Kong Takes the Lead in ‘Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire’

Somehow, it has come to pass that we are living in the age of the intelligent giant monster movie. The trend probably started with Peter Jackson’s excellent 2005 remake of “King Kong,” a lovingly-crafted homage to the 1933 classic. It then picked up steam in 2013 and ’14 with two very-well made and successful monster epics, Guillermo del Toro’s “Pacific Rim” and Gareth Edwards’s version of “Godzilla.” The latter launched what became known as the “MonsterVerse” franchise, with one film roughly every two years. Disappointingly, Mr. Edwards has not returned to the series, though he did direct “Rogue One,” generally regarded as the best of Disney Star Wars films. Still, there have been five MonsterVerse movies in 10 years, all of which are worth watching, especially “Kong: Skull Island” (2017), the reboot of everybody’s favorite giant ape on his own favorite dinosaur-laden island.The fourth MonsterVerse entry, “Godzilla vs. Kong” (2021) was a huge surprise on many levels: First, it somehow was a major hit, despite being released in the middle of the pandemic moment and well before movie theaters had reopened. As a piece of film-making, it was way better than most of us were expecting: More than a colossal slugfest, it had believable human characters and a compelling story to frame the anticipated bout. If there’s anything movie audiences like even better than two gigantic monsters slugging it out, it’s a conspiracy narrative about a monolithic corporation trying to keep a dark secret under wraps. Everyone knows that corporations are way more sinister than mega beasts.That 2021 success clearly called for a follow-up, and three years later, here it is. I think it’s fair to say “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” is a step down from “Godzilla vs. Kong” — both are directed by Adam Wingard, but this time the larger story is less interesting and more muddled. The largely repeated cast is less engaging, though it’s rejuvenated by the presence of Dan Stevens of “Downton Abbey” fame playing a freewheeling hipster veterinarian/monster wrangler, a role roughly analogous to Christopher Pratt’s in the recent “Jurassic Park” trilogy. At one point, another character addresses him as “Ace Ventura.” “Godzilla x Kong” opens appealingly with the voice of a country and western legend, Eddy Arnold, crooning “Welcome to My World” as we pan over “Hollow Earth.” This underground realm was first discovered in the 2021 film though certainly anticipated by Edgar Rice Burroughs, that greatest of fantasy world-builders, in his “Pellucidar” novels a hundred years ago. The film spends most of its 115 minutes in this locale, though there are crowd-pleasing shots of Godzilla (mostly) trudging through and oftimes inadvertently destroying recognizable landmarks of the world, reducing the great pyramids to rubble and taking a snooze in the Roman coliseum.Throughout there are surprises galore — minor spoilers follow — like man-eating trees, a tribe of giant apes led by a renegade who seems to follow the playbook of “The Lion King,” and an enormous infant ape, the most appealing fantasy film toddler since Baby Yoda. Also, there’s Kong being enhanced with a bionic-ish arm, not to mention a largely wasted cameo appearance by Mothra. The titanic insect, alas, doesn’t get much to do — maybe in the next movie he’ll fly into a giant closet and have to contend with massive mothballs. Nothing in the film is as interesting as Kong himself. In the MonsterVerse incarnation, he’s fully 300 or more feet tall, as opposed to 30-40 feet in 1933; a fall from the Empire State Building would hardly damage this big boy. As animated by the CGI artists, Kong is by far the most credible character here, more so than Mr. Stevens as Trapper or even Kaylee Hottle as Jia, an indigenous girl who communicates with Kong through signing. Most of the picture is Kong on his own, which makes sense because they haven’t quite figured out how to make Godzilla expressive; radioactive yes, but not expressive. Ultimately it’s Kong’s movie — like “Sleepless in Seattle,” the two titular protagonists don’t share the same scenes until near the end. Even though Godzilla is again top-billed, he seems relegated to serving as, please forgive the expression, second banana to Kong. Perhaps the only battle really worth fighting is the one for the audience’s empathy, and here, Godzilla doesn’t stand a chance.It’s worth noting that the trailers preceding “Godzilla x Kong” include a new Jordan Peele-produced fight flick called “Monkey Man” and the latest in the “Planet of the Apes” reboot franchise. I’m really looking forward to the latter, but I certainly don’t see a trend here, not at all.Correction: “Sleepless in Seattle” is the film in which the protagonists don’t share the same scenes until the end. An earlier version misstated the film’s name.

Kong Takes the Lead in ‘Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire’

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