King Kong - Dinosaur Chase Scene
We rented King Kong today, the 2005 version. I'm sitting here watching this and I just had to pause and take a moment to blog.
Folks have been saying that the dinosaur chase scene is amazing. Here's one:
The dinosaur chase scenes put Jurassic Park to shame. Halfway through the movie I commented to my friends that I thought this movie was redefining movies altogether.
I'll just say this one gets 5 stars and I'll definitely get the extended edition of this just so I can watch the dinosaur chase scene again and again.
Maybe I'm jaded, or have a sharp eye from working with graphics, but I'm been VERY disappointed with the lack of attention to detail in movie special effects over the last 4 or 5 years, while critics and the media heap on praise. What am I missing?
This chase scene looked like the actors were running on a treadmill and later pasted on the screen like paper dolls. It's clear an attempt was made to reconcile shadows and light sources, but several times shadows hit one character on entirely differnet sides than another. In one segment Jack Black slides down the side of a Brontosaur and hardly looks to be making contact. The little stow away runs along the edge of the cliff leaping over rocks that should be in his same position on the z-axis but are in totally different focus making the whole depth of field feel strange.
(In all the new Star Wars movies, tell me there were moments when it was clear the actors feet were never touching the computized ground. You think they'd at least let them leave footprints or something on Tatooine.)
End of rant. I guess it's just me and this is my secret shame.
I am wrong to thing that special effects are getting a little lazy? It's been 10 years since Jurassic Park and other than some fur effects (yawn) I'm not seeing what bars have been raised in the last decade (other than ticket prices).
Did you see King Kong? What did you think?
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Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.
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Ian Smith
Look at a movie like Independence Day. Back in '94 they had to use models in conjunction with CG which makes it look so much more realistic.
Anywhoo. Good rant. It sucks to have to pay $$$ over and over again and get absolutely nothing but a feeling that you've seen that before or that it looked fake. I know it's the movies, but still!!!
Oh, and you're right, the effects were bad. I kept thinking to myself that the 70's version (that Jackson apparently sneers at) seemed more realistic (but that could be just how I remember it).
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092610/
in terms of special effects; the character and environment effects on their own were pretty stunning- i thought kong was very well done, as were the hero shots of the dinosaurs; similarly, i thought the environmental shots of NYC, the sea, and the jungle were pretty impressive.
i agree that the dino chase scene was dissapointing, on many levels. it was clearly the "pod race" scene of kong... way too long, distracting from the main plot, and pretty outlandish. It just didn't do anything; especially compared, for example, to the "bugs" scene... which did a good job of conveying helplessness/despair/etc through excellent lighting, contrast, sound, dialog, camera moves, alternating tight/long shots, etc.
The 3D CGI effects for the bronto's and the raptors were somewhat well done (a bit cartoony), but very, very poorly composited; i'm thinking that a "B" team was responsible for the poor results... its possible that this entire scene was outsourced to some 3rd party shop as a last minute rush effort. in some ways, the entire scene reminded me of the original- it seemed campy, low budget, and gimmicky.
It was a tad overlong (ahem) and a few scenes were overkill (the little valley of the nasty bugs), but I really loved it. Ultimately it's an exceptionally noble story, and quite relevant, I think. I cried and cried and cried at the end. The moral of the story, from my perspective, is that regardless of the many different kinds of ferocious and dangerous animals in the world, truly the only ones that can be called "monsters" are men. Animals kill to survive; we kill for pleasure and profit.
Other people that I have mentioned this to however, commented on how 'apparently' it was because of the desire to give the film a bit of a retro feel.
I find myself looking towards this explanation, because I am unwilling to accept that anyone could think that these scene looked realistic in any way.
Carl
Havea look what I said back when it was out at the flicks http://www.nakedcleaner.com/index.php/2005/12/22/king-pong/
That particular scene you are talking about was ultimate lesson on how not to overdo special effects.
Keep it simple and real. We are not in the 80s or in the 90s when you can bedazzle the audience just by making showing us giant dinasaur or panning the camera over the cliff expecting us to go ooohh aaahhhh.
We want to be immersed in the special effects with both our brains and hearts.
Today you not only have to get your depth, light sources correct and dinasaur expressions right but they all have to be intelligently woven with the humans correctly.
To me this movie was bit B grade and the special effects unduly exaggerated.
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