Kong: Skull Island - Part 3

[Doctor Jones]

I saw this last night. I liked it, specially this part:

Spoiler

I thought the exact same thing.

 

[Arachnerd]

All the Kong sunset shots were drop-dead gorgeous.

 

[Gold Samurai]

Also glad they confirmed Kong was still young, and had more growing to do. Which would have been 40+ years ago. So time for him to get more Godzilla size for the throw down.

Enough to time to lose a sidekick and grow bitter at the world.

 

[DorkyFresh]

To be honest I think that Peter Jackson's Kong had the better fight scene with the 3 "V. Rexes". I really enjoyed this film more that Jackson's, but that scene still trumps any of this one's fights.

PJ's KK is superior in almost every way. It might not be dumb fun like this movie is, but it's definitely more inspired, well made, and it will stand the test of time better. If PJ's KK were Pacific Rim, Skull Island's equivalent would be Transformers.

 

[Wildcard]

Nah, I definitely wouldn't say Skull Island is "Transformers" in comparison because it's actually competently made, you can make out all of the action and the characters were actually likable. To be like TF would mean that all of those things mentioned would have gone in the complete opposite direction.

Peter Jackson's Kong was awesome, no doubt, but the first thing that always comes to mind when I think of it is that it's too damn long. Shouldn't have ever been a three hour venture. That alone would make me choose SI over it. Is it the better film of the two? No, but it's not awful either, it pits Kong in a new light and it manages to tell its story in a solid two hours.

 

[redhawk23]

PJ's KK is superior in almost every way. It might not be dumb fun like this movie is, but it's definitely more inspired, well made, and it will stand the test of time better. If PJ's KK were Pacific Rim, Skull Island's equivalent would be Transformers.

If anything, Kong Skull Island is directly comparable to Pacific Rim. They have many of the same strengths and weaknesses. Pacific Rim is a bit stronger thematically and by the skin of its teeth has better drama than KSI but both have similar action and operate with stock characters. Its more or less Legendary Picture's MO at this point.

Jackson's film brings a quality of acting rarely seen in this genre. Its basically a monster film as more of an Oscar type movie. Much of it collapses under its own weight though. There's a truly great movie that could have been chiseled out of that. Its kind of insane that there's an extended edition as the theatrical cut is already much akin to one of his extended editions.

 

[DaRkVeNgeanCe]

If anything, Kong Skull Island is directly comparable to Pacific Rim. They have many of the same strengths and weaknesses. Pacific Rim is a bit stronger thematically and by the skin of its teeth has better drama than KSI but both have similar action and operate with stock characters. Its more or less Legendary Picture's MO at this point.

Jackson's film brings a quality of acting rarely seen in this genre. Its basically a monster film as more of an Oscar type movie. Much of it collapses under its own weight though. There's a truly great movie that could have been chiseled out of that. Its kind of insane that there's an extended edition as the theatrical cut is already much akin to one of his extended editions.

SI doesn't have that unbearable giant block of wood known as Charlie Hunnam as it's lead, so that automatically makes it a lot better in my book.

 

[Arachnerd]

Might in the minority on this, but I actually don't like Pacific Rim that much.

The monster/robot battles, while cool at first, start to get tiring for me after a while because it's mostly always in the same setting. In a thunderstorm. Plus, I didn't really like any of the human characters apart from Ron Perlman and Idris Elba.

 

[Rowsdower!]

You're not alone; I hated Pacific Rim. I feel like that movie gets a pass because the internet still has a man crush on Del Toro despite the fact that he hasn't made a good movie since Pan's Labyrinth.

Anyway, I loved Skull Island. It was entertaining as hell and I especially appreciated all the Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now references. I thought it was better than Peter Jackson's film in every way possible too; here you had a very large principle cast and I felt like nearly ALL of them were more fleshed out than ANY characters in Jackson's film. I'm not sure what the plan is here for future installments; I know there's the whole Godzilla vs. Kong thing happening but I wouldn't mind seeing Hiddleston and Larson back for a solo Kong sequel... or another Kaiju film perhaps?

 

[Arachnerd]

After Godzilla vs Kong, it's up in the air at this point. Hopefully we get some news about where the Monsterverse is headed at Comic Con.

 

[Elayis]

You're not alone; I hated Pacific Rim. I feel like that movie gets a pass because the internet still has a man crush on Del Toro despite the fact that he hasn't made a good movie since Pan's Labyrinth.

Yep. I don't like anything about Pacific Rim except the score.

 

[DaRkVeNgeanCe]

I'm really glad I wasn't the only one that wasn't impressed with Pacific Rim. I walked out of the theater super disappointed with that one. SI really is the best big budget monster movie in a long time imo.

 

[superboy13]

I hated Pacific Rim. Long-ass Playstation cut-scene with no salvageable human characters.

 

[Quasimod0]

Didn like Pacific Rim at all. At least this Kong movie had some interesting characters. (I think it was a fun cast) Didn't think PR had any interesting characters and the dialogue was laughable.

 

[Micromind]

PJ's KK is superior in almost every way. It might not be dumb fun like this movie is, but it's definitely more inspired, well made, and it will stand the test of time better. If PJ's KK were Pacific Rim, Skull Island's equivalent would be Transformers.

I don't think Kong movie can be compared with King Kong, the story is not same neither is approach.

Still, Kong movie is lot better than Transformers or even Pacific Rim.

 

[Elayis]

I'm really glad I wasn't the only one that wasn't impressed with Pacific Rim. I walked out of the theater super disappointed with that one. SI really is the best big budget monster movie in a long time imo.

I still prefer Godzilla even though it disappointed me. It had a scope and scale to it that SI lacks.

 

[Wildcard]

I liked Pacific Rim but the criticisms against it aren't wrong; the action does get tiring and the human characters aren't all that interesting.

As for SI and Godzilla '14, I'd take SI. The problem with Gareth's film is that in some spots it sort of drags. SI doesn't ever drag (imo) and the pacing is far better. I still like the slow reveal of Godzilla, but I still wish the film had been a bit shorter in its runtime.

Plus, SI doesn't end with a hokey news title that's just utterly lame.

All in all, I'd just say that I prefer SI because not only is the action between the monsters a bit better, but the human characters don't feel like they're just there for the sake of it. I saw a lot of people saying they didn't care for Hiddelston, but personally I thought he did a great job, as did Larson, Jackson, Reilly and all of the cast, actually.

Going forth, there's a lot the MonsterVerse can learn from SI, especially when it comes to dealing with the human characters.

 

[terry78]

Jackson's Kong was almost a little too self indulgent. The mindset a lot of critics have is "it's a ****ing King Kong movie, Jesus!"

 

[Wildcard]

I imagine that was the issue a lot of people had with it. And looking back, I really didn't care for Jackson taking away the bipedal aspect of Kong and essentially making him a silverback gorilla on steroids.

I much prefer Jordan's approach to Kong and the design, for me, anyway, works so much better.

 

[JtheDreamer]

I hated Pacific Rim. Long-ass Playstation cut-scene with no salvageable human characters.

Same for Kong with the exception of John C. Reilly's character.

As for some of the Transformers comparisons going around - that movie had Spielberg behind it and is better in every way imaginable.

 

[Doctor Jones]

I thought everybody else worked. Hiddleston and Larson were the straight people that works spectacularly well. They're not getting enough credit. Those two characters were what Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard should have been more like in JW. These guys were more likable and didn't get annoying at times. They anchored the likes of Reilly and Jackson and they work in part because of those anchors. Hiddleston plays the stoic, straight laced Haggard like character very well and Larson had a nice ethos of her being a war photographer and differing perspective on violence. The scene where they see Kong face to face and where Kong eases off on the humans worked because of these reasons.

This isn't groundbreaking stuff, but in an era where we don't see them so much and where they can get annoying it was good to see ones that checked off all the marks on what they were supposed to accomplish.

 

[Wildcard]

I disagree, I still believe Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, especially the latter, were great with what they had in JW. In fact, Bryce's character had far more to work with than Pratt. He was just a straightforward "hey, look how badass I can be" archetype.

Getting back to SI, I do agree that Hiddleston and Larson aren't getting the proper credit. I've heard quite a few people say they think Hiddleston was miscast but I found him to be perfect in the role he had. He didn't try to force it and everything about the character came off as natural.

And I'll say it again, all of the characters here are certainly more enjoyable and layered than what you'll ever find in a Transformers film, whether Spielberg is behind it or not.

 

[Arachnerd]

Spielberg only had input in the first one, the rest were all Bay's creative babies.

As someone who likes those movies (minus the fourth one), I personally think Skull Island was more enjoyable. Yes, even more than the first one.

 

[Wildcard]

I used to enjoy the first two Transformers but my interest has waned and I can't find anything about them to get me to want to go back and revisit them. Not to mention a lot of the action is incoherent, even in broad daylight.

In Skull Island you can see everything that's going on. Even the night scenes are totally clear and decipherable. And even though SI has a hefty amount of action, it doesn't border on becoming tiring like with the TF films.

 

[Doctor Jones]

I disagree, I still believe Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, especially the latter, were great with what they had in JW. In fact, Bryce's character had far more to work with than Pratt. He was just a straightforward "hey, look how badass I can be" archetype.

Getting back to SI, I do agree that Hiddleston and Larson aren't getting the proper credit. I've heard quite a few people say they think Hiddleston was miscast but I found him to be perfect in the role he had. He didn't try to force it and everything about the character came off as natural.

And I'll say it again, all of the characters here are certainly more enjoyable and layered than what you'll ever find in a Transformers film, whether Spielberg is behind it or not.

I was just shocked that these two indie writers could write such cliched and obvious characters. Howard got annoying. I get it. She's an overworked business woman who doesn't remember her nephew's names and is out of touch with the real world and learns things! She gets dirty! These aren't bad ideas necessarily, I've just never seen such overly simplistic execution in a mainstream blockbuster in a long time. It was like something out of the 80's. It appears when they settled on the first ideas that came to their head and didn't decide to make it more nuanced.