The Son of Kong, plus Creation and The New Adventures of King Kong



The Son of Kong was rushed into production so quickly that it was in theaters by the end of 1933, the same year as the original King Kong. Sadly the sequel isn't really up to the same standards of the original.

The one thing I really like about Son is that as the film starts out Carl Denham (Robert Armstrong) is being sued by everyone in New York City. When a friendly process server(!) lets Denham know that he's about to be indicted Denham does the manly thing and flees to Indonesia on the Venture with Captain Englehorn. At one stop they pick up Helene (Helen Mack), a bad novelty singer, and Hellstrom, the man who provided Denham with the map to Skull Island in the first place. Hellstom tells Denham that there's a huge treasure on Skull Island, so everyone decides to risk becoming dino chow to get rich.



On Skull Island Denham and Helen find Kong's son, who is about half the size of his father and has white fur. Sonny boy is also much more friendly to humans, even comic. Of course it isn't long until all kinds of dangerous animals attack, including a giant bear, a four-legged carnivorous dinosaur, a Styracosaurus, and a sea serpent.

The special effects aren't nearly as elaborate as the first film, though a couple of little Kong's fights are pretty impressive, though played for laughs. Perhaps the biggest letdown about Son is that where the original film practically raced through the set-up and eschewed the kind filler that most movies in the 1930's had, Son has that filler in spades. First there's the interminable comic relief of the process server, then there's a monkey show, then we have to sit through all of Helene's song. Then there's a subplot about how Hellstrom killed Helene's father, and you've killed half the movie on stuff that doesn't really have anything to do with Skull Island.



Before King Kong, special effects wizard Willis O'Brien had been working on a movie called Creation. Creation was scuttled by Kong, but in many ways Creation is the prototype for the big ape movie. The new DVD of King Kong includes a telling of Creation using the film treatment and sketches by O'Brien. The plot is ripped-off whole from the Edgar Rice Burroughs novel The Land that Time Forgot. A yacht sinks in a storm and the passengers are rescued by a sub. The sub accidently finds itself in an underwater cavern that leads to the interior of a volcanic island where dinosaurs still live. Highlights would have included an Arsinotherium attack and a fight between a Tyrannosaurus and a Stegosaurus.

There is one last unmade Kong sequel worth mentioning, called The New Adventures of King Kong. According to the book King Kong: The History of a Movie Icon by Ray Morton this was first proposed by Kong producer Merian C. Cooper in 1934 as a way of continuing the franchise. A sort of flashback, it would have told the tale of the Venture's trip away from Skull Island after Kong was captured. The ship runs ashore in Malaysia, and the crew attacked by more giant monsters. The only way they can survive is to release Kong and hope he kills these other monsters. Other sources say O'Brien was trying to sell a movie by the same name to studios in the eary 1950's, but I'm not sure if it's the same film.

Posted: Mon - December 19, 2005 at      

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