KING KONG (1976)

KING KONG (1976)

Tagline: The most exciting original motion picture event of all time.

(Horror, Thriller, Adventure) [PG]

Coast-to-coast tours, beauty, and the beast, that's a grotesque farce!

In this one, a petroleum mogul is on his way to try and find some oil on an island that is ridiculously hard to find. On the way, they run into a woman floating at sea on a small boat who has aspirations to be a great actress. Once on the island, they don’t find petroleum they can use, but they do find KING KONG and quickly devise a plan to trap KONG and bring him back to America so they can make a butt load of money. 

This was the KING KONG film I grew up with and actually always sort of disliked. One of the reasons was Dwan (played by Jessica Lang). Her character seemed like she was either on sleeping pills or drunk the entire movie. I mean, try to find a single frame where she is standing up straight on her own.  It’s not going to happen. The other thing I remember disliking is that Jack Prescott struck me as a demanding dirty hippie. Some hippies on-screen strike me as cool and fun, not this dude. He struck me as just being freakishly weird. Like he might wake up one day and be eating cat poop out of his cat’s litter box or some crap like that. 

KING KONG himself looks just okay. I actually prefer both LEGENDARY versions far more. I think the fight that KONG has is just okay, but this movie misses so much of the spirit of the first one it’s almost depressing. The finale also lacks and I wasn’t crazy about the helicopter scene overusing planes in that sequence. 

What did I like? Well, the train scene in this one was pretty cool and I did like how they captured KONG. What I still question though is where they got the resources to get him out of the pit they dug? Charles Grodin who just passed away in May of 2021 was solid in this and I have always liked him as an actor. 

That’s it. Even as a kid I just really wasn’t fond of this one and was hoping we’d get something better as time went on. LEGENDARY filled the bill with SKULL ISLAND. Yes, Peter Jackson did do a KING KONG flick, but I wasn’t in love with that either. I am sure at some point I will have a review out on that. Outside of Grodin, the acting is just way overdone and almost comical looking back. The KONG effects were okay but the score and soundtrack were solidly in the “weak” category. 

I wish I liked this one more, it’s still watchable, but definitely not one I would recommend, even KONG’s actions are really almost bizarrely sexual. I guess this can be said for the first one as well, but this one is overly weird in that way. 

For me, this is a 3 out of 7 at best. 

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