Friday, December 08, 2017

Movie review - "King Kong: Skull Island" (2016) ***

I had a really good time watching this, even if it didn't quite hit the heights of Aliens it was aiming for. A mash up of King Kong and the Vietnam War is actually a great idea - all these traumatised soldiers who've just lost a big war running into a big ape.

There are a lot of characters - you could actually have cut stars Brie Larson and Tom Hiddleston out of the film. I wish they'd given Larson more to do - Kong doesn't even fall in love with her - and Hiddleston has this back story that isn't really needed.

Sam Jackson, John C Reilly and John Goodman are all a lot of fun. Moments feel undercooked (eg Reilly's relationship with the locals - wouldn't he have more of a connection? I wish one of them had been personalised). The effects and action scenes are excellent.

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