King Kong Preview

By Jack Mathews
New York Daily News
In assessing this year's Oscar race last month, I wrote that if Peter Jackson's "King Kong" turns out as well as his three "Lord of the Rings" movies, you can count it in as a Best Picture nominee.
I should have been more optimistic.
Now that I've seen it, the question is whether it can top 1997's "Titanic" as the highest-grossing movie of all time.
The short answer is, probably not. "Titanic's" box-office performance is in an orbit of its own. It sold $600.8 million worth of tickets at home -- $140 million more than No. 2 "Star Wars" -- and $1.8 billion worldwide, more than $700million better than the last "Lord of the Rings" episode.
But "Kong" is the first film to come along in years with at least a shot at the No. 1 spot.
"The pedigree of the filmmaker and the scope and breadth of 'Kong' lead me to believe it's the first movie that could remotely challenge 'Titanic' in cultural and box-office impact," says Paul Dergarabedian, president of the theater trend-watching Exhibitor Relations Inc.
"Kong," which opens nationally on Wednesday, is as good a movie as "Titanic," and it would seem to have a broader audience.
You'll remember that "Titanic's" spectacular run was fueled by teenage girls smitten by the ill-fated love of Leonardo DiCaprio's Jack and Kate Winslet's Rose. "King Kong" has its own love story -- two, if you count the one between humans -- and its run will be fueled largely by teenage boys smitten by the action on Skull Island.
It is there that Kong, while protecting blond actress Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts), takes on herds of dinosaurs, squadrons of giant bats and scores of pesky humans before succumbing to chloroform bombs and being hauled back to New York for his disastrous debut.
Over and over
As we have seen with the "Star Wars" movies -- which hold three spots in the all-time box office top 10 -- teenage boys will risk even repetitive-stress injury clutching tickets to the same action movie.
And "Kong," whose budget is in the $200 million range of "Titanic," offers those kids a lot more bang for the buck. Watching the Titanic go down in the second half of James Cameron's movie is visually and viscerally stunning, but Kong scaling the Empire State Building to swat at fighter planes is sheer inspiration!
Just as importantly, "Kong" is also very sentimental -- not just in the famous last scene, where he lies dead in the street next to the Empire State Building, the victim not of planes or bullets but of beauty.
In Jackson's movie, which he wrote with his "Rings" collaborators Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, beauty is more than blond-deep. It's the sense of life, love and freedom. Women, as my swooning colleague Jami Bernard has already attested, are going to fall hard for this Kong.
Watts' Ann Darrow is far friendlier to the ape than the wiggly, screeching Fay Wray was in the '33 film. She gives out a few early hollers, but after being saved several times by Kong -- and sensing a refreshing gentleness in this non-New Yorker -- she might be house-hunting on Skull Island if it weren't for her boyfriend, Jack Driscoll (Adrien Brody), and the film crew tracking her into the jungle.
In the scene where Ann wakes up in Kong's paw to see Jack motioning for her to slip away, there is a look of disappointment on her face, as if she wants to say, "Sorry, Jack, I'm with him now."
Sentiment is an essential element of blockbusters. Once "Star Wars" got going, teenage boys kept it going, but in the 1977 original, which ranks second behind "Titanic" on the box-office chart, there was the irresistible sexual tension between Han Solo and Princess Leia.
"Shrek 2," the third-highest grosser, was fueled by the audience's enchantment with the sublime romance between the ogre and Princess Fiona. And, of course, with "Gone With the Wind" (the most popular movie in history in terms of ticket sales adjusted for inflation), the power of love has passed the test of time.
So has the power of the timeless tale of the beauty and the beast, which has made King Kong Hollywood's greatest and most sympathetic monster. Jackson's remake will only enhance his reputation, and I'll be surprised if it isn't seen by everyone who has ever heard of him.