Kong on the screen wasn't ambition enough. The ship scenes had to outdo Cameron's Titanic ... the dinosaurs had to outdo Spielberg's Jurassic films ... the bug scenes had to outdo Indiana Jones, and so on.
I admire this film greatly, and enjoyed much of it. Jackson has accomplished something wonderful in taking the primal Kong of the original film and turning him into some kind of architypical romanic figure, and at times, the film soars.
But Jackson's Kong is an undisciplined film by a director who saw so many trees that at times he forgot he was in the forest. And it is precisely because of this undisciplined, self-indulgent tendacy that many consider Kong "bloated," "too long", and "straining credibility." I think the most important casualty of the new Kong, to return to my earlier thought is "pacing." Pacing, the ability to tell a story in a way that the action gains momentum, in a way that is efficient and direct, something the original had in SPADES, is sorely lacking here. And I think it's THE reason that some folks are disappointed in the film.

Follow Ups:

Twice as long as it should have been and half as good. - Dalton 08:20:03 12/25/05 (4)
Ironic, too, that in such a bloated production filled with unnecessary backstories, subplots and details, the one thing I would have wanted to see - how the hell they get Kong back onto the ship and into New York - was completely left out. We spend an hour on the ship without Kong and not one minute on what would surely be a precarious trip with him aboard?
Also, what happened to the natives after the first encounter? They just disappeared? Surely, on an island with stampeding dinosaurs, insects the size of automobiles and a ferocious 25 ft ape, the natives weren't going to be driven off by a handful of men with guns for long. Should they really have abandoned their walled village (the only relative safe spot on the island) without staging a counterattack later in the film?
- Kong's ride back to NYC was conveniently left out of the original, too. - LesF 15:01:36 12/28/05 (0)
  I think Jackson was just mimicking this 'Kong-size' plot hole from the original.
- Re: Twice as long as it should have been and half as good. - halfnote 15:09:59 12/25/05 (2)
  The amazing thing is that, with the film so chock-full of diversions and self-indulgent flourishes, he managed NOT to explore the two things you mentioned.
  I didn't miss the natives, though. But I agree that getting Kong onto the ship and back to New York would have been much more worthy of exploration than the trip to and arrival at Skull Island.
  - Re: Twice as long as it should have been and half as good. - Dalton 06:57:55 12/26/05 (1)
    Perhaps Jackson realized that he better gloss over getting Kong on the ship since it was already bottomed out on the rocks and the crew had jettisoned even furniture and kitchen utensiles during a high tide in an attempt to float the ship. I suppose the crew could have found deeper water, but it would have been further from shore and they would still have the problem of floating Kong safely out to the small, damaged ship and balancing the craft to prevent capsizing when attempting to crane him aboard. I'm not saying it couldn't have been done within context of the film's fantasy premise, but it would have been more interesting to see than, say, that playwrite typing for 5 minutes. Perhaps the details will show up in a 4 hour director's cut on DVD.
    - Re: Twice as long as it should have been and half as good. - halfnote 15:39:37 12/26/05 (0)
      Good points! There are so many things that strain credulity in this film -- and ship's condition is one that I didn't realize -- that you almost have to wonder if Jackson is playing with the audience, perhaps with some intention. I haven't gotten comfortable with the notion, but it keeps coming up.

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