Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
An oil company expedition disturbs the peace of a giant ape and brings him back to New York to exploit him.
The 1976 King Kong remake updates the setting to the World Trade Center and adds an oil-company satire angle, but the script is clunky and the characters are thinly drawn. Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lange (in her debut) do reasonable work but are hampered by weak material. The cinematography has some striking moments, particularly in the jungle sequences and the climactic tower scenes, though it lacks the grandeur it reaches for. As a remake it adds little that is genuinely distinctive beyond its contemporary trappings, feeling largely derivative of the 1933 original's concept without meaningfully surpassing or reimagining it. The ending, mirroring the original's tragic fall but relocated to the Twin Towers, carries some emotional weight even if it is not elegantly executed.