Just saw an advance showing of Kong: Skull Island. It was fun.
Without spoiling anything, I will just say it's a fun gratuitous action movie. I felt that Kong himself and the other denizens of Skull Island were well-realized. I didn't catch very many nods to earlier incarnations of Kong, but this movie seems to stand apart from any earlier King Kong continuity. It has nothing to do with the Peter Jackson version.
On the other hand, it does tie into the latest Godzilla picture and it's clear that they're setting up a franchise of TOHO style monster films. (the friend I attended this movie with said that was pretty well-known already and I'm just the last man who didn't already know that, so this may or may not be a surprise for you.)
Kong Skull Island is kind of a mash-up between a TOHO Kaiju movie and a Viet Nam War film, but it seemed to me to have trouble finding its tone. Sometimes it felt like it was trying to echo more serious war movies, but was never quite able to make it work. There are super gratuitous action moments and one particular scene that really stood out to me as being so over the top that it took me out of the movie for a bit. (I won't go into which moment yet, as I want to keep this spoiler-free). I do expect some measure of this sort of amplified action in this sort of feature, and other areas where it went over the top were less egregious... but--well--Maybe we'll talk about it after more people have seen the movie.
Also there were moments of comedy that, while actually pretty funny, kinda came out of no where. I enjoyed the laughs, but it didn't help the movie in figuring out its tone.
All that said, despite its flaws, I came out of the theater having enjoyed the movie. I'd see it again and I'd recommend it to anyone who likes big action movies that no one's inviting you to think through too hard.
--Alex
Without spoiling anything, I will just say it's a fun gratuitous action movie. I felt that Kong himself and the other denizens of Skull Island were well-realized. I didn't catch very many nods to earlier incarnations of Kong, but this movie seems to stand apart from any earlier King Kong continuity. It has nothing to do with the Peter Jackson version.
On the other hand, it does tie into the latest Godzilla picture and it's clear that they're setting up a franchise of TOHO style monster films. (the friend I attended this movie with said that was pretty well-known already and I'm just the last man who didn't already know that, so this may or may not be a surprise for you.)
Kong Skull Island is kind of a mash-up between a TOHO Kaiju movie and a Viet Nam War film, but it seemed to me to have trouble finding its tone. Sometimes it felt like it was trying to echo more serious war movies, but was never quite able to make it work. There are super gratuitous action moments and one particular scene that really stood out to me as being so over the top that it took me out of the movie for a bit. (I won't go into which moment yet, as I want to keep this spoiler-free). I do expect some measure of this sort of amplified action in this sort of feature, and other areas where it went over the top were less egregious... but--well--Maybe we'll talk about it after more people have seen the movie.
Also there were moments of comedy that, while actually pretty funny, kinda came out of no where. I enjoyed the laughs, but it didn't help the movie in figuring out its tone.
All that said, despite its flaws, I came out of the theater having enjoyed the movie. I'd see it again and I'd recommend it to anyone who likes big action movies that no one's inviting you to think through too hard.
--Alex
