ALL SCI-FI Forum Index ALL SCI-FI
The place to “find your people”.
 
 FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   MemberlistMemberlist   UsergroupsUsergroups   RegisterRegister 
 ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 

Kong: Skull Island (2017)
Goto page 1, 2  Next
 
Post new topic   Reply to topic    ALL SCI-FI Forum Index -> Sci-Fi Movies from 2011 to 2020
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 7:14 pm    Post subject: Kong: Skull Island (2017) Reply with quote




As much as I may dislike that horrible version of King Kong which Peter Jackson inflicted on us, it actually looks like we're about to get a remake that's even worse! Shocked

This new atrocity doesn't just bastardize the original concept, it throws the concept right into the trash and presents us with a moronic yarn about an island with "new species" (no dinosaurs) which battle a giant ape who is so freakin' big he could KO Godzilla with one punch!

I won't try to use logic or science to argue that a creature as large as the one in this movie would be biologically impossible, but from a dramatic point of view, the damn thing just looks ridiculous! It's colossal size is a constant reminder that this is a CGI creation which can't be taken the least bit seriously!

On the other hand, the original Kong was just large enough to be frightening to the people he encounter, but not so large that he made Mount Rushmore look like a family portrait! Shocked

I suppose fans of the original film might give this new atrocity a few points for presenting a King Kong which looks a bit more like the O'Brien version, rather than an anatomically correct gorilla who walks on all fours. But to me this is just a lame attempt to lure the purist into buying tickets for this cinematic insult of a timeless classic.

If you haven't heard about the atrocious plot of this offensive film yet, here's how Wikipedia describes it.
__________________________________

In 1973, a secretive organization known as Monarch finds an island that is shrouded in mystery and identified as the origin for new species.

The resulting expedition to the island reveals that a giant monstrous ape named Kong is at the centre of a battle for dominion over the island, against the apex predators, nicknamed "Skullcrawlers", responsible for wiping out his kind.

As the expedition crew makes plans to fight for survival against Kong and the other monsters on the island, some of them begin to see that Kong is worth saving.

__________________________________

If you're still not convinced that this movie is a $190 million mistake, here's the trailer.


________________ KONG: Skull Island - trailer


__________

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Fri Aug 23, 2019 8:29 pm; edited 2 times in total
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
MetroPolly
Space Ranger


Joined: 29 Nov 2015
Posts: 188
Location: Oakland,CA

PostPosted: Thu Mar 02, 2017 7:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Oh, I have seen the trailer, and you are so right.

It's ridiculous. One part makes a teeny bit of sense (the lost pilot, that is what Reilly is playing,right?) cliched, but passable.

The rest is a mush of action and totally horrible ideas.

However, I can't agree with you on one thing. I liked the Jackson remake. I liked it quite a bit, enough to see it in the theater several times.

It may have run longer than was wise, but I still liked it.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message AIM Address
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Thu Mar 02, 2017 7:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Yep, I went to see it when it was first released, too — filled with high hopes, eager to love the movie. Very Happy

But by the time the affectionate gorilla let his blond girlfriend ride on his back while skidding across a frozen pond, I was feeling literally nauseous.

And when the devoted blond girlfriend begged the airplanes not to shoot the murderous monster who snatched helpless girls off the street and tossed them over his shoulder when he saw that they weren't his lady love . . . I almost barfed into my popcorn.

Changing King Kong from "Beauty and the Beast" to "Romeo and Juliet" completely changed what the story was supposed to be about . . . and substituted sappy nonsense that was a hideous insult to the original movie and the millions of fans who've loved it for decades.

I'm sorry, but I hate the damn thing.


________________ Ice Skating in Central Park

__________

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Tue Mar 06, 2018 11:31 am; edited 2 times in total
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
MetroPolly
Space Ranger


Joined: 29 Nov 2015
Posts: 188
Location: Oakland,CA

PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2017 8:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Granted, the skating thing was stupid. I didn't barf, but I did almost fall over laughing.

Still, I feel it was Jackson's way of paying tribute to the movie that inspired him to go into filmmaking.

Mind you, this is the only film of his I can sit through, but that's another story.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message AIM Address
mach7
Quantum Engineer


Joined: 23 Apr 2015
Posts: 333

PostPosted: Mon Mar 27, 2017 9:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I saw Skull Island a few days ago. Not bad in a creature feature kind of way. No real story to speak of and very 2 dimensional, cliched, PC characters. Very good effects and production.

Entertaining if a mindless way, but fun.

The Jackson version was ok, but as I said WAY too long and a bit too PC.

For me, the 1933 film is still the best by far. Stilted acting and all. I watched it again last week in preparation.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Eadie
Galactic Ambassador


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 1695

PostPosted: Mon Mar 27, 2017 12:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

WINNER and STILL CHAMPION the one and only

KING OF ALL KONGS


Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Krel
Guest





PostPosted: Tue Mar 28, 2017 12:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

From the previews, this movie has the same problem as the 70s version. They are attacking Kong with helicopters, which can hover! You don't have to fly within arm's reach where Kong can grab you. You can just hover a distance away, and shoot him.

David.
Back to top
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Tue Mar 28, 2017 4:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

One of my pet peeves whenever I watch action movies is the foolish way the characters break the first rule of police work.

Rule #1 - Never stand within arms length of a suspect when you're covering them with a gun. There's no need to make it easy for the suspect to knock the gun right out of your hand.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Skullislander
Solar Explorer


Joined: 13 Jul 2016
Posts: 74

PostPosted: Sat Apr 01, 2017 4:12 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have seen this new Kong film six times and I love it!

I just love the look of Kong at his increased mass-height and the story is a much-needed change from another reworking of the 1933 story.

The overall look of Skull Island looked great and new attractions like the grotesque Skullcrawlers were appreciated by me personally.

Not so struck on the Vietnam references but I can put up with it.

The climatic battle may well be my personal fave Kong fight scene.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Sat Apr 01, 2017 11:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

That's incouraging. If it's different enough from the 1933 classic, it will be easier to enjoy than the Jackson version, which retained many aspects of the original, but it changed the most import thing of all. It turned Kong into Ann Darrow's pet Teddy Bear, instead of him being a monster that terrified her.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Andrew Kidd
Planetary Explorer


Joined: 20 Feb 2016
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Wed Apr 19, 2017 9:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm glad I was able to see it for free, thanks to my points card, because I really disliked it.

Having it take place in the Seventies makes sense because it's like a cross between not just the De Laurentiis King Kong but his Orca and White Buffalo as well (with Samuel L. Jackson in the Charles Grodin/Richard Harris/Charles Bronson role) and the Amicus "lost world" movies also made in the decade (with Tom Hiddleston in the Doug McClure role).

I found myself utterly uninterested in the poorly-motivated characters as well as the story line, and it's an ugly-looking film as well, with everything being photographed and decorated in grimy, dirty shades of green. Even King Kong looks ugly, looking more like perpetually petulant moss-covered bonobo than a majestic gorilla, and the Skullcrawlers are pretty dopey-looking to my eyes, textbook examples of badly-designed and conceived movie monsters. I kept wondering what sort of circumstances would have resulted in the evolution of a land predator with that sort of skull and posture (why are its FRONT limbs the ones that remained instead of the back ones, as is the usual with non-burrowing or non-swimming tetrapods?)

I did like the giant musk-oxen looking creatures, though, which may be based on the saola.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Yahoo Messenger
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Thu Apr 20, 2017 11:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Andrew Kidd wrote:
I found myself utterly uninterested in the poorly-motivated characters as well as the storyline and it's an ugly-looking film as well, with everything being photographed and decorated in grimy, dirty shades of green.

Sounds like another example of the trend these days to photography movies with an annoying high-contrast, highly tinted look (often green or yellow).

Some TV shows even do it, like APB (All Points Bulletin), a great show I liked very much except for the photography.

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Fri May 04, 2018 2:59 pm; edited 1 time in total
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Korinaz
Senior Crewman


Joined: 26 Mar 2017
Posts: 13

PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 4:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hi guys, I was busy working on this new project called SPOKEN. I haven't post in a while. But, here is some interesting stuff you didn't know about the movie.
I hope you like it. Smile

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5mzjqa_kong-skull-island-2017_shortfilms



_________________
Movie FACTS of the day:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJZ4YMQATTjOICTtQDD-w0w
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Sat Aug 19, 2017 11:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Skullislander wrote:
The climatic battle may well be my personal fave Kong fight scene.

It was certainly a rockem' sockem' slugfest, but the battle shown below remains my favorite.



_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Bud Brewster
Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)


Joined: 14 Dec 2013
Posts: 17018
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Fri May 04, 2018 6:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Well, unlike stubborn people like a certain politician I could name, I do admit when I'm wrong.

My feeling is that when you spout off opinions about a movie which all turn out to be wrong — especially when the opinions were voiced before you've even SEEN the movie — the only way to redeem yourself is to own up to the mistakes and correct the record! Shocked

For example . . . I now realize that Kong: Skull Island was described accurately above by the members who made these statements.

"Very good effects and production. Entertaining if in a mindless way, but fun."
~ Mach7

"I have seen this new Kong film six times and I love it! The overall look of Skull Island looked great and new attractions like the grotesque Skullcrawlers were appreciated by me personally."
~Skujllislander

Any other truly enthusiastic posts that our members might have made on this thread were probably discouraged by my initial Scrooge-like rant, so maybe this new post (with new opinions) might rectify that.

First of all, setting the story right at the end of the Vietnam war worked for me because I was honorably discharged from the Air Force in 1971, so I have nostalgic feelings for that era and the rock music we hear in a few scenes.

I still have dozens of the albums from that period. And I was stationed in South Korea, which gave me a taste of the Asian culture . . . without getting me killed or screwed up by PTSD.

The basic premise of the story has a science fiction element I really have to tip my hat too. Skull Island's strange nature and complete isolation are given a clever explanation. I'm not sure why the "permanent storm" existed around the island, but the presence of all the monster is explained by a variation on Edgar Rice Burroughs' Pellucidar concept — a "hollow earth" which contains an ecosystem with huge prehistoric creatures.

_____________

Kong is given a more complex and interesting character than Peter Jackson's ridiculous "love-sick gorilla who takes his girlfriend to the park to go ice skating".

In this film, Kong has an instinctive need to guard our world from the beast who come from his own subterranean realm. The characters in the story are a nice mixture of the good, the bad, and the in-betweeners we really don't mind seeing killed in graphic scenes. Rolling Eyes

When I first saw this movie a few months ago I didn't realize that the hero is Loki from Thor (Tom Hiddleston), looking very normal and handsome and heroic and totally bad-ass with a semi-automatic weapon, instead of a powerful scepter-thingie which zaps Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. Very Happy





Brie Larson is an admirable heroine, a war correspondent and dedicated combat photographer who never once screams in the Fay Wray tradition, which was a nice change of pace.



The "skullcrawlers" which I criticized in my original posts for not being traditional dinosaurs are suitably creepy for this unusual yarn, and they serve the story well.

The two examples of concept art below are damned impressive.





Kong himself manages to convince us that he's the real hero of story, and because of this I'm tempted to buy the Blu-ray of this movie.



The story gives us an exciting adventure involving a group of people trying to survive on Skull Island, very much like the great 1933 original. In that sense, this new version of the Kong legend does indeed capture the spirit of the original — right down to a giant spider scene!

My biggest complaints about the film are the way Samuel Jackson's character is so maniacal and self-destructive that I just end up hoping he'd get his death wish, and the way John Goodman's character never manages to make us like him enough to be upset when something really bad happens to him (if you know what I mean . . . )

In conclusion, Kong: Skull Island owes a debt of gratitude to Peter Jackson's version for showing us a better way to pay tribute to a classic, a way that gave us a brand new story that was GOOD, instead of a rehashed story that repeatedly slapped the original in face. Sad

_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Sun Jul 08, 2018 7:27 pm; edited 3 times in total
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Post new topic   Reply to topic    ALL SCI-FI Forum Index -> Sci-Fi Movies from 2011 to 2020 All times are GMT - 5 Hours
Goto page 1, 2  Next
Page 1 of 2

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group