King Kong (2005)

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King Kong films
King Kong Lives
King Kong (2005)
Kong: Skull Island
King Kong
King Kong (2005 film)
Directed by Peter Jackson
Producer Jan Blenkin, Carolynne Cunningham, Fran Walsh, Peter Jackson
Written by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens,
Peter Jackson
Music by James Newton Howard
Distributor Universal Pictures
Rating PG-13
Budget $207,000,000[1]
Box office $550,517,357[1]
Running time 187 minutes
(3 hours and 7 minutes; theatrical)
200 minutes
(3 hours and 20 minutes; extended)
Aspect ratio 2.35:1
Rate this film!
4.59
(68 votes)

King Kong is a 2005 American giant monster film produced by Universal Pictures, and a remake of the 1933 film of the same name. It was released to theaters on December 14, 2005.

The second remake of King Kong, Peter Jackson's 2005 version returns to the 1933 setting of the original and brings back many of the original characters. Once again, film director Carl Denham leads an expedition to the uncharted Skull Island in order to film his latest picture, but he and his crew get more than they bargained for when the natives kidnap the leading lady Ann Darrow and sacrifice her to their giant ape god Kong. Writer Jack Driscoll heads a rescue mission into the jungle, where the crew are faced with all manner of horrors from the prehistoric age. Ann meanwhile begins to empathize with Kong after the huge ape reveals his gentler side and protects her from the more malevolent denizens of the island. When Jack finally rescues Ann, Denham captures Kong and brings him to New York City to be displayed on Broadway. After Kong escapes and captures Ann once more, it leads to a recreation of the iconic climactic duel between Kong and the airplanes atop the Empire State Building.

Plot

In 1933 New York City at the height of the Great Depression, after a joyous performance vaudeville actress Ann Darrow returns to work in the morning to find the theater closed. Her stage partner Manny tells her to try out for a part in a play she had been eyeing, only for her to find that it had already been cast. The producer sent her to a burlesque theater out of pity, while elsewhere, director Carl Denham sits with another group of bored producers before pitching to them the idea of following a map he had received to an uncharted island to film there instead. However, they are less than thrilled at the prospect of wasting more money on him, and agree to scrap the picture for stock footage. Unwilling to see his art go to waste, Denham grabs his assistant Preston and makes preparations to leave immediately for Skull Island. Preston then informs them that their lead actress had pulled out of the film, and Denham leaves to find a new girl. While examining posters outside a burlesque theater, he spies Darrow reflected in the glass door, and goes after her when she turns away. Ann then tries to steal an apple only to be caught and have Denham buy her out of it before taking her to dinner to propose that she join him. She is interested but declines before learning that Driscoll is writing the screenplay, and accompanies Denham to the docks where the Venture is waiting. There, Preston informs him that police are coming to arrest them. Denham then bribes Captain Englehorn to start getting the ship ready to cast off. The director then went to see the writer Jack Driscoll who handed in an incomplete script. Denham then stalled to get him to stay on board as the ship pulled out of the harbor right when the police arrived.

As the ship makes its way out, Driscoll settles in and gets to know Ann over the course of filming. However, when the crew learns that they are not headed for Singapore as they had been lead to believe, Benjamin Hayes, Lumpy, and Jimmy warn him not to try to find Skull Island based on accounts from a mad castaway from seven years before. That night, Jack shows Ann a stage comedy he had started writing and the two share a passionate kiss before Englehorn receives a telegraph and begins to turn the ship around. Denham barges in to try to stop them, but Englehorn refuses and prepares to divert to Rangoon as the telegraph had ordered to turn Denham over to the authorities. However, with their navigational equipment malfunctioning, the entire crew begins to see that they are entering a thick fog. The ship is quickly scuttled on a hidden carving, and Denham spots the giant wall, knowing he had reached his destination. In the morning Denham takes his crew to the coast, and they discover an abandoned city, which turns out to be home to a civilization living in the ruins. Things quickly turn hostile and they lose two men before Englehorn and the sailors arrive with guns to save them.

Englehorn then orders the crew to lighten the ship and throw everything overboard and Jack wakes up after being clubbed in the head on the island. He discovers the necklace of the man who had struck him and goes to find Ann, only to find dead sailors and a ransacked cabin. He quickly informs Englehorn that she had been taken, and the captain quickly takes the crew ashore to rescue her. Ann, however had already been lowered over the other side of the wall, where chants and drums attracted the beast god Kong, who grabs her and takes her into the jungle as the sailors arrive. They enter the jungle and after hearing Ann scream they arrive at a boneyard, where they find a path of destruction left from the ape’s journey, and begin to follow the trail. After trekking through the swampy jungle, the group takes a five minute rest in a narrow valley, where a pack of Venatosaurus spook a herd of grazing Brontosaurus, who begin to stampede toward the rescue party. Most of the party manages to escape being trampled or eaten, and climb a steep ledge before continuing the journey. Elsewhere, Ann attempted to escape Kong while he stopped for rest, but he quickly found her and was enraged until she began to perform her vaudeville routine to his apparent amusement. However, when she refuses to continue performing, Kong becomes confused and angry, but leaves her there.

The remaining sailors come to a log bridging a deep crevice, and Hayes goes across before ordering them all back to the other side before Kong emerges from the tunnel at the other side before killing him. He then shakes the sailors off the log and into the pit below as Ann hears the gunshots and runs toward them only to come face to face with a Foetodon that is quickly eaten by a Vastatosaurus rex. The saurian gives chase, and just when she thinks she has escaped only to be faced with its mother. She screams, and Kong comes to rescue her. He wrestles with the two beasts, only for a third to enter the fray. He is able to smash the youngest’s head with a rock before wrestling the other two over a cliff, where they become entangled in vines. There he manages to kill one, but falls to the valley floor where he has a bloody battle with the last one remaining before taking Ann and moving on.

Jack awakes at the bottom of the pit and barely has time to check for other survivors before the monstrous bugs begin to make their move. Most of the sailors die, including Lumpy who is eaten by Carnictis trying to defend Choy’s body. However, when they find themselves cornered by encroaching Arachno-claws. However, Englehorn and Baxter return and rescue them. Jack alone ventures on, while Denham convinces Englehorn to try and capture Kong. He arrives at the beast’s lair under cover of night, and finds Ann asleep in Kong’s hand. As he tries to rescue her, the god awakes and furiously tries to smash Jack, but is distracted by a horde of Terapusmordax long enough for the humans to escape.

When they arrive at the gate, they discover the drawbridge is up, and they cannot cross. With Kong quickly catching up to them, Preston lowers the bridge against Denham’s orders and the two are able to get to safety, with Kong pounding on the massive gates behind them. When the ape breaks through, Englehorn gives the order for the attack to commence. The sailors drag him down with grappling hooks, and break a bottle of chloroform gas under his face. Ann protests the attack, and Englehorn tells Jack to take her away, but when the beast sees her leaving, he breaks free of the netting and gives chase.

He reaches the rocky coast as the crew are starting to row away and he smashes one of them when Jimmy shoots at him, causing Englehorn to shoot his leg with a harpoon, allowing Carl to smash a chloroform bottle on his face before vowing to bring him to Broadway as “Kong: The Eighth Wonder of the World”.

After returning to New York, Jack and Ann lose contact, and Kong is put up on Broadway. Jack goes to find her at the Alhambra theater where Kong is playing, but finds another actress playing her role. However, an overconfident Denham allowing flash photography to further distress Kong in the wake of discovering the fake Darrow causes him to break free of his bonds. On seeing Driscoll in the crowd, Kong immediately begins to chase him down. He finally smashes the cab and roars in triumph before Ann walks up to him, and the two enjoy a moment of peace in Central Park before the military forces him out. He leaps over the rooftops before finding the Empire State Building and beginning to climb up. At the base of the mooring mast, the two admire the rising sun before six Biplanes arrive, and Kong climbs to the very top, where he is shot at and swipes at the planes while Ann tries to climb up to get to him. Kong saves her life again by catching her when a ladder pulls away from the building. He sets her in the observation deck, and she climbs up to him, and they share a short moment together before Kong takes a row of bullets in the back and touches her face before falling dead from the top of the tower before Jack arrives to comfort her. Down on the street, photographers swarm around Kong’s body with one proclaiming that the airplanes had killed him. Denham then breaks the crowd to proclaim that “beauty killed the beast”.

Extended Cut

A short way into the jungle, the rescue party becomes spooked and fires wildly into the darkness only to cease at Hayes’ order. The mate then lights a flare and a Ferrucutus comes charging out of the brush. Wounded and wild, the beast flails about in an attempt to defend itself until Hayes is able to kill it with a volley of shots to its head.

After escaping the Brontosaurus stampede, Bruce Baxter and a few sailors return to the village, but those remaining tie logs together into makeshift rafts which they paddle across a swamp. Midway across, they are attacked by several Scorpio-pedes, but they all quickly retreat. The crew sits in silence for a moment before their rafts are rocked by a Piranhadon from under the water’s surface. It destroys the first raft, sending sailors spilling into the swamp. They frantically try to escape, and Carl shoots at the creature as it swims beneath them, breaking the raft. Many of the sailors make it to shore, but the Piranhadon eats the slowest sailor before returning to the depths.

As the crew continues through the jungle after the Piranhadon attack, Jack pauses to listen to movement in the jungle. Lumpy however becomes frightened and shoots toward the sound. Fearing he had shot Ann, Jack rushes through the brush to find a fallen Brutornis. Lumpy puts the creature out of its misery before they continue on.

Just before climbing out of the pit, Jimmy went to where Hayes was lying dead. He picked up Hayes' fallen cap and brushed it off before putting it on and moving to climb out of the chasm. While luring Kong out of the city in a taxi, Jack cuts down an alley, which Kong is able to chase him through.

Staff

Staff role on the left, staff member's name on the right.

  • Directed by   Peter Jackson
  • Written by   Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson
  • Based on a Story by   Merian C. Cooper, Edgar Wallace
  • Produced by   Jan Blenkin, Carolynne Cunningham, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh
  • Music by   James Newton Howard
  • Cinematography by   Andrew Lesnie
  • Edited by   Jamie Selkirk
  • Production Design by   Grant Major

Cast

Actor's name on the left, character played on the right.

Appearances

Monsters


Weapons, vehicles, and races


Release

The marketing campaign for King Kong started in full swing on June 27, 2005, when the teaser trailer made its debut, first online at the official Volkswagen website at 8:45 p.m. EST, then 8:55 p.m. EST across media outlets owned by NBC Universal (the parent of Universal Studios), including NBC, Bravo!, CNBC and MSNBC. That trailer appeared in theatres attached to War of the Worlds, which opened on June 29.

Jackson also regularly published a series of 'Production Diaries', which chronicled the making of the film. The diaries started shortly after the DVD release of The Return of the King as a way to give Jackson's The Lord of the Rings fans a glimpse of his next project. These diaries are edited into broadband-friendly instalments of three or four minutes each. They consist of features that would normally be seen in a making-of documentary: a tour of the set, a roving camera introducing key players behind the scene, a peek inside the sound booth during last-minute dubbing, or Andy Serkis doing his ape movements in a motion capture studio. The production diaries were released on DVD on December 13, 2005, one day before the U.S. release of the film. This was one of the first occasions in which material that would normally be considered supplementary to the DVD release of a film, was not only released separately, but done so in a prestige format; the Production Diaries came packaged in a box with a set of prints and a replica 1930s-era clipboard.It is also the first time such material was published prior to the release of the film.

Merchandising

A novelization of the movie and a prequel novel entitled King Kong: The Island of the Skull were written. A multi-platform video game entitled Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie was released, which featured an alternate ending. There was a hardback book entitled The World of Kong, featuring artwork from Weta Workshop to describe the fictional bestiary in the film. A number of spin-offs from the remake's franchise include books, novels, comics and video games.

Gallery

Main article: King Kong (2005 film)/Gallery.

Videos

Trailers

King Kong Trailer #1
King Kong Trailer #2
King Kong TV Spot - "Warrior"
King Kong TV Spot - "Epic"
King Kong TV Spot - "Tremble"
King Kong TV Spot - "Rolling Stone"
King Kong TV Spot - "Alone"
King Kong TV Spot - "King"
King Kong TV Spot - "Unknown" (30 seconds)
King Kong TV Spot - "Unknown" (60 seconds)

Clips

"Human Sacrifice" clip
"Dinosaur Stampede" clip
"Kong Battles the V-Rexes" clip
"Kong Rescues Ann" clip
"Giant Bugs Attack" clip
"Kong's Rampage" clip
"Ice Skating in Central Park" clip
"Climbing the Empire State Building" clip
"Kong Battles the Airplanes" clip
"The Fall of Kong" clip

Video releases

Universal DVD (2006)

  • Region: Various
  • Discs: 1 or 2
  • Audio: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1)
  • Special Features: Post Production Featurettes (150 minutes), Skull Island: A Natural History documentary (15 minutes), Kong's New York (28 minutes), behind the scenes footage of the Volkswagen tie-in ad (3 minutes)
  • Notes: The single-disc version only has the behind-the-scenes Volkswagen footage as a special feature.

Universal DVD (2006) [200-Minute Extended Cut]

  • Region: Various
  • Discs: 3
  • Audio: English (DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1), Spanish (DTS 5.1), French (DTS 5.1)
  • Special Features: Audio commentary by Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens, 16 deleted/extended scenes (40 minutes), blooper reel, Production Diary #59 (8 minutes), A Night In Vaudeville featurette (on the casting and filming of the vaudeville scenes), King Kong Homage featurette (guide to references in the film), Pre-Visualization Animatics featurette, "The Present" short film (made for Peter Jackson's birthday and starring most of the film's main cast), trailers, Weta Collectables featurette, scripts for the 1996 and 2005 versions of the film (for PC viewing), Recreating the Eighth Wonder (3-hour documentary on the making of the film), Conceptual Design Video Galleries (41 minutes)

Universal Blu-ray (2009)

  • Region: Various
  • Discs: 1
  • Audio: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1)
  • Special Features: Audio commentary by Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens, picture-in-picture cast and crew interviews, concept art galleries
  • Notes: Includes both the theatrical and extended cuts. All special features can only be accessed while playing the extended cut. Some versions are packaged with a DVD and digital copy of the film.

Universal Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD (2017) [Ultimate Edition]

  • Region: A/1
  • Discs: 3
  • Audio: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), English (DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1), French (DTS 5.1), Spanish (DTS 5.1)
  • Special Features: 2006 Introductions by Peter Jackson, Recreating the Eigth Wonder: The Making of King Kong eight-part feature, Production Diaries, Post Production Diaries, Deleted Scenes, Gag Reel, The Making of a Shot: The T-Rex Fight Featurette, Skull Island: A Natural History mockumentary, Kong's New York 1938 featurette, A Night In Vaudeville featurette, King Kong Homage featurette, Pre-Visualization Anmatics, Conceptual Design Video Galleries, "The Present" featurette, WETA Collectibles, and Trailer. It also includes the Special Features on the 2009 release.[2]
  • Notes: Includes both the theatrical and extended cuts.

Trivia

  • Director Peter Jackson originally wanted actress Fay Wray, who played Ann Darrow in the original 1933 King Kong, to make a cameo at the end of the film and deliver the iconic line "It was beauty killed the beast." However, Wray passed away before filming, and the line was delivered by the character of Carl Denham instead, as in the original film. According to Victoria Riskin, Wray's daughter, her mother had already previously declined to appear as she wanted to keep the original film and the 2005 remake separate.[3]
  • The scene where Denham and Preston are discussing possible replacements for the actress who dropped out of their film references both Fay Wray and King Kong creator/director/producer Merian C. Cooper:
Preston: “You'll never get [Mae West] into a size four. You gotta get a girl that'll fit into Maureen's costumes.
Denham: “Fay's a size four.
Preston: “Yes, she is, but she's doing a picture with RKO.
Denham: “(darkly) Cooper, huh? I might have known.
― Preston and Denham referencing Fay Wray and Merian C. Cooper
Since the film King Kong would not exist in this universe, Preston could be talking about The Most Dangerous Game, a 1932 film produced by Cooper and starring Wray. To add further layers to the references, sets from The Most Dangerous Game were reused in King Kong, Denham's original character is widely accepted to have been based on Cooper himself, and Max Steiner's three-note Kong motif from the original film plays on the soundtrack.
  • A cage in the Venture's cargo hold is labelled "Sumatran Rat Monkey, beware the bite." This is a reference to a creature from Peter Jackson's 1992 film Dead Alive which hails from Skull Island and causes a zombie outbreak through its bite.
  • At the time of its release, King Kong set a record for number of visual effects shots, with around 2,400.
  • Pocket Star released a prequel novel by Matt Costello, King Kong: The Island of the Skull, three months before the film. The novelization of the film itself was written by Christopher Golden.
  • Both director Peter Jackson and veteran special effects technician Rick Baker make cameos as a gunner and pilot respectively of one of the fighter planes that attacks Kong at the end of the film, their plane in paticular being the one that kills the great ape. Jackson said that the reason Baker wanted to be in the film was because Baker thought it would be appropriate to be the pilot who finally shoots down Kong given his experience portraying Kong in the 1976 film. Director Frank Darabont, who would later serve as a script doctor for Legendary Pictures' Godzilla, also cameos as another plane gunner.[4][5] Jackson's role is a reference to directors Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack having played a fighter pilot and gunner, respectively, during the climax of the original 1933 film.
  • The dialogue in Denham's movie, as acted out by Ann and Bruce aboard the Venture, is taken verbatim from a conversation between Ann and Jack in the original King Kong.
  • During Kong's Broadway debut, the costumes worn by the actors portraying Skull Islanders are identical to those worn by the actual Skull Islanders in the original King Kong. In addition, the music that plays during this scene is taken from Max Steiner's score for the original film.
  • In 2010, one of the dinosaur miniatures created for the film was auctioned off at the Shanghai International Film Prototype Exhibition charity auction. Famous film Hong Kong film actor Jackie Chan won the bid for the dinosaur with his bid being reportedly ¥500,000 ($100,000).[6]
  • One of the Venture sailors emits a Wilhelm scream when a Brontosaurus knocks him off a cliff. King Kong is one of many Peter Jackson films to feature this famous sound effect.

External links

References

This is a list of references for King Kong (2005 film). These citations are used to identify the reliable sources on which this article is based. These references appear inside articles in the form of superscript numbers, which look like this: [1]

  1. 1.0 1.1 "King Kong (2005)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 18 August 2019.
  2. [1]
  3. Keck, William (18 December 2005). "Keeping the big ape film in the family". USATODAY.com. Retrieved 18 August 2019.
  4. Wloszczyna, Susan (15 December 2005). "'King Kong' abounds with fun facts for fanboys". USATODAY.com. Retrieved 18 August 2019.
  5. Fordham, Joe. (January 2006) Return of the King. Cinefex, 104, p. 123
  6. Barclay, Keith (11 August 2010). "Hong Kong Festival 2010: opens tomorrow, selling well". SCREENZ.

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