★★½ King Kong (2005)

[Gino: 2.5, TwoShoes: 2.5, Tiny:2.0]

Gino says: "I am not going to lie to you: The visuals were stunning at times (especially Kong atop the Empire State building) and some action sequences make you a little giddy about their over-the-topness. Is Kong as rendered a painstakingly realistic ape? Yes. But in spite of Naomi Watts, did I buy the love story aspect? No I did not. Jack Black is kinda lousy in this. And Peter Jackson pulls some strange and distracting (and unnecessary) camera tricks. In the end a very competent and detailed monster movie but how far can you really go with this story?"

Tiny says: "Maybe watching this interminable movie over three nights affected my impression, but I was really disappointed. This remake offers little in the way of twists or surprises compared to the general outline of the story everyone already knows, and that makes the movie seem that much longer. The pacing was terrible. The special effects were subpar, particularly the scenes on the ship and in the ocean. (I thought Kong himself looked pretty good.) The part on the island was bizarre and very 'monster movie' in feel, with little in plot or true character development. Jack Black comes off as some evil hobbit, undersized in a world beyond his control that looks awfully like Jurassic Park, except when they are caught in the deep trench, at which point it looks awfully like Shelob's Lair from Lord of the Rings. I enjoyed the special effects during the climactic airplane attack, and suggest that if you rent this, you just watch the last half hour. The rest is crap."