Movie Talks Archives

Posted by: wildandhairy at February 15, 2006, 9:53 am

Topic: King Kong!! WOW! (Reviews) Forum: JoBlo

If I recall, apart from Hang Em High, Ted Post also directed Magnum Force, the follow up to Dirty Harry. Magnum Force always struck me as an urban western. Post did other work but it unfortunately escapes me at the time. O'Brien's use of natural elements like water to lend credibility to his stop motion was part of why he was so good. The water I mentioned is most frequently in The Lost World. By King Kong he had better tools at his disposal, in terms of set design (plants etc.), real and faked birds flying around, etc. For example, check out the opening shot of Skull Island in the 1933 version: to make it 'real' O'Brien included water, flying birds, etc--which help distract from the possible artificiality of the wall on the island. If I recall, the biggest use of water in relation to special effects in the 1933 version was when that water loving brontosaurus upset the raft the sailors were on. Of course, brontos were vegetarians, but what the heck. One thing we always seem to forget is that before 1960 movies were made to be seen on a big screen, and that was how they were seen. I am old enough to easily remember second run movie theatres--today of course we have cable. I run the Video Room at the local sf convention here, and have shown King Kong several times, and am always pleasantly surprised at how much more one sees when the image is big. By the way, I've also shown 2001 several times because many of our members are young enough that they have only seen it on tv. It is still a fond memory that when 2001 was first due to open in New York City, I sent away for a ticket. I think it cost $6, a big amount at the time. The ticket was gold. The premiere showing was the one I attended, in a beautiful large downtown theatre. I think it was a cinerama theatre, it must have been as the film was originally released in that super wide screen process. The audience was eagerly anticipating a sf movie, which at that time meant bug eyed monsters and ray guns. The audience was dead silent throughout the film. During the intermission, they were talking in the lobby, wondering what the hell Kubrick was thinking. The early reviews were all generally poor. It was only after the film kept playing due to wonderful word of mouth that some critics revisited the film and then pandered to the public by writing it was a classic. Anyway. The Getaway was okay, a solid film, yes. Alfredo Garcia, for me Peckinpah was deliberately rubbing the audience's nose in it. Straw Dogs, terrific film, but where people probably expected poetic violence, artistic violence, what they got was boiling water thrown in their face. Liked the film, but Peckinpah seemed resolute in avoiding certain audience expectations. Good for him, but it took him away from some of what he did best. Verhoeven? Absolutely. Those first two big US films he did, Total Recall & Robocop, were truly something else, especially Robocop. His earlier European work is also interesting, though at times a bit heavy on the sexual sadism. Films like Showgirls are just plain junk. Oh well, great way to start the morning, have to do some kind of work now.

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