So what can I say about this film. Well I will say it's a well written story and the acting is great. It takes itself very seriously and plays well as a psychotic dramatic thriller.
CHARACTERS - Michael Gough is great in the role of Doctor Decker. You can see allot of his mind playing around. You're really interested in him at first with his ideas and plans. But as the film progresses and obstacles start to bump him around, you start to miss judge him and he ultimately becomes a villain and a complete creep. He's married and hits on his college students. EW! Margret is a great character too and you see her struggles with what she has to deal with. The Rest of the cast, bland, aside from Bob and Sandra. Sandra is very innocent, not taking a hint that Decker is putting the moves on her. Kind of dumb. Bob, though bland has his struggles and is not dumb. He sees what Decker is up to and does what a boyfriend would do, get jealous AND COMPLETELY OBSESSIVE. There's a scene where he confronts Decker and he goes all Gollum on him.
KONGA - Even though the film is good in its characters and plot, what kills it is Konga itself. First of all, the fact that he becomes a giant Kong figure at the end, though a cool idea, does become out of place. 2nd and most of all, the suit. It's very standard issue for the time and looks awful, but I have seen worse. It looks nothing like a gorilla nor a chimp from the neck down. Plus the animatronic head is really creepy at times, like something out of chuck e cheese. Then there is the actor in the suit, he doesn't act for noting. In his rampage the actor just walks extremely lazy, it's like he doesn't care. Then in close up its like they dragged him off the street, put the suit on him and he looks left and right like "What is going on?" This is what killed the movie for me.
EFFECTS - The effects aren't really that good either. As I said, the suit is bad, but it's also other effects as well, especially with green screen and composting. You can tell that they filmed scenes on green screen and sometimes they don't even bother putting in the background. Like these shots, they couldn't afford a giant hand, but instead wrap the ape suit around the actors. It's even obvious that they could not afford a green screen, but instead, paint a bright green brick wall and use it as a green screen. This is probably why the composting shots look really bad.
TRIVIA - Apparently, C-Movie Exploitation film producer Herman Cohen had long admired the original King Kong he thought of the idea of a remake shot in color would bring big bucks. But RKO refused a remake so Cohen paid $25,000 for the rights to the name of Kong for exploitation purposes as long as he re framed from the source material. Also the special effects for the film that was one of the first giant monster movies shot in color took 18 months to complete. But who cares, the effects sucked.
VERDICT - To sum it up, it is a B-Movie that takes itself way too seriously, maybe too well that were invested in the characters in my opinion. But then the effects come in a kill it. So I will say it's a watch once movie.
CHARACTERS - Michael Gough is great in the role of Doctor Decker. You can see allot of his mind playing around. You're really interested in him at first with his ideas and plans. But as the film progresses and obstacles start to bump him around, you start to miss judge him and he ultimately becomes a villain and a complete creep. He's married and hits on his college students. EW! Margret is a great character too and you see her struggles with what she has to deal with. The Rest of the cast, bland, aside from Bob and Sandra. Sandra is very innocent, not taking a hint that Decker is putting the moves on her. Kind of dumb. Bob, though bland has his struggles and is not dumb. He sees what Decker is up to and does what a boyfriend would do, get jealous AND COMPLETELY OBSESSIVE. There's a scene where he confronts Decker and he goes all Gollum on him.
KONGA - Even though the film is good in its characters and plot, what kills it is Konga itself. First of all, the fact that he becomes a giant Kong figure at the end, though a cool idea, does become out of place. 2nd and most of all, the suit. It's very standard issue for the time and looks awful, but I have seen worse. It looks nothing like a gorilla nor a chimp from the neck down. Plus the animatronic head is really creepy at times, like something out of chuck e cheese. Then there is the actor in the suit, he doesn't act for noting. In his rampage the actor just walks extremely lazy, it's like he doesn't care. Then in close up its like they dragged him off the street, put the suit on him and he looks left and right like "What is going on?" This is what killed the movie for me.
EFFECTS - The effects aren't really that good either. As I said, the suit is bad, but it's also other effects as well, especially with green screen and composting. You can tell that they filmed scenes on green screen and sometimes they don't even bother putting in the background. Like these shots, they couldn't afford a giant hand, but instead wrap the ape suit around the actors. It's even obvious that they could not afford a green screen, but instead, paint a bright green brick wall and use it as a green screen. This is probably why the composting shots look really bad.
TRIVIA - Apparently, C-Movie Exploitation film producer Herman Cohen had long admired the original King Kong he thought of the idea of a remake shot in color would bring big bucks. But RKO refused a remake so Cohen paid $25,000 for the rights to the name of Kong for exploitation purposes as long as he re framed from the source material. Also the special effects for the film that was one of the first giant monster movies shot in color took 18 months to complete. But who cares, the effects sucked.
VERDICT - To sum it up, it is a B-Movie that takes itself way too seriously, maybe too well that were invested in the characters in my opinion. But then the effects come in a kill it. So I will say it's a watch once movie.