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Posted by Ron Yost (Member # 1850) on 10-29-2005, 02:23 PM:
 
October 27, 2005

Copyright 2005, The New York Times Company

A BIG GORILLA WEIGHS IN, By Sharon Waxman

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 26 - In hiring Peter Jackson, the Oscar-winning director of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, to remake the monster classic "King Kong," Universal Pictures took a daring leap, paying him $20 million to direct, produce and be the co-writer of the film.

With seven weeks to go before the movie's release, the risks are becoming clearer. After seeing a version of the film in late September at Mr. Jackson's studio in New Zealand, Universal executives agreed to release "King Kong" at a length of three hours.

The film is substantially longer than Universal had anticipated and presents dual obstacles: the extra length has helped increase the budget by a third, to $207 million, while requiring the studio, owned by General Electric, to reach for the kind of long-term audience interest that made hits out of three-hour movies like "Titanic" and the films in Mr. Jackson's "Rings" trilogy.

Hollywood blockbusters have increasingly relied on big releases that bring in as much as half of their ticket sales on the first weekend. But long films receive far fewer showings per day, and the most successful ones, like "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" (2001) by Mr. Jackson, which took in $315 million at the domestic box office for New Line Cinema, have remained in theaters for well over half a year.

The film industry and Universal could use a big seller.

Hollywood has been struggling this year at the box office, with overall revenue down more than half a billion dollars, about 8 percent, from last year's total, according to Box Office Mojo, an online tracking service. Industry experts attribute the decline to a migration of audiences to other forms of electronic entertainment, whether television, DVD's, video games or the Internet. Universal has had a mediocre year at the box office. The studio had a hit in the summer with the comedy "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," but has endured disappointments, like the drama "Cinderella Man," and has had lackluster results with films like "The Perfect Man," "Kicking and Screaming" and "Doom," which opened last week to a tepid $15 million.

Asked about the length of "King Kong," Universal executives said they saw it as an advantage in an era when jaded moviegoers are hungering for something extraordinary.

"This is a three-hour feast of an event," said Marc Shmuger, vice chairman of Universal Pictures, who described the film as a tragic love story between the ape and Naomi Watts, who plays Ann Darrow, an actress. "I've never come close to seeing an artist working at this level."

Set for release on Dec. 14, "King Kong" retells the classic beauty-and-the-beast tale first filmed in 1933, with its lasting image of Kong atop the Empire State Building, and remade in 1976. Along with Ms. Watts, it stars Jack Black, Adrien Brody and a 25-foot, computer-animated gorilla.

This time around, the picture depends upon another oversize talent in the person of Mr. Jackson, who was granted an unusual degree of control at a time when studios are trimming costs and tightening their grips on most productions. Not only did Mr. Jackson produce and direct, and also write with his longtime partner, Fran Walsh, and Philippa Boyens, but his companies Weta Digital and Weta Workshop also created the physical and computer special effects in the film at Mr. Jackson's studio in New Zealand.

Twentieth Century Fox and Paramount took a risk in granting the director James Cameron a similar degree of control over his famously overbudget 1997 film "Titanic," and eventually came up winners. In that case, Mr. Cameron's three-hour epic, a love story set in the midst of the ship's sinking, went on to break box-office records and win 11 Oscars. With "King Kong," Universal executives say they are convinced that they have an epic of comparable worth, even though they were surprised by the length.

"I anticipated it would be long, but not this long," the Universal chairwoman, Stacey Snider, said. As recently as late September, she expected about two hours and 40 minutes, she said. But on Wednesday she expressed delight with the picture she's got: "This is a masterpiece. I can't wait to unveil it."

The increased length, Ms. Snider said, means that the movie will cost $32 million more than planned, adding to expenses that had already gone up $25 million from an original $150 million production budget.

Who will pay for these budget overruns has been the subject of intense negotiations over the last two weeks, with representatives of the studio and the director haggling over who was responsible, according to those involved in the negotiations.

Ms. Snider said that as of Wednesday, all had been resolved, with the studio more or less splitting the $32 million expense with Mr. Jackson.

In an e-mail message, Mr. Jackson appeared to disagree, saying instead that he would be paying for those expenditures, which were mainly associated with extra digital-effects shots. Referring to his partner, Ms. Walsh, Mr. Jackson wrote: "Since Fran and I believed in the three-hour cut and wanted to take responsibility for the extra length, we offered to pay for these extra shots ourselves. That's what we're doing." He did not say how much that would be, but said the extra effects shot would cost "considerably below $32 million."

A spokesman for Universal responded, "We are working together to cover overages."

In granting Mr. Jackson immense latitude, Universal relied not just on his skills, but also a huge fan base, much of which has followed the production through the director's frequent communications on a Web site, www.kongisking.net.

But few elements of the film have been seen by the larger public, and even Universal executives saw a finished version of King Kong's face - with its expressive eyes, broadly fierce nose and mane of computer-generated hair - only in recent days.

Universal lost an opportunity to capitalize on a "Kong" revenue stream when an anticipated deal to release the film on Imax screens in December, at the same time the movie would appear in regular theaters, failed to materialize, and Imax chose to show Warner Brothers' new "Harry Potter" film, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire."

"We think 'King Kong' will be a big movie," Richard L. Gelfond, co-chairman of Imax, said, "but unfortunately we could not agree on deal terms, including the box-office split."

Ms. Snider said Imax could not guarantee space in its theaters at the time of Kong's release, and acknowledged that both the studio and Mr. Jackson were disappointed.

A spokeswoman for NBC Universal said Bob Wright, the chairman, has been told of the rising cost and length of "King Kong." "Bob is more than aware of what is going on with this production and other major productions, and he has enormous confidence in the leadership team at Universal Studios," said the spokeswoman, Anna Perez.

Ms. Snider said she did not think the three-hour length would be an obstacle for moviegoers. Three-hour epics, she said, are Mr. Jackson's "brand."

Exhibitors have long complained that very long films make it harder to draw audiences, though in this difficult year at the box office, they have complained louder about not having enough good films to show. Paul Dergarabedian, president of Exhibitor Relations, which tracks the box office for theater owners, agreed that long movies posed problems. "But if it's a really fine film, it won't be a detriment to its success," he said.

-- end article

Ron Yost
 

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Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 10-29-2005, 02:51 PM:
 
If the film is good enough, 3 hours is what it deserves and audiences will eat it up. Peter Jackson's LOTR movies were good enough -- hopefully Kong will be too.
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 10-29-2005, 03:22 PM:
 
The IMAX DMR thing is actually kind of stupid.

Universal could make some 5-perf 70mm blowups and essentially have the same thing as a DMR release, but using one third of the 70mm film stock. With just a little work between themselves and some movie theater circuits they could indeed have 70mm engagements set in key markets around the country.

Given that we're still 2 months from release date, a 5-perf 70mm solution would still be do-able.

Of course, if the show were rendered at only HDTV quality 2K (the whole thing is very likely output via digital intermediate) then the 70mm thing is only going to be good for projecting onto oversized stadium seated theater screens.
 

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Posted by Pravin Ratnam (Member # 1417) on 10-29-2005, 05:32 PM:
 
Solution - King Kong Vol 1, Vol 2

At the end of Vol1, Jack Black tells some lady, "Is Watts aware that their(Kong's too) son ........is still alive?"
 

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Posted by Andy Summers (Member # 3207) on 10-29-2005, 06:27 PM:
 
The original King Kong was 1hour 41minutes the remake was 2hours 14miutes so three hours long wow hope looks good and sounds good with lots of low end in all the channels?
 

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Posted by Robert Harrison (Member # 3202) on 10-29-2005, 06:28 PM:
 
Perhaps Mr. Jackson is just "jacking" Universal around for not letting him do the film earlier. You might recall that he was originally hired to do this remake just before his film "The Frighteners" was released. When that film didn't do much business (it was highly entertaining, though), they apparently reneged.

Now, post-"LOTR," the folks at Universal have regained their hard-on to do this project, a boner they have had since the 70s, when they announced "The Legend of King Kong" (to be presented in Sensurround, no less) but had to put it on the back burner because of Paramount's 1976 version (which, word was, Universal has a "cut" of, regardless).

Frankly, these directors do tend to get full of themselves. We have all heard the stories of how they fall in love with every frame of film shot and can't bear to cut anything. Obviously, he did with the LOTR trilogy, but he made damn sure there were longer versions available on DVD. Perhaps that is the route he should take with "Kong." If it goes over well, then you can add all the filler back in for home video.

My friends and I are giant monster movie fans. One thing we can't stand is what we call I.L.O.M. That is an acronyn which stands for Irritating Lack Of Monsters. There had better be a ratio heavy on monster footage for any given running time or boredom sets in. For a three hour film, I want at least 2 hours of monsters. I could give a flying fart about Adrien Brody wanting to pork Naomi Watts. I want to see the star of the film, Mr. Kong himself, and lots of other creatures, not just a damn snake like back in the 76 version.

And, yes, that can be boring, also. So, we're back to "why does this film have to be so damn long?" It probably doesn't. But, if it is successful, I hope Sony Pictures will release an English language version of "Godzilla: Final Wars" to theatres. At over 2 hours, that is the longest (Japanese-made) Godzilla movie ever, but it has monsters up the wazoo!
 

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Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 10-29-2005, 07:11 PM:
 
This movie will bomb massively. Is Peter Jackson the Michael Cimino of our time?
 

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Posted by Andy Summers (Member # 3207) on 10-29-2005, 07:46 PM:
 
Michael’

That was “The Deer Hunter” 1978 not sure what you mean by this, but are you saying this maybe a flop and at the box office as well?

But technically it well look good and sound good, and yet Oscar may handout an award for visual effects and sound effects editing?
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 10-29-2005, 08:32 PM:
 
Andy, I guess you never heard of "Heaven's Gate," correct?

I'm not sure I would call Peter Jackson the "Michael Cimino of our time" either. But I'll certainly agree 100% with the tag if he sticks a 30 minute long wedding sequence into the movie.
 

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Posted by Andy Summers (Member # 3207) on 10-29-2005, 08:42 PM:
 
Bobby’

Yeah I’ve head about that the reviews of it around the early 1980’s weren’t good and so on. So yes I’ve heard of it…

So this King Kong will be a King Turkey.?
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 10-29-2005, 09:47 PM:
 
I'm not going to pronounce judgment against the film before I see it. The movie trailer, at least, looks pretty cool. Download Quicktime 7 and watch in HD from Apple's website if your computer can handle it.

In 1997, lots of people were predicting "Titanic" would suck due its bladder bursting run time and giant budget. But the movie turned out to be pretty cool. It broke box office records, won Oscars and got a lot of women to think of Leonardo DiCaprio when they masturbated.

Naomi Watts is certainly good inspiration for rubbing one out.
 

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Posted by Jonathan M. Crist (Member # 413) on 10-29-2005, 10:15 PM:
 
I understand that Chronicles of Naria is also supposed to be about three hours as well.
 

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Posted by Frank Dubrois (Member # 3042) on 10-29-2005, 11:05 PM:
 
Put me to sleep. 3 hours of crap no doubt. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy put me to sleep. Thanks to Peter Jackson, I'm getting plenty of sleep now.
 

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Posted by Matt Fields (Member # 3211) on 10-29-2005, 11:29 PM:
 
Anyone who thinks that people do not want to see a giant monkey fight with dinosaurs does not have their pulse on the movie going public.
 

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Posted by Dustin Mitchell (Member # 372) on 10-29-2005, 11:38 PM:
 
But three hours? What in the King Kong story warrants three hours of film time? If Jackson pulls it off I'll be the first to admit I'm wrong but honestly three hours is way to long for this type of film.
 

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Posted by Steve Scott (Member # 630) on 10-30-2005, 01:45 AM:
 
Perhaps Snakes on a Plane will go for this lengthy run time towards the same effect...
 

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Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 10-30-2005, 01:39 AM:
 
What I meant by the comparison is this: Cimino made "The Deer Hunter" which was a long, unusual, and brilliant film, and a great success. Desperate to get a new big production by a certified genius, he was given completely free hand by United Artists in the production of "Heaven's Gate", and the production went completely out of the rudder (or do you say "off the rudder"?) resulting in a very long, very expensive, and very unsuccessful movie.
The comparison is not very good, I agree, but some of the stuff in the quoted article just reminded me massively of what I read in Steven Bach's book "Final Cut" which chronicles the Ciminogate.
"This is a three-hour feast of an event," said Marc Shmuger, vice chairman of Universal Pictures, who described the film as a tragic love story between the ape and Naomi Watts, who plays Ann Darrow, an actress. "I've never come close to seeing an artist working at this level."
Wishful thinking on an epic scale with a very strong smell of desperateness about it.

I have to admit though that I am obviously biased because I didn't like "The Lord of the Rings" at all. I applaud the enormous determination and energy Jackson had to put together this vast project, but I think the movies failed completely in bringing the richness of the original story across. I think the scripts were just bad copy and paste jobs, and the visuals had nothing very imaginative about them, it was just a lot of standard kitsch blown up to a very large scale.
But because there is so much in that story, so many characters and events which in themselves are interesting, the movies still ended up having enough in them to interest a lot of people.
But the King Kong thing doesn't have much potential, and I just can not see Jackson making it any more interesting.
 

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Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-30-2005, 06:30 AM:
 
If it's going to work, it'll have to have a decent script. The original film was a masterpiece because (i) it satirised the exploration documentary genre that Cooper & Schoedsack pioneered in the '20s (indeed, the two of them were parodying themselves), (ii) it was an ironic response to the depression (i.e. we may be in the midst of an economic crisis with 'nice girls' in the world's most advanced city forced into prostitution, but at least we don't wear grass skirts and worship a gorilla), and (iii) the special effects were new and spectacular. The 1976 version worked because it satirised the '70s oil crisis ('This'll beat the shit out of 'We'll put a tiger in your tank'!') and updated the symbolism quite cleverly, for example with the final shoot out featuring the World Trade Center.

Jackson's version is going to have to have some topical ideas worked into the script if his reinvention of the story is going to work. Just relying on CGI won't be enough: the 'wow' factor that sold Jurassic Park and Terminator 2 has had a decade to wear off, and it'll no longer sell a film by itself. We've all been there and seen that now. Given Jackson's hilarious sideswipe at the film archive community in Forgotten Silver, he might just be able to pull this one off.
 

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Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 10-30-2005, 06:36 AM:
 
Has anyone noticed that Peter Jackson is an extremely large individual who does not believe in personal hygiene?
 

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Posted by Andy Summers (Member # 3207) on 10-30-2005, 07:41 AM:
 
Yeah I’ve heard those rumours too, the set must be Pen & Ink, hate to image setting in at the Kodak Theatre at the Oscars with lots of people, and the one that stands out the most is Peter “Pen & Ink” Jackson man “King Pong”
 

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Posted by Mike Heenan (Member # 392) on 10-30-2005, 09:47 AM:
 
Really Joe? Last time I checked he was quite skinny.
 

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Posted by Andrew McCrea (Member # 674) on 10-30-2005, 10:21 AM:
 
I have to agree with Dustin: "But three hours? What in the King Kong story warrants three hours of film time? If Jackson pulls it off I'll be the first to admit I'm wrong but honestly three hours is way to long for this type of film."

This is the type of movie that's supposed to be a "popcorn" movie. Its suppose to be short and cheesy, bad on purpose... I mean, who will see a cheesy 3 hour movie twice?

Instead, it seems like it will be a serious love story between a woman and her ape.

C'mon Jackson, you can't just always use the same formula for every film and think that your won't/doesn't stink.
 

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Posted by Hillary Charles (Member # 769) on 10-30-2005, 01:16 PM:
 

quote: Joe Redifer

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Has anyone noticed that Peter Jackson is an extremely large individual who does not believe in personal hygiene?

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quote: Michael Schaffer

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he was given completely free hand by United Artists in the production of "Heaven's Gate", and the production went completely out of the rudder

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quote: Thomas Jonsson

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With such long films, no wonder attendance are declining. They each are long enough for two normal films.

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quote: Bobby Henderson

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Do we really need anymore TV series turned movie type shows?

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quote: Bobby Henderson

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For the past few weeks box office business has really been slow. This is the kind of lull I'm used to seeing in traditionally slow periods (January, April, late August). Normally October has some good, significant releases. Right now the only movies I want to see are in limited release in large cities.

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quote: Thomas Jonsson

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With such long films, no wonder attendance are declining. They
each are long enough for two normal films.

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quote: Bobby Henderson

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I think the audience decline may have more to do with an over-abundance of crap quality to mediocre quality films.

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quote: Bobby Henderson

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Didn't "Star Wars" hit theaters during some of the Arab oil embargoes? The late 1970's wasn't exactly a great time for gas prices. And that's when the so-called "summer movie" model was born.

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The well known oil embargo occurred during 1973 and 1974. Star wars was released in 1977.

Oil prices that spiked from the embargo leveled in 1976, and did not have a major spike again until the end of 1978.

Fuel rationing, which was actually caused by the US governments implementation of price controls on old oil, while allowing new oil to be priced by the oil companies, a move intended to create new exploration, actually backfired resulting in the oil companies withdrawing old supplies from the market.

Rationing was abandoned in 1976 when the prices leveled out on oil supplies from OPEC. (edited to remove brain pan leakage caused by improper information dissemination)

Oil prices peaked in 1981 and began a sharp decline until 1986, where it stayed relatively level until 1998, with one major short spike and decline in 1991.

[ 11-01-2005, 12:03 AM: Message edited by: Dave Williams ]
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 10-31-2005, 01:33 PM:
 
The first "summer movie" was "JAWS", in 1975, and it wasn't intended to be as such-it just became that way. Spielberg had a winner that summer.

(I was living in SLC when "JAWS" was playing at the Regency up on Foothill Dr. Played the entire summer up there until Christmas).

-Monte
 

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Posted by Matt Fields (Member # 3211) on 10-31-2005, 02:08 PM:
 
I always thought that it was President Reagan who ended the price controls on oil in 1980, hence the drop in prices in the 80's. In fact, it was the first thing he did as President. The second was to abolish the "Council on Wage and Price Stability".

Price controls create:
1) increased demand
2) decreased supply
3) lower quality
4) black markets
 

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Posted by Dave Williams (Member # 299) on 10-31-2005, 11:58 PM:
 
You are right Matt. Price controls continued until President Reagan eliminated them. It was Rationing that was abandoned in 1976. In fact, during the iran iraq conflict that began in 1978, production nearly shut down and resulted in light supplies, leading to the long lines that so many people are remembering of.

Ciao
 

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Posted by Matt Fields (Member # 3211) on 11-01-2005, 07:36 AM:
 
There is a new quicktime "inside look" for King Kong. 3 Hours or not, I think it's cool. Also, Peter Jackon looks mighty thin. He might even be clean.

Check it out: New Kong Preview
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 11-04-2005, 08:00 PM:
 
The new "King Kong" trailer is hitting theaters today. It also happens to be available at Apple's Quicktime movie trailers site, viewable in 480p, 720p and 1080p HD.

King Kong Linky

I notice Peter Jackson and WETA Digital have changed the look of King Kong. In the teaser trailer Kong had a bottom incisor tooth peeking from his lip. That has been eliminated in this version. The ape's eyes look a bit more emotionally sympathetic (actually I think it's surprising how good a job they did with that visual detail).
 

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Posted by Michael Schaffer (Member # 1204) on 11-04-2005, 11:25 PM:
 
I can't open these videos in either IE or Opera. All I get is error messages. My QuickTime is updated to the latest version.
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 11-05-2005, 01:09 AM:
 
The HD clips are supposed to load in the Quicktime movie player application, not within a browser window.

You might try downloading the newest 7.0.3 version. It fixes a couple of security issues.
 

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Posted by Paul Linfesty (Member # 214) on 11-05-2005, 02:03 AM:
 
Has the new trailer been yanked? All I can find is the LOOK INSIDE" and the original teaser from the above links.

EDIT: Never mind. Apparently I had to do a refresh. Stupid me!
 

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