King Kong Lives

King Kong Lives (1986)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Sequel to the 1976 remake has Kong in a coma after falling from the World Trade Center. His heart is quickly going back so he needs a mechanical heart installed. Before the doctor (Linda Hamilton) does this, Kong is going to need blood so thankfully there's a redneck hunter (Peter Elliott) who has captured a female Kong. This movie has the reputation of being one of the worst ever made and people must have believed it because they stayed away from the film when it was originally released and it turned into one of the biggest box office disasters in history. This was a favorite of mine when I was a kid but it really hasn't aged too well. The biggest problem with the film is the film itself because it's never quite clear what the movie is trying to do. The story is all over the place, characters are coming in left and right and the entire Army set up just doesn't make too much sense at all. I'm going to take a wild guess and say this movie was meant for romance because we've got Hamilton and Elliott falling for each other and we've got the two Kong's falling in love. There's no doubt this is a very stupid movie but thankfully it's dumb enough to be mildly entertaining. The scenes with the two Kong's falling in love are pretty funny as is a scene later in the movie where redneck hunters trap Kong and try to torture him. The ending is just as wild as anything that follows it and I must admit that I found it pretty cute and touching. The special effects are certainly several notches below the previous film but they aren't too bad. Elliott and Hamilton really don't have too much to do because the screenplay doesn't offer them much but both are fine in their roles. What really kills the film from being a true cult item is the fact that we've got a 75-minute story expanded to 105-minutes, which is way too long.