King Kong (1933 film)

King Kong
Image:Kingkongposter.jpg
Directed by	Merian C. Cooper Ernest B. Schoedsack
Produced by	Merian C. Cooper Ernest B. Schoedsack David O. Selznick (executive producer)
Written by	Merian C. Cooper (story) Edgar Wallace (story) James Ashmore Creelman (screenplay) Ruth Rose (screenplay)
Starring	Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, Bruce Cabot
Music by	Max Steiner
Cinematography	Eddie Linden J.O. Taylor Vernon Walker
Distributed by	RKO Radio Pictures, Inc.
Release date(s)	March 2, 1933 (U.S. release)
Running time	104 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Followed by	The Son of Kong
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This is about the original movie and novel. For other uses and adaptations see King Kong.

King Kong is a landmark 1933 Hollywood horror-adventure film in black-and-white about a gigantic prehistoric gorilla named Kong.

The film was made by RKO and was written originally for the screen by Edgar Wallace, Ruth Rose, and James Ashmore Creelman from a concept by Merian C. Cooper. A novelization of the screenplay actually appeared before the film, in 1932, adapted by Delos W. Lovelace, and contains descriptions of scenes not in the movie.

The film was directed by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack and starred Bruce Cabot, Fay Wray, and Robert Armstrong. It is notable for Willis O'Brien's ground-breaking stop-motion animation work, Max Steiner's musical score, and actress Fay Wray's performance as the ape's improbable love interest. King Kong premiered in New York City on March 2, 1933.

Influences

King Kong was influenced by the "Lost World" literary genre, in particular Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World (1912) and Edgar Rice Burroughs' The Land That Time Forgot (1918), which depicted remote and isolated jungles teeming with dinosaur life.

In the early 20th century few zoos had monkey exhibits so there was popular demand to see them on film. William S. Campbell specialized in monkey-themed films with Monkey Stuff and Jazz Monkey in 1919, and Prohibition Monkey in 1920. Kong producer Schoedsack had earlier monkey experience directing Chang in 1927 (with Cooper) and Rango in 1931, both of which prominently featured monkeys in real jungle settings.

Capitalizing on this trend "Congo Pictures" released the hoax documentary Ingagi in 1930, advertising the film as "an authentic incontestable celluloid document showing the sacrifice of a living woman to mammoth gorillas!". Ingagi was an unabashed black exploitation film, immediately running afoul of the Hollywood code of ethics, as it implicitly depicted black women having sex with gorillas, and baby offspring that looked more ape than human.^[1] The film was an immediate hit, and by some estimates it was one of the highest grossing movies of the 1930s at over $4 million. Although producer Merian C. Cooper never listed Ingagi among his influences for King Kong, it's long been held that RKO green-lighted Kong because of the bottom-line example of Ingagi and the formula that "gorillas plus sexy women in peril equals enormous profits". ^[2]

Both directors, incluinding Merian C. Cooper, also author of the original idea, fought in World War I, and probably create the protagonist monster inspired by propaganda posters released during the conflict. In particular, King Kong probably was inspired by a poster that showed Germany like a bloodthirsty giant ape seizing a helpless girl in its hand, design wide spread in United States and Europe^[3].

The special effects were influenced by the unfinished 1931 film Creation.

Plot

The film starts off in 1930's New York City, during the depths of the Great Depression. Carl Denham, a film director famous for shooting 'animal pictures' in remote and exotic locations, is unable to find an actress to star in his newest project and so wanders the streets searching for a suitable woman. He chances upon a poor girl, Ann Darrow, just as she is caught trying to steal an apple. Denham pays off the grocer then buys Ann a meal and offers her a job starring in his new film. Although Ann is apprehensive, she has nothing to lose and, after reassurances from Denham, agrees.

They set sail aboard the freighter Venture, which travels for weeks in the general direction of Indonesia. Despite his ongoing declarations that women have no place on board ships, the Venture's first mate Jack Driscoll is obviously becoming attracted to Ann. Denham tells Driscoll he has enough troubles without the complications of a seagoing love affair. Driscoll scoffs at the notion and reminds Denham of his toughness in past adventures. Denham's reply outlines the theme of both King Kong and the picture he is making: "The Beast was a tough guy too. He could lick the world. But when he saw Beauty, she got him. He went soft. He forgot his wisdom and the little fellas licked him. Think it over, Jack."

After maintaining secrecy throughout the trip, Denham finally tells Driscoll and the Venture's captain Englehorn that they're searching for an island uncharted on any normal map. (Outside the movie, this landmass is often called Skull Island, but it is never given any name onscreen.) Denham says that a skipper gave him the one map on which it is charted, having received it from a native of the island who had been swept out to sea. Denham then describes something monstrous connected to the island, a legend of vague fear: "Kong."

As the Venture creeps through the fog surrounding the island the crew hear drums in the distance. Arriving at the island's shore, they see a primitive village perched on a peninsula and cut off from the bulk of the island by an enormous and ancient wall. An expedition from the ship goes ashore and encounters the natives, who are about to hand over a woman to Kong as a ritual sacrifice. Although Denham, Englehorn, Jack, Ann and a number of crewmen are hiding behind foliage, the native chief spots them and approaches threateningly. Captain Englehorn is able to understand the native speech; when the chief gets a clear look at the blonde Ann, he proposes to swap her for six native women. Denham delicately declines the offer as he and his party edge away from the scene.

Back on the Venture, Jack and Ann openly express their love for one another. Jack is called away, and Ann is promptly captured by a contingent of natives in an outrigger canoe, taken back to the wall, and handed over to Kong in a ceremony; when Kong emerges from the jungle, he is revealed to be a giant gorilla. The Venture crew returns to the village and takes control of the wall from the natives; a portion of the crew then goes after Kong, encountering aggressive dinosaurs.

Up ahead in the jungle, Kong places Ann in the cleft of a dead tree. He then doubles back and confronts the pursuing crewmembers just as they are crossing a deep ravine by way of an enormous log. Kong shakes them off, killing all except for Driscoll and Denham; Driscoll continues the chase, while Denham, stuck on the wrong side of the ravine, returns to the village. Meanwhile, a Tyrannosaurus rex is about to attack Ann; Kong rushes back and a long struggle between the two titans ends when Kong rips off the T. rex's jaw. He takes Ann up to his mountaintop cave, in the process fighting off another attack from a plesiosaur. Kong then inspects his blonde prize and begins to caress her, tearing off pieces of her clothing until Jack interrupts the proceedings by knocking over a boulder. When the gorilla leaves Ann to investigate the cause of the noise, a pterosaur swoops from the sky and clutches Ann in its talons. Another fight ensues and the pterodactyl is defeated. While Kong is thus distracted, Jack rescues Ann and takes her back to the native village. Kong chases them, breaks through the large door in the wall and rampages through the village, killing many of the inhabitants. Denham hurls a gas bomb, knocking Kong unconscious, whereupon he exults in the opportunity to take the giant back to New York as an exhibit: "He's always been King of his world. But we'll teach him fear! We're millionaires, boys! I'll share it with all of you. Why, in a few months, it'll be up in lights on Broadway: 'Kong — the Eighth Wonder of the World!'"

The next scene begins with those very words in lights on a theater marquee. Along with hundreds of curious New Yorkers, Denham, Driscoll and Ann are in evening wear for the gala event. The curtain lifts, and Denham presents a subdued and manacled Kong to the stunned audience. All goes well until photographers, using the blinding flashbulbs of the era, begin snapping shots of Ann and her fiance Jack. Under the impression that the flashbulbs are attacking Ann, Kong breaks his chains and escapes from the theater. He rampages through the city streets, destroying an elevated train and killing a number of citizens.

He then finds and abducts Ann and carries her to the top of the Empire State Building, where the authorities dispatch four Navy biplanes to destroy him. The ape gently sets Ann down on the building's observation deck and climbs atop the dirigible mooring mast, trying to fight off the planes. He destroys one, but Kong is ultimately no match for modern technology; gunned down, he crashes to his death in the street below. Denham rushes up, where a New York City cop remarks "The airplanes got him". Denham's reply: "Oh, no, it wasn't the airplanes; it was beauty killed the beast."

Cast

• Fay Wray as Ann Darrow
• Robert Armstrong as Carl Denham
• Bruce Cabot as John 'Jack' Driscoll
• Frank Reicher as Capt. Englehorn
• Sam Hardy as Charles Weston
• Noble Johnson as Native Chief
• Steve Clemente as Witch King (as Steve Clemento)
• James Flavin as Second Mate Briggs

Significance

Although King Kong was not the first important Hollywood film to have a thematic music score (many silent films had multi-theme original scores written for them), it's generally considered the be the most ambitious early talkie film to showcase an all-original score, courtesy of a promising young composer, Max Steiner.

It was also the first hit film to offer a life-like animated central character in any form. Much of what is done today with CGI animation has its conceptual roots in the stop motion model animation that was pioneered in Kong. Willis O'Brien, credited as "Chief Technician" on the film, has been lauded by later generations of film special effects artists as an outstanding original genius of founder status.

At the end of the scene where Kong shakes the crew members off the log, he then goes after Driscoll, who is hiding in a small cave just under the ledge. The scene was shot using the miniature set, a mockup of Kong's hand and a rear-projected image of Driscoll in the cave. This is not the first known use of miniature rear projection, but certainly among the most famous of early attempts at it.

Many shots in King Kong featured optical effects by Linwood G. Dunn, who was RKO's optical technician for decades. Dunn did optical effects on Citizen Kane and the original Star Trek TV series, as well as hundreds of other films and shows. In the 1990s, in his 90s, Dunn co-invented an electronic 3-D system now used for micro-surgery in hospitals and in the military, as well as co-inventing a video projection system with better resolution than 35mm film that is used in modern cinemas.

During the film's original 1933 theatrical release, the climax was presented in Magnascope. This is where the screen opens up both vertically and horizontally. Cooper had wanted to wow the audience with the Empire State Building battle in a larger-than-life presentation. He had done this earlier for his film Chang (1927) during the climactic elephant stampede.

Censorship

The first version of the film was screened to a sample audience in San Bernardino, California, in late January, 1933, before the official release. Apparently the film at that time contained a scene in which Kong shakes four men off a log into a crevasse where they are eaten alive by a giant spider, a giant crab, a giant lizard, and an octopoid. The spider-pit scene caused members of the audiences to scream and some left the theater. After the preview, the film's producer, Merian C. Cooper, cut the scene. However, a memo written by Merian C. Cooper, recently revealed on a King Kong documentary, indicates that the scene was cut because it slowed the film down, not because it was too horrific. According to King Kong cometh, the scene did not get past censors and that audiences only claim to have seen the sequence. On the 2005 DVD, it is not mentioned about the sequence being in the preview screening. Stills from the scene exist, but the scenes themselves remain unfound to this day. It is mentioned on the 2005 DVD by Doug Turner, that Merian C. Cooper, the director, usually relegated his outtakes and deleted scenes to the incinerator (a regular practice in all movie productions for decades), so many have presumed that the Lost Spider Pit Sequence unfortunately met this fate[1]. Models used in the sequence (a tarantula and a spider) can be seen hanging on the walls of a workshop in one scene in the 1946 film Genius At Work, and a spider and tentacled creature from the sequence were used in O'Brien's 1957 film The Black Scorpion. Director Peter Jackson, and his crew of special effects technicians at Weta Workshop, created an imaginative reconstruction for the 2005 DVD release of the film (the scene was not spliced into the film but is intercut with original footage to show where it would have occurred, and is part of the DVD extras). The scene is also recreated in their 2005 remake, with most men surviving the initial fall but having to fight off giant insects to survive.

King Kong was released four times between 1933 and 1952. All of the releases saw the film cut for censorship purposes. Scenes of Kong eating people or stepping on them were cut, as was his peeling off of Ann's dress. Many of these cuts were restored for the 1976 theatrical release after it was found that a film editor had saved the trims. Later, an uncensored print of much higher quality was discovered in the United Kingdom (which was not covered by the American Production Code).

Reception

Critical reaction

The film received mostly positive but some negative reviews on its first release. Joe Bigelow of Variety claimed that the film was a good adventure if the viewer is willing to suspend disbelief and "after the audience becomes used to the machine-like movements and other mechanical flaws in the gigantic animals on view, and become accustomed to the phony atmosphere, they may commence to feel the power."^[4] The New York Times found it a fascinating adventure film: "Imagine a fifty-foot beast with a girl in one paw climbing up the outside of the Empire State Building, and after putting the girl on a ledge, clutching at airplanes, the pilots of which are pouring bullets from machine guns into the monster's body". ^[5]

More recently, Roger Ebert wrote in his Great Films review that the effects are not up to modern standards, but "there is something ageless and primeval about King Kong that still somehow works." ^[6]

Theatrical Re-Releases

King Kong was a great box office success, as it became the highest grossing film of 1933 and the fifth highest grossing film of the 1930s. This was an impressive feat considering King Kong came out during one of the worst years of the Great Depression. Due to popular demand, King Kong was re-released numerous times through the years.

• In 1938 King Kong was re-released for the first time, but suffered some censorship. The Hays Office, in accordance with stiffer decency rules, removed a few scenes from the film that were considered violent or obscene. These include:
  • The Apatosaurus biting men to death in the swamp
  • Kong peeling Ann Darrow's clothing off
  • Kong's violent attack on the native village
  • Kong biting a New Yorker to death
  • Kong dropping a woman to her death after mistaking her for Ann Darrow

• In 1942 King Kong was re-released again to great box office success. However it was altered again by censors as various scenes were darkened to 'minimize gore".

• In 1952 King Kong saw its greatest release to date. Not only did it gross more money then any of its other releases, but it brought in more money then most new "A-List" pictures did that year. Due to this success, Warner Brothers was inspired to make a giant monster film of its own called The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms. This movie in turn ended up kicking off the "giant monster on the loose" film boom of the 1950s.

• King Kong was sold to television in early 1956 and pulled in an estimated 80% of all households with televisions in the New York area that week. In summer of 1956, King Kong was re-released theatrically (mainly drive-ins) based on its great TV success.

• In the late 1960s, all the censored scenes that were cut back in 1938 were found, and restored back into the film. Janus Films gave the restored King Kong a brief theatrical re-release in 1971. This was the first time since its original run in 1933 that King Kong was seen in its complete form.

Awards

The now classic film was not nominated for any Academy Awards, although it is reasonable to speculate that it could have been nominated for Special Effects for its many groundbreaking techniques, if the award had existed at the time. As it was, however, the Special Effects category would not be introduced until 1939, with The Rains Came receiving the honor.

The film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1991.

Famous and deleted scenes

Famous scenes

The film includes a number of scenes that have become iconic, including:

• The native ceremony for the "bride" of Kong.
• The crew being hunted by a Apatosaurus-like creature.
• Kong shaking the crew off a fallen tree over a chasm.
• Kong battling a Tyrannosaurus-like creature.
• Kong battling a plesiosaur-like creature.
• Kong's fight with a giant Pteranodon-like creature.
• Kong attacking the native village.
• Screaming Ann Darrow (Wray) being held in Kong's giant hand. Later in life, Wray named her autobiography On the Other Hand (ISBN 0-312-02265-4) in memory of her screaming in Kong's grip.
• Kong's escape and rampage in New York.
• Kong climbing a building, finding a woman, and dropping her to her death.
• In the finale Kong carries a screaming Ann to the top of the Empire State Building but is gunned down by a swarm of helldiver biplanes.

Deleted scenes

Known deleted, censored, or never-filmed scenes (some restored or reconstructed today).

• Kong battles three Triceratops. Unfilmed but planned.
• The sauropod more violently kills three sailors in the water.
• A Styracosaurus chases the sailors onto the log. Unknown if this was filmed or cut later.
• When Kong drops the log down the chasm, four surviving sailors are eaten alive by a giant spider, an octopus-like insect, a giant scorpion/crab, and a giant crocodile/lizard. When Merian C. Cooper showed the film to a preview audience with the scene intact, viewers were either frightened, scared out of the theater, or wouldn't stop talking about the scene. Ultimately, Cooper cut the scene. When asked later, he claimed that he cut the scene due to pacing.
• Kong pulls off Ann's clothes and smells them. Censored for the 1930s rerelease, now in every official print since 1972. Curiously, one brief moment during Ann's rescue was not cut out. The scene had her and Jack swimming to the surface of the water, and for one frame, Ann's naked breast could be seen, nipple and all.
• A longer scene of Jack and Anne running away from Kong's lair. This was cut by Cooper for pacing even though the painstaking stop-motion animation had been completed.
• Kong steps on two natives. Censorship cut.
• Kong kills two natives and a New Yorker with his teeth. Censorship cut.
• Kong picks a sleeping woman out of the hotel, then realizing she's not Ann, drops her to the streets below to her death. Censorship cut.
• Kong breaks up a poker party in the hotel. It's unknown if this was filmed or not, but the reason why it was dropped was because it was too similar to an almost identical scene in The Lost World.
• A shot showing Kong's body from above as he falls off the Empire State Building. This was cut because the special effects didn't look realistic enough; Kong seemed 'transparent' as he fell to the streets below.

Dinosaurs and reptiles

The dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals depicted on Skull Island are never precisely identified in the film. O'Brien based his models on well-informed reconstructions, particularly on those of Charles R. Knight, which were exhibited in major museums at the time (in particular, the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, and the Chicago Natural History Museum). The reconstructions are surprisingly accurate for their time: paleontologist Robert T. Bakker has commented that despite their anatomical inaccuracies, the depiction of the Apatosaurus coming out of the swamp and moving on land, and the Tyrannosaurus being a swift, active predator are actually more accurate than what scientists at the time were teaching. Even so, there are many inaccuracies when compared with 21st century knowledge. However, it is important to realize that King Kong is not a documentary on prehistoric life; it is a movie made for public entertainment, and is not meant to be perfectly accurate.

See Skull Island for a list of creatures that appear in King Kong and its sequel Son of Kong.

Sequels

Further information: King Kong

A sequel, The Son of Kong, was also released in 1933, just in time for the Christmas season. The story concerned a return expedition to Skull Island that discovers that Kong has left behind an albino son.

Video releases

The film was released officially for the first time on DVD in the U.S. in November of 2005, after long being only available on home video releases, and bootleg VHS and DVD releases.

Warner Home Video and Turner Entertainment (the current copyright owners of King Kong) have released the film in a two-disc special edition that has been released both with regular DVD packaging and in a Collector's Edition featuring both discs in a collectible tin can which also includes a variety of other printed extras exclusive to the Collector's Edition. As of 2006 the US Special Edition has not been released in the United Kingdom.

At the same time that these two solo editions of King Kong were released, Warner Brothers also released a DVD box set featuring the original 1933 King Kong, as well as the films The Son of Kong and Mighty Joe Young, which were also released separately.

King Kong when it was released on a Criterion laserdisc in 1985 featured the first ever audio commentary track, by Ron Haver, on a home video release.

The film was also part of the film colorization controversy in the 1980's when it and other classic black and white films were colorized for television. In recent years, the colorized version has become highly prized among Kong collectors, and there have even been bootleg DVD releases that have appeared on eBay, some containing both versions of the film. Although the colorized version was released officially on the 2004 PAL-format Region 2 DVD from Universal (UK only), it has never been made available on DVD officially in the Region 1 NTSC format.

Quotes

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• And now, ladies and gentlemen, before I tell you any more, I'm going to show you the greatest thing your eyes have ever beheld. He was a king and a god in the world he knew, but now he comes to civilization merely a captive — a show to gratify your curiosity. Ladies and gentlemen, look at Kong, the Eighth Wonder of the World. — Carl Denham

• We're millionaires, boys! I'll share it with all of you! Why, in a few months his name will be up in lights on Broadway! KONG! The Eighth Wonder of the World!

• No, it wasn't the airplanes, it was beauty killed the beast.

— Carl Denham; referencing the tale of "Beauty and the Beast".

Trivia

• In the original script, the gorilla is named "Kong". "King" was added to the title by studio publicists. Apart from the opening titles, the only time the name "King Kong" appears in the picture is on the marquee above the theater where Kong is being exhibited — and the marquee was in fact added to the scene as an optical composite after the live footage of the theater entrance had been shot. However, Denham does refer to Kong in his speech to the theater audience as having been "a king in his native land".
• The giant gate used in the 1933 movie was burned along with other old studio sets for the burning of Atlanta scene in Gone with the Wind. The gate was originally constructed for the Babylonian segment in D. W. Griffith's 1916 film Intolerance and can also be spotted in the Bela Lugosi serial The Return of Chandu (1934).
• King Kong is often credited as being Adolf Hitler's favorite film (unconfirmed but mentioned in many news and magazine articles on the film, including a 2005 Wired Magazine story)
• Some jungle scenes were filmed on the same set as the jungle scenes in The Most Dangerous Game (1932); others were filmed on the Caribbean isle of Saba.^[7]
• One of the several original metal armatures used to bring Kong to life, as well as other original props from the 1933 film, can be seen in the book It Came From Bob's Basement, a reference to one armature's long-time owners, Bob Burns, who lives in Los Angeles. One armature (Burns'?) was on display in London until a few years ago in the now-closed Museum of the Moving Image. Burns recently sold his armature to Peter Jackson, who also bought all the original Kong dinosaur armatures from Forrest J Ackerman (editor of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine).
• King Kong's height is different in different parts of the movie. He appears to be 18 feet tall on the island, 24 feet on the stage and in the streets of New York, and 50 feet on the Empire State Building.
• The film's budget was approximately $600,000 USD
• Paul du Chaillu's travel narrative Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa (1861) was a favorite of Merian C. Cooper when he was a child. The gorilla chase scene in the book was likely an inspiration for King Kong.
• In the 1933 film, King Kong is displayed at the Palace Theatre in New York City. Along with the film itself, the marquee makes references to the folktale of "Beauty and the Beast". Interestingly enough, the Palace is the same theatre that Disney's Beauty and the Beast opened at in 1994 (and ran there until 1999). On a side note, by 1933, the Palace had become a full-fledged movie house no longer running stage acts.
• The film reportedly influenced director Peter Jackson to go into filmmaking.
• It was this film that inspired the King Homer segment in the Simpsons Treehouse of Horror III.
• Aus T.V Series Fast Forward sent-up King Kong in its last Series ('92).
• The movie premiered in New York City at Radio City Music Hall. After the premiere, the film was also shown concurrently at RKO Center Theater which was the Music Hall's "sister" theater. Because of the seating capacity of the Radio City Music Hall (6,000+ seats) and the RKO Center (4,000+ seats), more than 10,000 patrons could be accommodated at the same time in two theaters.

See also

• King Kong
• King Kong (1976 film)
• King Kong (2005 film)
• Creation (1931 film)
• List of stop-motion films

References

• Wallace, Edgar; Cooper, Merian C. [1932]. King Kong. Modern Library. ISBN 0-8129-7493-X. 
• Greatest Films from Filmsite.org

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