Review of Kong: Skull Island (2017) by Fiddle J — 02 Dec 2017

Kong: Skull Island is the latest cut of the King Kong cloth. This time around Kong has survived the aeroplanes of the 1930s all the way through to the end of the Vietnam War in 1973. The film was directed by Jordan Vogt-Roberts, and sees a team of scientists, adventurers, and soldiers embark on a journey to unearth the mysteries of the unexplored Skull Island. As the title suggests, they encounter a great, big, angry ape called Kong.

Sweeping drama and lady love interests are not what this movie is aiming for. Instead, it's filled with bombastic action sequences, over the top characters, and a few decent laughs. Running at just shy of two hours, it's a jam-packed romp that wraps itself up fairly quickly.

The action sequences are where this film is at its strongest (if you don't count the scenes where John C. Reilly is on screen). Wide shots are used very effectively to show the kinetic energy of this film, as almost everything in shot is in some kind of motion during these sequences. There are a few great fights with some new monsters, which have some really cool designs. The monsters are big. The action is loud. It's blockbuster at its very limits. However, this film had a habit of using slow-motion in just about every action scene, and this grew on my nerves very quickly. Sometimes it was slow-mo of something interesting, other times it wasn't. It became awkward the more it happened, as though there wasn't any clear reason as to why it was being used. It was just in slow-mo because slow-mo is cool, I guess?

Skull Island is a lot of fun, but I don't think that it's quite as much fun as it wanted to be. The concept of going up against Kong during the era of the Vietnam War is enjoyably ridiculous, but the writing and pacing of this film lack the intelligence to turn an enjoyable ridiculousness into an amazing ridiculousness. It doesn't have the giddiness and self-awareness to make fun of itself, and instead turns to blockbuster action pieces, which are good, but nothing new.

The plot of Skull Island is at a bare minimum, so if you struggle to sit back and just go with the action, this probably isn't the film for you. There are characters who feel half-written and just stop being interesting half way through the film. There are strange scenes where the dialogue seems to not even flow coherently. Thankfully, John C. Reilly gives the best performance in the whole movie, and is the only one who seems to be able to balance the film's goofy and serious elements.

I had a fun time with Kong: Skull Island. That is ironically both the most and the least that I can say about it. The film is battling with itself at its core; it is very tonally upset. But, I cannot say that I was ever bored while I was watching it.