Fay Wray, Beauty to Kong's Beast, Dies at 96

The New York Times ^ | 08/09/2004

[UnklGene]

[eastsider]

I saw them doing the remake of KK at the WTC. I miss the WTC.

I took my kid sister to the shoot at the WTC for the final scene. Everytime the crowd rushed the corpse of King Kong, people would start pulling hair out of it for souvenirs. The director would yell, "Cut!," the offenders would be escorted off the set, the crew would fix up Kong, and we'd start all over again. Lots of fun, great memories : )

[UnklGene]

[Doctor Stochastic]

I seem to remember that King Kong was the only movie in which she was a blonde.

[ServesURight]

King Kong is the original summer blockbuster movie. For a 1933 movie it was way ahead of its time.

Peter Jackson will screw up the remake, like the 1976 version that starred Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lange. I don't understand why Hollywood just can't remaster the original and re-release it back in theaters.

[12 Gauge Mossberg]

Warner Brothers screwed up BIG TIME by not re-releasing King Kong in 2003 (on the 70th anniversary of it's release).

It just goes to show you how vapid and clueless H'wood is. I understand that Peter Jackson (LOTR) is making a remake. Ugh! I'll take cheesy stop-motion effects over computerized special-effects anyday.

[UnklGene]

'And lo, the beast looked on the face of beauty...

[Wiggins]

I agree with you about the computerized special effects. To me they give a cartoonish look to a movie.

[bruin66]

If the villagers wanted to keep Kong out, why did they put a door in the wall?

[weegee]

The thing for me is "we know it's fake, does it look cool".

Stop motion animation was only ever done in the film by a relatively small number of special effects people so a lot the technique is consistently applied.

Ray Harryhausen and Willis O'Brien (and later Dave Allen) all were able to put some personality into their sculptures and in the movements they gave the figures.

The skeletons in Jason & the Argonauts, Kong, et al may look "fake" but it's a good fake. With computer editing, motion blur could even be added now (and matting is much better than in old days).

I think that the bigger factor is cost (although computers aren't cheap).

I will say that Gollum in the second LOTR movie approaches the sophistication of stop motion animation dazzle. I still haven't seen the third film (missed it in the theaters and am waiting for the extended DVD).

I don't have high hopes for 21st Century Kong (Jack Black and others in the cast strike me as populism over ability).

[12 Gauge Mossberg]

I agree with you about the computerized special effects. To me they give a cartoonish look to a movie.

Yep. That's why the 1998 Godzilla movie bombed. Give me the old Godzilla anyday.

[weegee]

I've seen the WB archive print and the film is already in flawless condition (better than ever definition and contrast).

I think this is in part due to a print that was located in England in the 1990s.

Some other countries have released Kong to DVD but I don't know how good the quality is.

[weegee]

The plot and character designs of the American Godzilla film were lousy as well.

Godzilla 2000 was a return to form with an extended (something like 20 minute) fight scene. It is glorified wrestling; not "dinosaur invades NYC and births 2000 'Raptors".

[weegee]

Oil firefighter Red Adair.

[Jimmy Valentine]

"If the villagers wanted to keep Kong out, why did they put a door in the wall?"

A truly Existential question.

Regards,

[PISANO]

To this day the original is the BEST KONG ever made. IMHO, also the best beauty to all the beasts that made it to celluloid. A big inpact on this kid in in the black bottom "FORTIES".

God rest her soul!!

[Borges]

This is the original 1933 movie review from the NY Times. Check out the bit I bolded. Sub-literacy amongst journalists is older then we thought. KING KONG By MORDAUNT HALL Published: March 3, 1933 At both the Radio City Music Hall and the RKO Roxy, which have a combined seating capacity of 10,000, the main attraction now is a fantastic film known as King Kong. The story of this feature was begun by the late Edgar Wallace and finished by Merian C. Cooper, who with his old associate, Ernest B. Schoedsack, is responsible for the production. It essays to give the spectator a vivid conception of the terrifying experiences of a producer of jungle pictures and his colleagues, who capture a gigantic ape, something like fifty feet tall, and bring it to New York. The narrative is worked out in a decidedly compelling fashion, which is mindful of what was done in the old silent film The Lost World. Through multiple exposures, processed "shots," and a variety of angles of camera wizardry, the producers set forth an adequate story and furnish enough thrills for any devotee of such tales. Although there are vivid battles between prehistoric monsters on the island which Denham, the picturemaker, insists on visiting, it is when the enormous ape, called Kong, is brought to this city that the excitement reaches its highest pitch. Imagine a fifty-foot beast with a girl in one paw climbing up the outside of the Empire State Building, and after putting the girl on a ledge, clutching at airplanes, the pilots of which are pouring bullets from machine guns into the monster's body. It often seems as though Ann Redman, who goes through more terror than any of the other characters in the film, would faint, but she always appears to be able to scream. Her body is like a doll in the claw of the gigantic beast, who in the course of his wanderings through Manhattan tears down a section of the elevated railroad and tosses a car filled with passengers to the street. Automobiles are mere missiles for this Kong, who occasionally reveals that he relishes his invincibility by patting his chest. Denham is an intrepid person, but it is presumed that when the ape is killed he has had quite enough of searching for places with strange monsters. In the opening episode he is about to leave on the freighter for the island supposed to have been discovered by some sailor, when he goes ashore to find a girl whom he wants to act in his picture. In course of time he espies Ann, played by the attractive Fay Wray, and there ensues a happy voyage. Finally, through the fog, the island is sighted and Denham, the ship's officers and sailors, all armed, go ashore. It soon develops that the savages, who offer up sacrifices in the form of human beings to Kong, their super-king, keep him in an area surrounded by a great wall. Kong has miles in which to roam and fight with brontosauri and dinosauri and other huge creatures. There is a door to the wall. After Denham and the others from the ship have had quite enough of the island, Kong succeeds in bursting open the door, but he is captured through gas bombs hurled at him by the white men. How they ever get him on the vessel is not explained, for the next thing you know is that Kong is on exhibition in Gotham, presumably in Madison Square Garden. During certain episodes in this film Kong, with Ann in his paw, goes about his battles, sometimes putting her on a fifty-foot high tree branch while he polishes off an adversary. When he is perceived on exhibition in New York he is a frightening spectacle, but Denham thinks that he has the beast safely shackled. The newspaper photographers irritate even him with their flashlights, and after several efforts he breaks the steel bands and eventually gets away. He looks for Ann on the highways and byways of New York. He climbs up hotel façades and his head fills a whole window, his white teeth and red mouth adding to the terror of the spectacle. Everywhere he moves he crushes out lives. He finally discovers Ann, and being a perspicacious ape, he decides that the safest place for himself and Ann is the tower of the Empire State structure. Needless to say that this picture was received by many a giggle to cover up fright. Constant exclamations issued from the Radio City Music Hall yesterday. "What a man!" observed one youth when the ape forced down the great oaken door on the island. Human beings seem so small that one is reminded of Defoe's Gulliver's Travels. One step and this beast traverses half a block. If buildings hinder his progress, he pushes them down, and below him the people look like Lilliputians. Miss Wray goes through her ordeal with great courage. Robert Armstrong gives a vigorous and compelling impersonation of Denham. Bruce Cabot, Frank Reicher, Sam Hardy, Noble Johnson, and James Flavin add to the interest of this weird tale. KING KONG (MOVIE

[Graymatter]

She played Leslie Nielsen's mother in "Tammy and the Bachelor." Debbie Reynolds movie. 1956-ish. :)

[Graymatter]

"If the villagers wanted to keep Kong out, why did they put a door in the wall?"

Well they didn't want to keep him out altogether. They wanted to control the circumstances and make a sort of sacrament of the experience. It being so very scary and potentially fatal. Kong was taboo. Taboo, it's like cooking with rum, you have to know exactly what you're doing, and do it in small doses, or else you wind up in the gutter.

Nothin' existenshal about it! :P

[Keith in Iowa]

>>>Rick James, Fay Wray. Who'll be number three?

If you're not talking entertainment people, Ms. Wray would be #3...James, Red Adair, and Wray in this batch...