You Big Ape!

You Big Ape!

I went to the opening of King Kong yesterday evening. Hollywood must be short of blockbusters this year. The movie was three butt-numbing hours of screaming blonde and rampaging gorilla. As the review in Le Monde asked, "why does it take Peter Jackson twice the time to tell the same story as the original did in 1933"? Basically, there are two reasons why: lethargic plotting and overblown special effects. The opening sequence in New York was overly long, and while I liked much of the Skull Island action, I felt that one scene of dinosaurs mashing people was enough. The giant bugs were cool, though.

Like The War of the Worlds that I watched on DVD last week, the main problem with Kong was simply that it's an old, tired and outdated story that has too many miles on its literary and cinematic odometer. Previews for films debuting next year looked bleak too: yet another Mission Impossible and a remake of the 70s disaster flick Poseidon Adventure (now shortened to merely Poseidon).

Hollywood is bereft of original ideas. Guys, you wonder where your slump originates? Check your scripts!

Another really annoying thing about the movies nowadays is the ads. Before the film even started, we were subjected to ads for Coke, TV shows, cars and movies just out on DVD that had appeared in the theater mere weeks ago. Does it not occur to the movie moguls that the audience is a wee bit peeved at paying $9.50 for a ticket and then being subjected to more commercials than appear in an hour of Lost? At least at home, I can fast-forward through the ads with my DVR.

Corporate greed is killing culture, just like it's killing the American worker with the Wal-Martization of industry. The blockbuster mentality kills books as well. Publishers will scoop mountains of cash into the next Harry Potter or Da Vinci Code clone, but starving young authors receive not even mere crumbs from the big guys' plates anymore.