20 Greatest Movie Blockbusters Of The 21st Century (So Far)

20. King Kong

This one may be a surprise appearance on this list, as the shine of director Peter Jackson’s stardom has dimmed somewhat due to questionable choices in the years since his phenomenal work on the Lord of the Rings—The Lovely Bones, anyone?

Anyone at all?

But this lengthy, gorgeously realized monster movie remake from 2005 is the finest screen distillation of Kong’s tragic story since the original.

As fun as the likes of Kong: Skull Island may be, there’s no way the 2017 action spectacle would even exist without the success of Jackson’s gory, scary Skull Island sequence in this flick—and that’s just one of many staggering set pieces, including Kong’s doomed excursion to New York, which elevate this from standard blockbuster fare to classic status.