King Kong

Timed to coincide with the DVD release!

Well, not really. An explanation is in order. The following text was the entry for January 6th in the Spanish version of this blog, which was a continuation of sorts for an entry -in Spanish- at La Hoguera de las Necedades, and it was the last thing I posted there for several weeks, even though at the end of the piece I announce a "sequel" to it.

After little over two months, I finally completed that second entry, and I felt so relieved that inmediately after posting it I translated it for this blog. But, when I was about to push the "Publish" button, I realized that I never finished translating the first part. So, here it is. And you won't have to wait two months to read the complementary text -lucky you-, since I plan to post it tomorrow. And now, without further ado, my thoughts on King Kong...

First, some background info on my first encounter with King Kong.

Details are sketchy, but as best as I can remember, King Kong (1976) was the first movie I ever saw in a movie theater. Or at least the first one that wasn't an animated feature. Back then new releases certainly took its time to get to Mexico so I'm guessing it was at some point in 1978. Memories from the movie itself elude me, and, according to some people who remembers it, that is something I should grateful about.

What I do remember is the company on which I saw it. Also I remember the movie theater. It was a big theater, unlike the two smaller ones that today are in its place. It had two stories of seats and a big screen. Two cousins and some uncles were with me and we decided to sit on the upper lever. The reason? Well, if Kong was as big as it seemed to from the posters, surely we would have a better look from upstairs. : )

A few years went by before I had the chance to see the original movie (1933), thanks to a TV channel owned by a Public University where they used, and still do, to present old movies on Saturday mornings. When I went to watch Peter Jackson's remake I did so with little recolection of this other movie. But I remembered the island, the prehistoric creatures and the fight with the Tyrannosaurus Rex (I guess every boy from my generation had, at some point, a fascination with dinosaurs), and the final scene with Kong battling the fighter planes atop the Empire State.

A few days ago I had a chance to watch again the 1933 version. It may as well be the best monster movie ever made -at least out of Japan, to avoid controversy-. But I think that a few things should be noted for the casual moviephile that could be on the lookout for it after watching Jackson's film.

This movie shouldn't be judged by today's movies standards. I'm not about to say this is because "there were simpler times" since I think that anybody who thinks about the Great Depression as "simpler times" is a moron, but the social enviroment was different and the movie industry more so. Talking movies were relatively new, and the dialogues and acting in every film from that time are evidence to it. The dialogues are too innocent, even naive, and the acting is overtly dramatic, perhaps as a clue to the theatrical background of many performers.

An important part of the film are its special effects, and one has to remember that technology was very different then and almost everything was done as handcraft. And even with all those limitations, King Kong is still considered as one of the greatest moments in the history of special effects, specially in what refers to stop motion and miniatures. In that field I have to mention Marcel Delgado, the sculptor in charge of building and animating Willis O'Brien designs. When I found out that almost nobody knew about Delgado or his work, I wrote an entry for the Wikipedia, both in English and in Spanish. Hopefully I, or others, will build upon it as time goes by.

However, there's no doubt that King Kong has a well deserved place as a classic, and in my next post I'll try to expand on my thoughts on why I think Peter Jackson's remake should share that place.