December 16, 2005

Gorillas in Banarnia

I just got back from watching Peter Jackson's Kong. Pretty good. Don't notice the 3 hours. Its great how much computer animated violence you can show to a 12 year old- as long as they are accompanied by an adult of course. At one point Kong actually bit the tongue out of a dinosaur's mouth and spit it out in slow motion. Great action throughout, spoilt by "Lord of the Rings" style "slow mo's with choirs" It was great to see the stars of Jurrasic park back in work and up to their usual tricks.

One of my favourite bloggers put her "bitchitude" into this movie a little while back. I can see her point, but I still think of the Gorilla as a Gorilla and not a black man. Especially this gorilla. The amount of facial expressions he comunicates is an artistic triumph. I always believed Golem was robed anyway, so give the Gorilla the Oscar.

In Jackson's version Kong is still the hero, and his friendship with the blonde chick is more platonic than in the slightly steamier 70's version. He's sort of a surf dude at heart who wants to chill and watch the sunset. Still a Gorilla though.

I'm more offended about Banarnia. When are we going to see a real British kid on film and not these stupid, dizzy Enid Blyton "posh twats for the American audience"?

"Oh Edmund! leth's go to Narnia! It'll be fantathtic!"

What a pile of bollox. Please don't encourage the makers of movies like these. If you are American write to your studios- DEMAND REAL ENGLISH ACTORS! Not this spiffing "blatht from the patht" with lashings of ginger beer bullshit.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Are you saying limey kids aren't like the ones in Mary Poppins? Is that what you're saying?? Because if it is, I have a big problem with it, with them, & with you

DAVE BONES said...

And "Gaw blimey guvna" Dick van Dyke isn't a limey either.

Indigobusiness said...

The latest and geatest documentary on Gigantopithecus pretty much lays to rest the nonsense about King Kong being racist.

The History Channel(R)
'GIGANTO: THE REAL KING KONG'
White Wolf Entertainment, GIGANTO: THE REAL KING KONG will use modern science and technology to probe the mystery of a giant ape named Giganto...

I'm looking forward to Kong, but I'm weary of computer razzle dazzle in films.

DAVE BONES said...

Yeah, some of it was good, some of it was obviously computa-gen. The action sequences get a bit processional if they aren't really inspired. there are some inspired ones in Kong tho.

Anonymous said...

You mean they had YANKS playing Brits?? That's ridiculous, they should have gotten Margaret Cho

Indigobusiness said...

beautifulatrocities pegged it.

I've been waiting for the western that features indians as cowboys and cowboys as indians.

DAVE BONES said...

theres one with gay cowboys aparently.

Indigobusiness said...

I figured you'd already seen that one.

Anonymous said...

Okay, I saw it too. I can't put my finger on it, but it somehow managed to be exciting & boring at the same time. And Jack Black didn't work

Anonymous said...

It had no center. I don't know why he put Jack Black in it, cuz he never turned him loose. It needed a strong personality to anchor it. Vaseline-lensed shots of the lovely Naomi Watts don't do it. He almost did it as an ensemble piece, like LOTR, which is all wrong for this film. Thus saith Beautiful Atrocities

DAVE BONES said...

Yeah the LOTR style effects didn't work for Kong. I thought Jack Black was OK except for the awful line he delivers at the end.

Exciting and boring at the same time. Like a lot of this CGI heavy stuff no?

I thought it was worth it just for the range of facial expressions on thr Gorilla.

Anonymous said...

The audience I saw it with laughed when Kong fell off the skyscraper. Bad sign. I thought Jack Black was terrible; you could hear Jackson going "Okay, now stare off into futurity for 5 minutes..." WTF? His character should have been a demented dervish, but he seemed like he was on methadone

Indigobusiness said...

Maybe 15 minutes of fame was too long in Jack Black's case?

DAVE BONES said...

None of the kids in the cinema seemed to panic about Kongs gory battles with the dinosaurs, it was the creepy-crawlies which got to them.