King Kong (2005)

Name: King Kong

Directed by: Peter Jackson

Screenplay by: Philippa Boyens Peter Jackson Fran Walsh

Based on a Story by: Merian C. Cooper Edgar Wallace

Produced by: Jan Blenkin Carolynne Cunningham Peter Jackson Fran Walsh

Co-Producers: Philippa Boyens Eileen Moran

Associate Producer: Annette Wullems

Director of Photography: Andrew Lesnie

Production Designer: Grant Major

Film Editor: Jamie Selkirk

Music by: James Newton Howard

Costume Designer: Terry Ryan

Art Directors: Joe Bleakley Simon Bright

Supervising Art Director: Dan Hennah

Set Decorators: Simon Bright Dan Hennah

Casting by: Victoria Burrows Daniel Hubbard John Hubbard Liz Mullane

Voice Casting Director: Barbara Harris

Studio: Pixar Animation Studios

Production Company: WingNut Films

Producer/Release: Fox 2000 Pictures

Airdate: December 14, 2005

Length: 3 hours, 7 minutes, 33 seconds / 3 hours, 20 minutes, 25 minutes (Extended Version)

Budget: $207-273 million

Box Office: $550.5 million

Pixar Movie Number: 1318

King Kong is a 2005 epic monster adventure film co-written, produced, and directed by Peter Jackson. A remake of the 1933 film of the same name, the film stars Naomi Watts, Jack Black, Adrien Brody, and, through motion capture, Andy Serkis as the title character. Set in 1933, King Kong tells the story of an ambitious filmmaker who coerces his cast and hired ship crew to travel to the mysterious Skull Island. There they encounter Kong, a legendary giant gorilla, whom they capture and take to New York City.

The Whole Story
In 1933, during the Great Depression, New York City vaudeville actress Ann Darrow is hired by financially troubled filmmaker Carl Denham to star in a film with Herb, Carl's cameraman, Mike, Carl's soundman, Preston, Carl's assistant, and actor Bruce Baxter. Ann learns her favorite playwright, Jack Driscoll, is the screenwriter. As their tramp steamer, the SS Venture, journeys to the mysterious Skull Island, Ann and Jack fall in love. The people on the ship consist of Englehorn the captain and his crew, including Hayes, a World War One veteran, Lumpy the cook, Choy the janitor, and the Venture's lookout Jimmy. Captain Englehorn has second thoughts about the voyage, prompted by Lumpy and Hayes' speculation of trouble ahead.

Deep in the southern waters, the Venture receives a radio message informing Englehorn that there is a warrant for Carl's arrest due to his defiance of the studio's orders to cease production. The message instructs Englehorn to divert to Rangoon, but the ship becomes lost in fog and runs aground on the rocky shore of Skull Island. Carl and his crew explore the island and are attacked by natives, who kill Mike as well as one of the sailors. Ann screams as she is captured, and a loud roar is heard beyond a wall. After this, the matriarch of the tribe targets Ann, muttering the word "Kong". Englehorn kills one of the natives and his crew break up the attack. Back on the ship, they lighten their load to float off the rocks and carry out repairs, but Jack discovers Ann has been kidnapped and another sailor has been killed. The natives offer Ann as a sacrifice to Kong, a 25 feet (7.6 m) tall gorilla. The crew returns fully armed, but is too late as Kong takes Ann and flees into the jungle. Ann wins Kong over with juggling and dancing, and begins to grasp Kong's intelligence and capacity for emotion.

Englehorn organizes a rescue party, led by Hayes and Jack. Carl's crew, Lumpy, Choy. Jimmy (disguised in ski cap but later discovered by Hayes), and several other sailors come along. They encounter and kill a Ferrucutus ferrus. The rescue party is then caught in the middle of a pack of Venatosaurus saevidicus and the herd of Brontosaurus baxteri they are hunting, and four people are killed, including cameraman Herb. The rest of the rescue party come across a swamp where Baxter and two others leave the group. The rest cross the swamp on rafts, only to be attacked by "Scorpio-pedes", as well by a "Piranhadon", which devours three sailors. The rescue party is making their way across a fallen log over a ravine when Kong attacks. Five crewmen, including Hayes and Choy, are killed after being thrown off the log, and the rest of the crew ride the log down the ravine and land in a pit. Preston however, doesn't fall down as he is able to cling to a vine from the falling log. Kong returns to Ann and rescues her from three Vastatosaurus rex. Kong takes her to his lair in the mountains. The remaining rescue party find the pit to be full of giant insects. Lumpy is killed by the maggot-like Carnictics sordicus while two others are killed by spider-like creatures. Englehorn, Baxter and the two crewmen return, saving Jack, Jimmy, Carl, and Preston. As Jack continues searching for Ann, Carl decides to capture Kong. Jack goes to Kong's lair, inadvertently waking him and provoking a swarm of flying Terapusmordax. As Kong fights the swarm, Ann and Jack escape. They arrive at the wall with Kong pursuing them, and Ann becomes distraught by what Carl plans to do. Kong bursts through the gate and attempts to get her back, killing several sailors, but is subdued when Carl knocks him out with chloroform.

In New York City, Carl presents "Kong, the Eighth Wonder of the World" on Broadway, starring Baxter and an imprisoned Kong. Ann is played by an anonymous chorus girl, and Kong becomes enraged after realizing that the girl on stage is not Ann. After breaking free from his chrome-steel chains, he wrecks the theater and chases Jack and attempts to search for Ann as well. Kong knocks Jack out by stopping his car and flipping it, then encounters Ann again. Kong and Ann share a moment on a frozen pond in Central Park until the U.S. Army attacks. Kong climbs with Ann onto the top of the Empire State Building, where he fights off six F8C-5 Helldiver Navy planes, downing three. Kong is mortally wounded by the planes' gunfire, and gazes at Ann for the last time before dying and falling from the building. As Ann is reunited with Jack, civilians, policemen, and soldiers gather around Kong's corpse. Carl makes his way through the crowd, takes one last long look at Kong and says, "It wasn't the airplanes. It was Beauty killed the Beast."

Voice Cast

 * Naomi Watts as Ann Darrow, a struggling vaudeville actress who is desperate for work. Carl first meets her when she tries to steal an apple from a fruit stand. Further into the voyage, she falls in love with Jack and forms a special relationship with Kong.
 * Jack Black as Carl Denham, a film director who obtained the map to Skull Island. Due to his debts, Carl starts to lose his moral compass and obsesses over his film to the point that he disregards safety.
 * Adrien Brody as Jack Driscoll, a screenwriter who falls in love with Ann. He unwittingly becomes part of the voyage when, while delivering a script to Denham, he is deliberately delayed by the latter before he can get off of the Venture.
 * Thomas Kretschmann as Captain Englehorn, the German captain of the Venture. Englehorn shows a dislike for Denham, presumably because of his obsessive nature.
 * Colin Hanks as Preston, Denham's neurotic but honest personal assistant.
 * Jamie Bell as Jimmy, a naive teenager who was found on the Venture, wild and abandoned.
 * Andy Serkis as Kong (motion capture) a 25-foot (7.6 m) gorilla who is around 120–150 years old. He is the last of his species, Megaprimatus kong.
 * Serkis also plays Lumpy, the ship's cook, barber, and surgeon. A brave sailor, he warns Denham about rumors he has heard about Skull Island and Kong.
 * Evan Parke as Benjamin "Ben" Hayes, Englehorn's first mate and a mentor to Jimmy who leads Ann's rescue mission because of his army training and combat experience gained during World War I.
 * Kyle Chandler as Bruce Baxter, an actor who specialises in adventure films. He abandons Ann's rescue mission but brings Englehorn to rescue the search party from the insect pit, and is given credit for rescuing Ann during the Broadway display of Kong.
 * John Sumner as Herb, Denham's loyal cameraman.
 * Lobo Chan as Choy, Lumpy's best friend and a janitor on the Venture.
 * Craig Hall as Mike, Denham's soundman for the journey.
 * William Johnson as Manny, an elderly vaudevillian actor and colleague of Darrow.
 * Mark Hadlow as Harry, a struggling vaudevillian actor.
 * Jed Brophy and Todd Rippon appeared in the film as crew members.

Home Media Release
King Kong was released on DVD on March 28, 2006 in the United States and Canada. The three versions that came out are a single disc fullscreen, a single disc widescreen, and a two-disc Widescreen Special Edition.

A three-disc Deluxe Extended Edition was released on November 14, 2006 in the U.S., and on November 3 in Australia. Twelve minutes were reinserted into the film, and a further forty minutes presented alongside the rest of the special features. The film was spread onto the first two discs with commentary by Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens, and some featurettes on discs one and two, whilst the main special features are on disc three. Another set was released, including a WETA figurine of a bullet-ridden Kong scaling the Empire State Building, roaring at the Navy with Ann in hand. The extended film amounts to 200 total minutes.

A special HD DVD version of King Kong was part of a promotional pack for the release of the external HD DVD Drive for the Xbox 360. The pack contained the HD DVD drive, the Universal Media Remote and King Kong on HD DVD. It was also available separately as a standard HD DVD. The film's theatrical and extended cuts were released together on Blu-ray Disc on January 20, 2009. A re-release of the Blu-Ray with a new bonus disc compiling the extras from all previous editions titled the "Ultimate Edition" was released on February 7, 2017. An Ultra HD Blu-ray followed in July 2017.

Aspect Ratios

 * 2.35:1 (CinemaScope)
 * 1.85:1/1.33:1 (Full Open Matte)

Original

 * Play
 * Scenes
 * 1) Opening - New York 1933
 * 2) Vaudeville
 * 3) Theater Closed
 * 4) Denham's Screening
 * 5) "Defeat Is Always Momentary"
 * 6) A Fateful Meeting
 * 7) "A Woman Born To Play This Role"
 * 8) The Moving Picture Ship
 * 9) An Early Departure
 * 10) Jack's Quarters
 * 11) Bruce Settles In
 * 12) Jimmy's Story
 * 13) Ann Meets Jack Driscoll
 * 14) A Moustache For Bruce
 * 15) "We're Filming On An Island Now?"
 * 16) Filming A Classic Scene
 * 17) Romance on the Venture
 * 18) The Last Blank Space On The Map
 * 19) A Long Sea Voyage
 * 20) "It's In The Sub-Text"
 * 21) A Change in Course
 * 22) Skull Island
 * 23) Expedition Ashore
 * 24) The Inhabitants of Skull Island
 * 25) Ann's Abduction
 * 26) The Sacrifice
 * 27) Rescue Party
 * 28) Ceratops Attack
 * 29) The Killing Ground
 * 30) Discovering the Footprint
 * 31) Brontosaurus Stampede
 * 32) Playing Dead
 * 33) The Party Is Divided
 * 34) Ann Disarms Kong
 * 35) The Swamp Journey
 * 36) Encountering the Moa Bird
 * 37) The Log Chasm
 * 38) The T-Rex Battle
 * 39) The Insect Pit
 * 40) "Beautiful"
 * 41) Denham's Plan
 * 42) Jack Rescues Ann
 * 43) Captured
 * 44) "Eighth Wonder of the World"
 * 45) "Cry Havoc!"
 * 46) Carl Denham Presents Kong
 * 47) Kong In New York
 * 48) Reunited
 * 49) Under Attack
 * 50) The Empire State Building/End Credits
 * Languages
 * Spoken Language: English 5.1
 * Subtitles: English SDH, French and Spanish
 * Introduction by Peter Jackson

Extended

 * Play
 * Scenes
 * 1) Opening - New York 1933
 * 2) Vaudeville
 * 3) Theater Closed
 * 4) Denham's Screening
 * 5) "Defeat Is Always Momentary"
 * 6) A Fateful Meeting
 * 7) "A Woman Born To Play This Role"
 * 8) The Moving Picture Ship
 * 9) An Early Departure
 * 10) Jack's Quarters
 * 11) Bruce Settles In
 * 12) Jimmy's Story
 * 13) Ann Meets Jack Driscoll
 * 14) A Moustache For Bruce
 * 15) "We're Filming On An Island Now?"
 * 16) Filming A Classic Scene
 * 17) Romance on the Venture
 * 18) The Last Blank Space On The Map
 * 19) A Long Sea Voyage
 * 20) "It's In The Sub-Text"
 * 21) A Change in Course
 * 22) Skull Island
 * 23) Expedition Ashore
 * 24) The Inhabitants of Skull Island
 * 25) Ann's Abduction
 * 26) The Sacrifice
 * 27) Rescue Party
 * 28) Ceratops Attack
 * 29) The Killing Ground
 * 30) Discovering the Footprint
 * 31) Brontosaurus Stampede
 * 32) Playing Dead
 * 33) The Party Is Divided
 * 34) Ann Disarms Kong
 * 35) The Swamp Journey
 * 36) Encountering the Moa Bird
 * 37) The Log Chasm
 * 38) The T-Rex Battle
 * 39) The Insect Pit
 * 40) "Beautiful"
 * 41) Denham's Plan
 * 42) Jack Rescues Ann
 * 43) Captured
 * 44) "Eighth Wonder of the World"
 * 45) "Cry Havoc!"
 * 46) Carl Denham Presents Kong
 * 47) Kong In New York
 * 48) Reunited
 * 49) Under Attack
 * 50) The Empire State Building
 * 51) Kong's Last Stand
 * 52) "It Was Beauty Killed The Beast"
 * 53) End Credits
 * Languages
 * Spoken Language: English 5.1
 * Subtitles: English SDH, French and Spanish
 * Introduction by Peter Jackson

Quotes

 * King Kong (2005) Quotes

Credits

 * King Kong (2005) Credits

Other Languages

 * King Kong (2005) Other Languages

Language Dubs

 * King Kong (2005) Language Dubs

Trailers

 * King Kong (2005) Trailers