What The Film?! is a new weekly column exclusive to Under The Gun Review that brings to light the plot holes Hollywood hoped you’d never notice. Written by comedy writer Dane Sager, this column shows no mercy to films that try and pull the proverbial wool over our eyes.

If you know a film with major plot holes that you feel needs to be exposed, tell us! Email utgjames@gmail.com with the subject “What The Film” and we’ll try to get your suggestion featured on the site.

This Week’s Movie: 1933’s & 2005’s King Kong
(Suggested by UTG’s own James Shotwell)

King Kong is one of the very first movie icons. When it was released in 1933, it was a landmark in movie production. The acting, the story, the special effects, everything that this movie did was never seen before. This movie didn’t just set the bar higher for other movies, it set it so high that only some sort of gigantic ape creature could reach it.

Of course he's smiling, he's playing “Keep Away” with the rest of Hollywood.

Film legend Merian C. Cooper came up with the idea for King Kong when he was young, having a fascination with Gorillas and other exotic creatures from Africa. He eventually came up with an vague outline about a pack of Gorillas fighting Komodo Dragons. As this idea was tweaked over the years, it gradually became one gigantic Gorilla fighting Dinosaurs. As someone who has seen all versions of King Kong multiple times, the sentence “One gigantic Gorilla fighting Dinosaurs” still gets me excited

Even Gorillaz fighting Dinosaurs sounds awesome. Someone call Jamie Hewlett.

The movie grew beyond the simple spectacle of a giant Gorilla fighting Dinosaurs, adding human characters, an uncharted island, “I’m not sure what Race this is racist towards but that’s racist” natives, human sacrifice, and a finale set in the dense urban jungle of Manhattan. The climax is one of the most iconic film sequences of all time. All these elements were blended together perfectly to create one of the most thrilling adventure movies ever made. Had these elements not been added and the movie stayed as its original premise, it would have been a mindless specter being 1930s equivalent to Transformers.

Someone please tell me why a robot that has guns and cannons built into it need a sword.

King Kong follows a production team as they venture to an uncharted island to make a movie together. Once they arrive at the island, the natives promptly capture the movie’s female lead (Ann) and attempt to sacrifice her to the title character: Kong.

The rest of the movie crew attempt to rescue Ann, battling various dinosaurs; Triceratops, Brontosauruses, Tyrannosauruses, and even gigantic crabs and spiders. Kong, on the other side of the island has grown attached to Ann, and rather than killing her for health (did anyone else play Rampage? No? Oh, never mind then), he ends up taking care of her, also battling many dinosaurs to protect her.

Come on, guys, this game was awesome.

Eventually the film crew rescues Ann and subdues Kong. With their movie in shambles, they take Kong back to New York in chains, presenting him in a theater for money. Kong breaks his chains, grabs Ann and runs off. The military arrives and tries to kill Kong, causing him to get even more angry because he’s doesn’t want Ann to be hurt. Eventually Kong scales the Empire State Building, all the while being attacked by biplanes. After a few moments of holding them off, Kong ultimately falls 102 stories to his death. The director of the failed movie then looks upon his dead body and utters one of the most famous lines in movie history.

“Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me, aren't you?

King Kong was a massive gorilla, his height changing between several movies from forty feet tall to seventy feet tall. He’s one of the very few creatures to have defeated Godzilla (in 1962’s King Kong Vs. Godzilla). He is an insane powerhouse, they all knew this, and they decided that taking it to the ultra crowded Manhattan was the best place for him. In Jurassic Park, inGen at least had the common sense to put the Dinosaurs on an island.

“Dane, Kong was important to those natives on the island. The dinosaurs weren’t! Kong was a much more important creature to them!” Yes, that’s true, but the vaguely-racist natives on Skull Island were never their demographic. The people on the island are in no way a good indicator about how Manhattan would appreciate it. Specially if the people in Manhattan knew that the team decided to not bring Dinosaurs to New York, then Kong is just another large ape.

No one on the team points out that maybe bringing a dinosaur, a smaller creature incapable of scaling buildings whose skeletons alone fill everyone with amazement and wonder, back to Manhattan. They see the gorilla and they’re not phased by the dinosaurs. There’s little if any shock towards dinosaurs. Dinosaurs are such an amazing discovery that if Jurassic Park was real and people died there regularly, I would still fight tooth and nail to get there.

This was the best part of the movie.

It’s a common problem in a lot of different movies. A normal person sees one strange thing and is then totally immune to anything strange that happens afterward. There’s a massive lack of amazement. Movie present a character with something peculiar and they immediately accept this new reality and nothing is shocking to them ever again. It’s a cheap way to get around the fact that a normal human being in these situations would be messing themselves and screaming constantly.

This exact opposite problem exists in the Harry Potter movies where Harry is amazed at everything, even in the 7^th and 8^th movie. He’s shown new spells, items, ideas, and they’re all so incredibly shocking to him despite the fact that this has been his world for almost half his life now. Harry, you went back in time in the 3^rd movie, how can anything in this universe surprise you?

“Wow, so does that mean-” IT'S MAGIC, IT CAN DO ANYTHING, YOU BITCH

Dane is currently in the process of fighting off demons with a small stick. You can help fight off the demons by following him on Tumblr or Twitter!

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Dane Sager

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