My Review of "Kong: Skull Island"

Kong: Skull Island is the second big Warner Brothers MonsterVerse movie that came out back in 2017. I'm not a huge fan of the MonsterVerse as I feel that the quality of their movies are on a decline after each iteration. Though this one is probably one of my favorites of the MonsterVerse series.

This movie starts off in the 1940s during the Pacific portion of World War II. Here we have 2 opposing pilots crashing onto a mysterious island. One of the pilots is American and the other one is Japanese. When they both crash land they come at each other in order to kill one another. This all suddenly stops when they realize there's a gigantic gorilla watching them.

We then cut to the end of the Vietnam war in the 1970s. A group of military men are about to go home but are put on one last mission. The mission is orchestrated by a mysterious group called Monarch. They basically look at paranormal phenomenon and they recently received satellite images of a mysterious unexplored island.

Of course if they have to investigate they have to get the best people to help them out. So on this trip we have a bunch of scientists, a tracker, a photographer and military men. It's a weird amalgamation of people but it's not a movie where you have to make sense of a lot of things.

Their job is to find out what is up with this mysterious island and perhaps kill whatever is there to ensure the preservation of mankind. That obviously goes awry when they discover what really is up with this island.

I like a lot of things about this movie. They have a lot of different perspectives. We have a military leader who is angry about the loss of his men. He wants to seek revenge but Kong may be his Moby Dick as well. There are the compassionate observers that try to do good throughout the travels. We also have the indifferent individuals that kind of get stuck between the two extremes.

This movie does a good job in balancing the perspectives without us groaning too much. Again you're going to have to take this movie as it is because there's a lot of logic you have to throw out the window to enjoy this one. One small thing throughout the movie is that the photographer is able to continue to take photos of everything with only one wide angle lens. I thought this was hilarious but then again there's a lot of weird things in this movie that are like this.

To enjoy this movie the most you have to watch this in 4k and Dolby Atmos. This movie is a very advanced movie. The special effects are absolutely amazing and the sound effects are mind blowing. They have little nuanced sounds flying around everywhere that will have you moving your head around wondering where the sound was coming from. The night scenes will especially be appreciated with higher resolution as well.

One of the highlight characters was the Hank character. He's the American pilot that had been marooned on the mysterious island for 30 years. His character breathes a lot of life with color and comedy. Otherwise the tone of the movie is quite serious. I like the fact that the comedy that they added wasn't over the top. It's just to give a little levity to the otherwise intense moments.

Overall, I've seen this movie quite a few times over the years and I have to say that it is still pretty entertaining. It's more of a popcorn ride than anything and sometimes we need that in our lives. That's why I have to give this one a 7 out of 10. Don't expect this one to be a masterpiece, however it is a very entertaining movie. Just don't think too much while you're watching it.