Running Time: 187 minutes You could almost watch the original King Kong through twice in the time it takes to slog through Peter Jackson's 2005 remake. And when the only source for that film is the original that is not something to be proud of. Obviously there's some things that need to be added to make a version of the story of a giant ape and his tragic trip to the big city work for modern audiences. The characters need to be more than just crudely drawn archetypes and more narrative motivation is demanded; why would you bring an ape to New York. There's even some nice additions that would please serious fans - the scene with Kong throwing the crew off a log into a pit of beetles is the realisation of a sequence cut from the original. But that's something the 1976 remake tried and semi-successfully did at an apparently spry 134 minutes. Jackson's film has so much padding and so little restraint that the only thing that keeps you watching is the promise of the Empire State Building finale. What could be cut? So, so much. Taking an hour to get to the island is ridiculous, and the amount of extended action sequences that serve only to give Jack Black something to do in the second act push things too far. Also the Central Park scene, which not only stretches physics, but also acts just to tease the audience shouldn't have seen the light of day.
