Kong: Skull Island - Part 3

[DaRkVeNgeanCe]

The one use of the F word with the Ant line was pure gold. It got the audience for each showing I went to.

 

[Doctor Jones]

This movie just delivered on exactly what it needed to. A kick ass kaiju movie. Plus, I adored Skull Island itself. It's never been cooler with some excellent world building.

 

[moviedoors]

I've heard some people say the characters in this movie were worse than Godzilla's, like Jeremy Jahns for example.

I will never understand this criticism for the life of me.

It’s not that the characters are great in Godzilla ‘14, but they at least have a clean, unambiguous core to them. I’m not one to fetishize the military, but I prefer they’re workman-like portrayal here as efficient professionals. I like the way we see them react reasonably and to the best of their abilities. They can’t help that they’re hopelessly overmatched. The no-BS military briefings make for a sturdy vehicle with which to deliver exposition as well. This approach also avoids the tedium of inter-human conflict that Kong wades into. These characters are on the same side.

I also think Gareth Edwards knows that we have to motivate our human characters enough to keep the story moving forward, but also not to push it too far, knowing that their true function is as windows into the monster battles. As such, he doesn’t waste time with swelling music late in the film giving a character a heroic ending that feels at odds with his portrayal earlier in the film (and a seemingly unintentionally hilarious death to boot). The real star of his film is mother nature and he structures it accordingly, no awkward family reunions to close out his film, when a brief group hug will do.

I also think Edwards is just a better nuts-and-bolts filmmaker than Vogt-Roberts, his command of blocking and editing so much stronger than Vogt-Roberts, that his character scenes go down easily as opposed to grinding to a halt.

 

[Galactus123]

Did Kong's size bother anyone else? He was just too big. The plot could have been much better if he was smaller and they could have done more with him. Also it was odd that he was able to sneak close to people without anyone noticing.

 

[DaRkVeNgeanCe]

I really loved how big he was especially after revisiting Jackson's Kong recently and finding his version to be smaller than I remember.

 

[The Big G]

Did Kong's size bother anyone else? He was just too big. The plot could have been much better if he was smaller and they could have done more with him. Also it was odd that he was able to sneak close to people without anyone noticing.

Nope.

If anything he needs a montage to get bigger for his title match against the Big G

 

[KaijuDude1992]

I'll somewhat give Edwards credit for atleast knowing how to develop characters in his movies, but I still think he has major problems when it comes to making characters likable or interesting which is definitely a problem when it comes to characterization. Godzilla and Rogue One had this problem IMO, but it was a lot more glaring to me in Rogue One. Felicity Jones really brought that movie down and it's not necessarily because of her acting, but I just never found her character engaging. Outside of the Robot and Donnie Yen I honestly didn't care for anybody in that movie.

 

[Mr.?]

I'm a huge Kong fan and I thought this movie was amazing, really don't understand the complaints. All these complaints about no character development are amusing. The original Kong is one of the best movies ever made and there's no character development whatsoever. I would rank this right behind the original in the series of movies (Didn't care for Peter Jackson's Kong).

I personally don't watch monster movies for things like character development. I go to see the monster and this had plenty of Kong in it. Hopefully they show off Godzilla as much as they did Kong in the sequel.

 

[Doctor Jones]

But you need people in monster movies, otherwise you don't care about the monsters. That's the problem. You want to see the monster but you can't do a monster movie with just the monster. You don't watch Jaws just for the shark or Alien for the xenomorph. This is a modern monster movie that finally delivers on likeable and engaging characters.

 

[Mr.?]

But you need people in monster movies, otherwise you don't care about the monsters. That's the problem. You want to see the monster but you can't do a monster movie with just the monster. You don't watch Jaws just for the shark or Alien for the xenomorph. This is a modern monster movie that finally delivers on likeable and engaging characters.

I agree I enjoyed all the characters in this. Human characters are important but it seems like people really wanted to know these characters background and see them develop and I personally couldn't care less about that. They were light fun characters and theres nothing wrong with that.

 

[Doctor Jones]

The only reason we can enjoy the monsters though is because the characters are there to anchor them, otherwise the monsters are ineffective, brainless special effects. My point is, the statement of "I don't watch monster movies for things like character development" is false.

 

[Arachnerd]

It’s not that the characters are great in Godzilla ‘14, but they at least have a clean, unambiguous core to them. I’m not one to fetishize the military, but I prefer they’re workman-like portrayal here as efficient professionals. I like the way we see them react reasonably and to the best of their abilities. They can’t help that they’re hopelessly overmatched. The no-BS military briefings make for a sturdy vehicle with which to deliver exposition as well. This approach also avoids the tedium of inter-human conflict that Kong wades into. These characters are on the same side.

I also think Gareth Edwards knows that we have to motivate our human characters enough to keep the story moving forward, but also not to push it too far, knowing that their true function is as windows into the monster battles. As such, he doesn’t waste time with swelling music late in the film giving a character a heroic ending that feels at odds with his portrayal earlier in the film (and a seemingly unintentionally hilarious death to boot). The real star of his film is mother nature and he structures it accordingly, no awkward family reunions to close out his film, when a brief group hug will do.

I also think Edwards is just a better nuts-and-bolts filmmaker than Vogt-Roberts, his command of blocking and editing so much stronger than Vogt-Roberts, that his character scenes go down easily as opposed to grinding to a halt.

The problem in regards to the human characters in Godzilla is that, excluding Cranston, Watanabe and even Straithairn to a lesser extent imo, the other characters were just...boring. Ford is literally one of the blandest characters I've seen in recent cinema. There's nothing to him, he's a cardboard cut-out. We spend a good amount of time with him on the movie's second act, and that's my least favorite part of the film.

The characters motivations don't matter if the actors aren't directed well and if the writing doesn't give them any material to work with. At least with this movie, I didn't find myself nearly dozing off every time there was no monster action, because while the writing wasn't the best, the acting in Skull Island was superior to the majority of the acting in Godzilla, imo.

I will agree with you that Godzilla was a better movie on a technical and editing level, though.

 

[DaRkVeNgeanCe]

The problem in regards to the human characters in Godzilla is that, excluding Cranston, Watanabe and even Straithairn to a lesser extent imo, the other characters were just...boring. Ford is literally one of the blandest characters I've seen in recent cinema. There's nothing to him, he's a cardboard cut-out. We spend a good amount of time with him on the movie's second act, and that's my least favorite part of the film.

The characters motivations don't matter if the actors aren't directed well and if the writing doesn't give them any material to work with. At least with this movie, I didn't find myself falling asleep every time there was no monster action, because while the writing wasn't the best, the acting was superior to the majority of the acting in Godzilla, imo.

Even if he is the strong silent military type, I did find him a tad bland. I liked all of the characters in SI no matter how little developed the were. They served their purpose well. I only wish Goodman was utilized a little more. I am really glad to see a lot of people out there liking this.

 

[Mr.?]

The only reason we can enjoy the monsters though is because the characters are there to anchor them, otherwise the monsters are ineffective, brainless special effects. My point is, the argument of "I don't watch monster movies for things like character development" is false.

I see where you are coming form but to me the monster itself is the character Im invested in.

 

[Doctor Jones]

I agree a monster can be a character worth investing in but the thing is it doesn't work as well without the characters too which tend to get overlooked in making these movies.

I mean this happened with Godzilla. I loved the Godzilla stuff, but I have no interest to watch the film any time soon. But if you do, that's you I guess.

 

[Arachnerd]

Even if he is the strong silent military type, I did find him a tad bland. I liked all of the characters in SI no matter how little developed the were. They served their purpose well. I only wish Goodman was utilized a little more. I am really glad to see a lot of people out there liking this.

Thing is, I understand what they tried to do with Ford. I know there are people in the military like this. However, this is an aspect you really need to work hard to make it work, especially if this is a main character in a film, to make us care about him. Unfortunately the execution of the idea was terrible.

And yeah, I remember a lot more characters from Skull Island than Godzilla. While I thought Hiddleston and Larson were serviceable enough, John C. Reilly and Samuel L. Jackson's characters were the highlights for me.

 

[Mr.?]

I agree a monster can be a character worth investing in but the thing is it doesn't work as well without the characters too which tend to get overlooked in making these movies.

I mean this happened with Godzilla. I loved the Godzilla stuff, but I have no interest to watch the film any time soon. But if you do, that's you I guess.

I liked Godzilla when he was in it or the characters were talking about him but man, the main character really made the movie dull.

 

[JtheDreamer]

I'm a huge Kong fan and I thought this movie was amazing, really don't understand the complaints. All these complaints about no character development are amusing. The original Kong is one of the best movies ever made and there's no character development whatsoever. I would rank this right behind the original in the series of movies (Didn't care for Peter Jackson's Kong).

I personally don't watch monster movies for things like character development. I go to see the monster and this had plenty of Kong in it. Hopefully they show off Godzilla as much as they did Kong in the sequel.

No character development in Jackson's Kong? Did you watch the movie with TV off?

 

[JtheDreamer]

But you need people in monster movies, otherwise you don't care about the monsters. That's the problem. You want to see the monster but you can't do a monster movie with just the monster. You don't watch Jaws just for the shark or Alien for the xenomorph. This is a modern monster movie that finally delivers on likeable and engaging characters.

These characters were the furthest thing from engaging. That's what happens when you have a terrible screenplay with no depth.

 

[Blitzkrieg]

 

[Arachnerd]

These characters were the furthest thing from engaging. That's what happens when you have a terrible screenplay with no depth.

Subjectivity is a thing, you know.

 

[scarlet-witch]

Saw this today. I liked it quite a bit. I did care for about half of the characters, which is more than I expected to after reading a few reviews. Hiddleston was miscast though, I felt like he spent most of his time posing.

 

[JtheDreamer]

Subjectivity is a thing, you know.

Or you're just too easily engaged.

 

[TheVileOne]

Most of the characters came off like cookie cutter caricatures in Skull Island. Hiddleston and Larson are good actors, but they felt really hollow and bland to me.

The only character in Skull Island I thought was likable and genuinely interesting was John C. Reilly.

 

[terry78]

Maybe that was the point. He was the only one to get any closure.