Peter Jackson's Spectacular Remake of a Classic
King Kong (2005), a remake of the 1933 classic, was directed by Peter Jackson (The Lord of the Rings), and Naomi Watts takes the role played by Fay Wray in the original. The remake boasts greatly improved special effects and runs an hour and 20 minutes longer, but the story remains essentially the same. The movie won Academy Awards for sound, sound editing and visual effects.
The Pretty Actress and the Gargantuan Ape
The movie is set during the Great Depression, when money is tight and jobs are scarce. Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts), an out-of-work vaudevillian, encounters Carl Denham (Jack Black), a filmmaker who desperately needs a leading lady. Denham recruits her, and he manipulates playwright Jack Driscoll (Adrien Brody) into being his screenwriter. Soon all three of these characters take an ocean voyage into uncharted waters and end up on Skull Island, where they find many wondrous creatures, including a huge gorilla known as Kong. Ann and Kong develop a special bond, and later when the gorilla is taken back to New York, he winds up atop the Empire State Building.
Two Documentaries, Plus Extras Brought Over From the Web
On DVD, the second disc of the King Kong Two-Disc Special Edition contains almost three-and-a-half hours of bonus materials. Among these are a pair of documentaries: (1) a 28-minute look at New York City circa 1933, including the effects of the Great Depression, vaudeville and the skyscraper boom; and (2) a 17-minute faux documentary on Skull Island that treats the fictional place as if it were real, revealing information about the mysterious island's origins and its strange inhabitants. Also on the disc are the "Post Production Diaries," which are made up of 35 short segments about the movie after principal photography ended, including pick-up shooting, creation of the soundtrack, music, visual effects, color timing, premieres of the film, and the like. These segments have a total running time of a little more than two-and-a-half hours, and they have been brought over to DVD from the kongisking.net Web site.
DVD Details
The DVD edition of King Kong described here is the Two-Disc Special Edition. Disc One contains the feature film, and there is no commentary track. In fact, this disc provides nothing I'm willing to call a bonus material, although it does have a two-minute feature on shooting a car commercial. Disc Two contains the extras discussed in the preceding paragraph, plus a three-and-a-half minute intro to these supplementary materials by Peter Jackson.
In addition to the Two-Disc Special Edition of King Kong, there are a pair of single-disc editions. One of these is identical with Disc One of the Two-Disc Special Edition, which has the feature film in widescreen. The other single-disc edition has the same content, except the movie is in full frame (1.33:1). Interestingly enough, the suggested retail price for either of the single-disc editions is only a dollar less than that of the two-disc version. Below I have given the details for the Two-Disc Special Edition of the King Kong DVD.
Release Date: March 28, 2006
Number of Discs: 2
Feature Film Run Time: 3 Hours 8 Minutes
Anamorphic Widescreen (2.35:1), Color
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for Frightening Adventure Violence and Some Disturbing Images
English 5.1 Dolby Digital
English Captions for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing
Spanish Subtitles
French Subtitles
Introduction by Peter Jackson (3 min. 30 sec.)
Post Production Diaries (35 segments totaling 2 hr. 33 min.)
Skull Island: A Natural History (17 min.)
Kong's New York, 1933 (28 min.)
