This new DVD release, capitalising on Peter Jackson's remake, marks the fourth time I've purchased King Kong. Was it worth it?

King Kong has a relatively simple story. A rouge movie maker named Carl Denham (Robert Armstrong) is having trouble casting a female lead for his next picture. When the usual methods for procuring an actress fail, he literally pulls a woman (Fay Wray, the original scream queen) off the street. With his cast and crew now assembled, Denham sets sail for a mysterious island, a land that time forgot. Now, normally I don't like to discuss plot that occurs after the 30 minute mark, but I'm thinking it's safe to say that on the island, they encounter dinosaurs and of course the greatest gorilla of all time. Mario wouldn't stand a chance against this Kong!

Much has been made about Jackson's King Kong taking forever to get to the island, but I think it should be pointed out that the original film takes its own sweet time before going ape. But that is the only real criticism I have of King Kong. The FX may be dated, the dialogue may be filled with 30s slang, and we may all know a giant gorilla is unlikely to actually want to grind people into the ground, but how could anyone not love this movie? In fact, if you don't, there's only one word for you: Fascist (notice, I didn't say a LOGICAL word). Some of the FX still hold up, with very innovative, groundbreaking stuff on display. People still wonder how the cave sequence was done, and always worth mentioning is the film sequence that defined what a good monster fight should be, the T-Rex battle. Rounded off with a tragic ending, the film is an unchallengeable classic.

Disc one only has a few extras on it. First is a commentary by Ray Harryhausen and Ken Ralston, with excerpts from interviews with producer, co-author, and co-director Merian C. Cooper and star Fay Wray. Wray doesn't get to say much, but Cooper's excerpts (along with the doco on disc two) should hopefully squash allegations that King Kong is a racist parable. It's just about a giant ape running amok, that's it! Harryhausen is able to provide insight into the film's FX, but his commentary is obviously less knowledgeable than the one on the Mighty Joe Young disc, given he actually worked on that film. Finishing off the disc is a collection of Cooper related trailers for the following films: King Kong, Son of Kong, Flying Down to Rio (which marked the first on screen coupling of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers), Fort Apache, 3 Godfathers, Mighty Joe Young, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, and The Searchers.

Disc two is mostly devoted to a feature length documentary which is broken into seven parts, which are: The Origins of 'King Kong;' Willis O'Brien and 'Creation;' Cameras Roll on Kong, The Eighth Wonder; A Milestone in Visual Effects; Passion, Sound and Fury; The Mystery of the Lost Spider Pit Sequence; King Kong's Legacy; and Creation Test Footage, which has commentary by Ray Harryhausen. While I did think it was overlong for one viewing, there's not a thing I would have cut. I maybe would've pulled Peter Jackson's loving attempt at reconstructing the spider pit scene out of the main doco, but it is an absolute must see for fans of Kong, and the effort that went into this is very appreciated. It just didn't sit well for me in the middle of stuff actually about the film, though it does go into a lot of detail about the FX techniques used on King Kong. If this bit were separate on the disc, I'd only be raving about how cool it is. But this IS DVD, so chapter selection makes this not-really-a-complaint almost completely moot. Disc two also has a 56-minute documentary about Merian C. Cooper, an interesting guy and the model for the Carl Denham character.