Kong!
June 28th, 2005
The trailer for Peter Jackson’s King Kong remake is online.
Admittedly, it’s difficult to discern anything from the trailer alone that makes the film seem much more than one more major Hollywood CGI-heavy action movie, but I think that in the absence of a sign that they’ve made any fundamental mistakes - a guest appearance by Jar Jar Binks, say, or a Spielberg-style disastrously misjudged ending - I think Peter Jackson has enough of a track record to earn my trust that he’ll produce something very much above average. I think I know what I’ll be seeing at the cinema the weekend before Xmas this year.
It’s interesting that this first trailer concentrates on the Skull Island part of the story; presumably they’re saving the iconic Kong-hangs-off-a-tall-building-in-New-York shot for nearer the release date. Or maybe - just maybe - they’re going to leave the money shot to our imagination until we get to see it in the film itself.
July 14th, 2005 at 12:17 pm
I think people are too ready to dismiss films that are heavy with CGI graphics. Ok, Star Wars prequels do make a fairly convincing argument that effects do not maketh the movie. However, when used to augment the storyline as Jackson did with his LOTR trilogy the results can produce a classic film that will stand for years to come. Judge a film on its merits, not on the technology used to make it. I for one think that a CGI Kong will look much more realistic than an animatronic puppet, and would allow the audience to be immersed in the story much more completely. If only we could CGI Fay Wray back into this remake we would have a perfect film.
July 14th, 2005 at 8:51 pm
I agree that Jackson has shown himself well able to use CGI effectively: I wasn’t so much criticising the CGI as I was noting that the trailer didn’t show us a lot else, thereby making it tricky to infer anything about the film’s merits.
Oh, and for what it’s worth I’d take Naomi Watts over Fay Wray (or the young Jessica Lange) any day.