King Kong (1976)

(In French, On TV, December 2005) Some childhood memories should be left alone, and the seventies remake of King Kong may be one of them. Another look at it, post 2005-King Kong, largely serves to make the Peter Jackson effort look good: The script is even more tedious than the 2005 version and the special effects really haven’t aged well at all. (Here’s a piece of trivia for you: It won the “Special Visual Effects” Oscar in early 1977. The next winner in that category, of course, would be Star Wars.) Fortunately, there are still a few good things about it: Jessica Lange (in her screen debut) still looks great thirty years later, Jeff Bridges is delightful in an early role as a shaggy photographer and the World Trade Center is prominently featured. The opening sequences have a charming feel to them as a petroleum expedition is efficiently dispatched to The Island. Things start to sour soon after, as the film grinds down to a halt to go through all of the expected plot points. King Kong himself is a disappointing man in a suit, even if said man is Special Effects legend Rick Baker. It adds up to a fine piece of seventies blockbuster entertainment: Sometime tedious, sometime earnest, occasionally fun, but certainly not something that escapes its context.

(Second Viewing, On Cable TV, April 2020) I have changed my mind. Having seen the other versions of King Kong, I go back to the 1976 one feeling as if it’s my favourite. There’s some nostalgia at play here—I recall seeing it on TV as a boy—but it’s also because it’s relatively well made. I like the mid-1970s feel, I like the techno-thrillerish approach, I like the links to the 1933 version (such as having an actress on board the exploration ship) without the endless CGI excesses of the 2005 version. I certainly like that we spend more time on Manhattan than on Skull Island. I like the gradual mystery—even if we know damn well that there’s a giant ape behind the gate. Even forty-some years and one 9/11 later, this is one of the most striking uses of the Twin Towers ever put on-screen. The plot is admittedly a bit dull, but the execution is fine. Some (but not all) of the special effects hold up—and Jessica Lange, in her first film role, is a special effect of her own. This is Kong filtered through the 1970s disaster movie lens (director John Guillermin had previously directed The Towering Inferno) and it has the kind of accidental details that anchor this film into a now-remarkable period feel. The 1976 version of King Kong is not the best, the slickest or the most innovative… but it just may be my personal favourite.