People get embarrassed for a myriad of different things.
Some people are ashamed for uncontrollably peeing their way through elementary school.
Some missed a three-pointer and now reminisce on what those college scouts would’ve thought if they’d made that basket.
Some have the perfect chance to get with the girl of their dreams, and instead stutter and tell the girl that they’ll pay for her cab fare home.
And some, like me, are embarrassed because they haven’t seen a particular movie yet. I call this “normal,” while my psychiatrists have a tendency to call it things like “anti-social” and “OCD.”
I’d never seen Son Of Kong before.
Son Of Kong is a sequel to 1933’s King Kong, and was released in the exact same year, meaning that someone was very, very excited by the prospect of making more money off a story of a similar giant ape.
The story of Son Of Kong seems to have been one line: “Uhhhh, another giant gorilla!” and the creators of the film stick to that story exactly. King Kong is one of those films that worked well on its own, because there are not too many other places to go with it. The plot of A) Find Giant Ape and B) Kill Giant Ape doesn’t lend itself to repeats.
Regardless of it having story that one could complete on a napkin, Son Of Kong was, for lack of a better term, delightful. Now, delightful is a word that I use if I’m describing an expensive desert or trying to prove to a lady that I know what books are, but I enjoyed this film in a warm, comfortable way, which is what I think “delightful” means. In that case, add Son Of Kong to a list including blankets, hot chocolate, not crying and more blankets.
I won’t do a straight review of this film, but I will share my thoughts on it. I was extremely excited when I bought it and I’d been waiting to see it in its complete form since I was a child.
So read these notes, I beg you.
You’re watching the wish fulfillment of a six-year-old who dreamed that the King Kong sequel from the book he read existed.
You go, six-year-old me!
And when Jacob tells you that dirt and water makes chocolate milk, that asshole is lying.
- Robert Armstrong (returning to his role as Carl Denham) was in King Kong, this film, and Mighty Joe Young. I would give him an award for “Acted In Most American Films About Large Primates (Probably),” which is an award that would rival Best Film, for the amount of prestige, and Best Foreign Language Film, because no one would care just as much.
- They reveal who gave Carl Denham the map of Skull Island in the first film, some lanky drunk named Hellstrom, which is a very awesome name. (Mental Note: Change potential son’s name to Hellstrom Son Of Kong Dockery. Mark out Robocop Zombie Dockery but leave Firestarter Robocop Dockery as a candidate.) I like that they reveal who gave Denham the map. I know that most people wouldn’t notice this detail, but it’s things like this that make me go “Damn, that’s cool” to no one in particular.
- Call me a shallow movie-goer, but if the rest of the film was about these four monkeys playing tiny instruments on stage for a disinterested tent crowd in the South Seas, I wouldn’t be completely disappointed.
- Look at the man on the left, as he pioneers a fashion style that I’d like to call “Hair Or Hat? Did You Buy The Shirt Like That?”
- Denham and his four-man lifeboat crew are surprised when the Native Chief threatens to kill them and has them look for another place to port. Yes, Denham. Your old crew helped the natives stop Kong, but only after Kong tore through the village and ate a good half of its population.
- Aww, Son of Kong is kind of cute. And his fur is all white which makes me decipher a metaphor about his good yang and his father’s evil yin, which is a metaphor that has never existed before and never will again after this sentence is over.
- To save Son of Kong from quicksand, Denham pushes over a tree. Forget Kong as the 8th Wonder Of The World. This slowly fattening, middle-aged man just ripped a jungle plant from its roots.
- CAVE BEAR.
- CAVE BEAR FIGHT.
- CAVE BEAR DEFEATED.
- I like the long scene of Denham putting that cloth on Son of Kong’s
finger, as he describes, in detail, how Father Kong was
opportunistically taken from his homeland and then slowly shot to death
on top of an iconic building.
- There’s treasure on Skull Island too? With my survival skills, I’d last on it about as long as it takes for me to say “Dinosaurs are extinct!” but this is the coolest island ever. Come on, actual biology and geography. Get on your game here.
- Son of Kong has potential, but he needs to work on power with his punches. Also, the kid has a pretty good rear naked choke. His Dad, though old, could’ve taught him a thing or two about striking tactics and how to play to your endurance advantage when you’re mat grappling.
- If movies are to be believed, then prehistoric animals went extinct because of high blood pressure. Every single one of them is pissed off for no reason.
- The book in which I first learned about Son Of Kong as a child said that Hellstrom died when the island volcanoes erupted. But he is clearly eaten by an aquatic lizard beast here. Consider my childhood ruined. Everything is a lie. There is no such thing as love.
- Carl Denham finally gets together with the leading lady at the very end of this movie. However, the love story feels kind of superfluous considering that the rest of the film is centered on treasure and an ape beating the heads in of whatever prehistoric beast comes by.
As I said, utterly delightful.
