'Kong: Skull Island' Review

Image from Warner Bros.

By Darian Scalamoni

            Let’s start with this, I thought Kong: Skull Island was incredibly disappointing. When looking at the cast assembled, subject matter and next building block in Legendary’s monster universe, it looked like it was going to be a surefire home run of a blockbuster. Unfortunately, most of these elements don’t hit and the movie falls short of expectations.

            The film takes place in the 70s and you can tell that it has an influence from Apocalypse Now as the colors and look of the film pays homage to the war classic. The pure eye candy for the film is the remarkable cinematography. Throughout, the movie looks like it’s on a grand scale and when noticing the films that cinematographer, Larry Fong has worked on in the past (Batman v. Superman, Super 8, 300) it’s clear he sticks with his distinct style here and it works at its best for a massive scale monster movie revolving around the iconic gorilla. The issue with the movie is that besides for the titular Kong, the rest of the cast falls flat.

            In terms of acting caliber, it might be one of, if not, the best ensemble of the year with Tom Hiddleston and Brie Larson in the forefront as younger, rising stars but also supporting performances from veterans like John Goodman, Samuel L. Jackson and John C. Reilly can’t save the plunging script that does itself no favors. The humor embedded within the film is cringe worthy and does not work apart from Reilly, who next to the giant CGI ape is the true MVP of the film. All the monster scenes within the movie that include Kong and the other otherworldly beasts are terrific. The fight scenes are great and provide a glimpse of the power that Kong has and how he’ll look for the upcoming Godzilla vs. Kong movie set for a Summer 2020 release.

            The issue here is more of something that happens in other tentpole movies like the Transformers movies where the human characters make silly decisions and aren’t very likable. Tom Hiddleston’s character of mercenary James Conrad was a huge disappointment as he’s barely developed and kind of just thrown into the story because of his “abilities” and dashing good looks. Brie Larson is even less developed as war photographer Mason Weaver. Coming off an Oscar win, you’d think that the writers would give her character more to do but she is often in the background making reactionary faces to what’s going on around her. Other actors in the film like Thomas Mann, Jason Mitchell and Corey Hawkins are underutilized and could’ve really been played by anyone.

            The dialogue spoke by the characters is even worse than the character development though as they seem like they’ve been taken straight from a TV movie, and not one from a premium network like HBO. The tone developed by director Jordan Vogt-Roberts (The Kings of Summer) didn’t help at all either. The quick edits lead to pacing issues and frankly, take you out of the movie. It seems very often throughout that the scenes are just one after another with no pure story building even with the mythology and adding a layered style to make an interesting blockbuster that just doesn’t work as well as it should.

            Kong: Skull Island often feels like a B-movie when it should ultimately be one of the best blockbusters of the year. Unfortunately, the cheesy dialogue, conflict filled with clichés and themes that are barely developed let alone explored further make the movie less of a positive resurgence than its former monster movie back in 2014, Godzilla. Am I excited to see the two mega monsters battle? Of course, I am, but here’s hoping they develop a better script with human characters that the audience cares about.

5.9/10