The Son of Kong (1933)

The Son of Kong (1933) must rate as one of the least known sequels in cinematic history.  Rushed into production by RKO to cash in on the success of its progenitor, King Kong (1933), the film didn't do anywhere near as well at the box office.  Spurned by audiences and largely dismissed by critics, the movie has garnered a reputation as an unworthy successor and consequently isn't as screened as frequently as the original.  In truth, it was always going to be an impossible task to create a follow up to a film as sensational and phenomenal as King Kong, no matter the quality of Son of Kong, it was never going to be judged on its own merits, doomed to forever live in the shadow of his cinematic father.  The writers, too, realised the impossibility of their task, opting for a much smaller scale story that, most crucially, placed the emphasis upon humour, with the titular character effectively becoming the comic relief to his human co-stars.  Moreover, with the film's short production scale, Willis O'Brien simply didn't have time to produce the extensive stop-motion sequences of the original, something reflected in the story line, which spends some two-thirds of its length in scene-setting, skullduggery in exotic Far Eastern ports and a mutiny at sea.  The final third rushes through a new adventure on Skull Island, where the titular character, referred to by other characters as 'Little Kong', finally appears, before it all rolls to a cataclysmic and somewhat abrupt ending.

The film is notable for its fidelity to the conclusion of the original, (although, in truth, it had no choice really, as King Kong was still on release and fresh in cinema goers minds), with Carl Denham being sued for damages by everyone in sight following Kong's rampage through New York.  To escape his creditors, he sails off to he Far East with Captain Engelhorn, in search of cargoes.  Winding up in the port of Dakang, everything now stops for a musical number from the film's leading lady Hilda, the daughter of the guy who runs a performing monkey show.  The latter is killed in a fight with shady ship-less Captain Helstrom, coincidentally the man who sold Denham the charts showing Skull Island, who is forced to escape a possible investigation by sailing with Engelhorn and Denham, on the pretext that he knows of a treasure hidden on the island.  Hilda stows away on the ship and with Denham, Engelhorn, Helstrom and Charlie the cook, are cast adrift in a boat following a mutiny.  Naturally, they end up on Skull Island.  This time around, though, Skull Island doesn't seem to be quite as teeming with prehistoric life as before, but Denham and Hilda help rescue an eighteen foot tall white ape, possibly King's offspring from a swamp, earning his friendship.  Separated from the rest of the group, they and 'Little Kong' stumble on the real treasure of Skull Island, before a volcano erupts and the island sinks beneath the waves.  'Little Kong' drowns saving Denham and they all get way on their boat, (except Helstrom, who is eaten by a plesiosaur) and are picked up by a passing ship.  All of this is packed into less tan seventy minutes of running time.

Son of Kong's biggest problem is that, despite its short running time, it drags quite badly, seemingly taking forever to get to Skull Island, then hurrying through these scenes with indecent haste.  The whole first two thirds of the film are all too obviously there simply to pad out the running time until we get to Skull Island and the stop motion sequences everyone has been waiting for.  As noted, for practical reasons, these couldn't be anywhere near as extensive as those in King Kong, but what we do get are actually pretty decent.  While we don't get as many monsters as in the first film, we do get a cave bear, which 'Little Kong' fights, a Nothosaur, also fought and defeated by Kong, a rather good Styracosaurus, that chases Engelhorn, Charlie and Helstrom and the aforementioned plesiosaur.   While their screen time is limited, the standard of the animation is, if anything, some what better than in the original, with the creatures moving much more smoothly and naturally.  Clearly, the experience learned from King Kong allowed O'Brien and his team to improve their techniques.  This is especially evident in 'Little Kong', not only is he scaled far more consistently than his father had been, but his movements are less jerky and his fur doesn't constantly betray the fingermarks of the animators.  Most impressively, his face is far more emotive, allowing a far greater degree of characterisation than had been possible with Kong himself.  Clearly playing upon the fact that, despite being pitched by the studio as a villain, King Kong had been seen by audiences as a sympathetic character, the sequel goes all out to portray 'Little Kong' as a likeable, loyal and eventually heroic sidekick.  As noted, he provides most of the comic relief, with his curiosity, clumsiness and over eagerness to please resulting in a number of slapstick sequences, his face constantly registering varying degrees of shock and surprise.  (It could be argued that he is suspiciously close to the characterisation used for black comic relief characters in many films of the era - even his facial features are reminiscent of the common cartoon caricatures of black men).

All of which makes his demise somewhat jarring, putting a pall over the few remaining minutes of the film.  Indeed, this unevenness of tone is another of the film's problems, with the comedic antics of 'Little Kong' sitting uneasily alongside the other, more ferocious monsters, not to mention the murder and the mutiny, which are played straight.  While it is true that The Son of Kong is a somewhat underwhelming sequel to what is probably the greatest monster movie of all time - certainly the most influential, as it set the format for the genre - that was inevitable.  After all, how do you follow up a forty foot gorilla trashing New York and swatting biplanes from the top of the Empire State building?  By making it bigger?  Putting more monsters in the mix?  Both strategies have been tried by both the original Japanese Godzilla series and the more recent US series with, in both cases, rapidly diminishing returns.  Son of Kong's decision to instead pursue a comedic approach, with a smaller, less scary and more audience friendly version of the original's protagonist was at least innovative, if not particularly successful.  (Turning the monster protagonists more audience friendly was also a strategy adopted, with varying degrees of success by both series of Godzilla movies).  It's still a film worth watching, if only for curiosity's sake and 'Little Kong' is actually quite an engaging character, even if he isn't exactly a chip off of the old block.