Cult-TV Theme Watch: Lizards

In real life -- at least officially -- we’ve never encountered aliens.   

And because of that fact, many cult-television series about visitors from other worlds have sought to portray them as variations of familiar but inhuman Earth life: snake people, insect people, or, frequently, lizard people.

Why do lizards prove endlessly appealing as surrogates for alien life forms? 

Well, they are cold-blooded (using exothermic means to regulate body temperature) for one thing, a quality which, metaphorically-speaking portends a very different and apparently less “warm” nature than cuddly mammals. 

For another, our planet’s own pre-history suggests that lizards might have been the dominant life-form if things were just a little different. Dinosaurs ruled the Earth for a significant span, and if a meteor strike hadn’t driven them to extinction, they might have risen to prominence, while mammals became just…dinner.  Indeed, this is the background of the famous Silurians from Doctor Who, first seen in 1970 in the Jon Pertwee era.  The Silurians awoke from hibernation to discover the interloper man ruling their world.

The most famous cult-tv lizard people, perhaps, are The Visitors from V: The Series (1985) and the two mini-series that preceded that program.  These fascist lizard-people from Sirius came to Earth in search of water and food, but sought to gain these resources through underhanded and violent means.

Throughout the series, the Visitors, led by the diabolical Diana (Jane Badler), are seen eating hamsters, guinea pigs, rats, and other small creatures.  Their true, reptilian nature is discovered by cameraman Mike Donovan (Marc Singer).  Underneath their human masks, they are humanoid lizards, green-skinned, scaly, and with forked-tongues.

Various incarnations of Star Trek have also featured alien lizards.  Captain Kirk overcame his (innate?) fear and distaste of lizards to spare the Gorn’s life in “Arena.” 

Meanwhile, Captain Picard and his crew hosted the reptilian Selay -- known to eat their enemies, the mammalian Anticans -- on “Lonely Among Us.”   An early episode of Deep Space Nine, “Captive Pursuit,” depicted a race of hunters from the Gamma Quadrant who used a lizard-like alien called Tosk as prey.

In Star Trek: Voyager, the episode “Distant Origin” involved alien lizard people in the Delta Quadrant called “Voth.”  The Voth had a repressive society that refused to acknowledge that their people might have originated on Earth, on a planet populated by mammals.  Voyager was pinpointed as a kind of space age missing link.

In more terrestrial, horror genre cult-television, lizards have also made several important appearances.  The second season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer features an episode titled “Reptile Boy,” about a secret fraternity society (think Skull and Bones) sacrificing teenage girls to a lizard-like demon, Machida.

Meanwhile, the eighth season X-Files episode “Alone,” finds Doggett (Robert Patrick) and Mulder (David Duchovny) tracking a dangerous lizard/human hybrid in a dank tunnel system beneath a wealthy estate.   This is the first episode in which the two male investigators team up, and begin to develop a sense of trust.  The lizard, a solitary creature by comparison, hunts alone and depends on a blinding venom, not social interaction.

In MTV’s Teen Wolf (2011 – 2012), Scott (Tyler Posey) and his friends come up against a shape-shifting lizard creature called a Kanima.  Worse, they think the indestructible lizard may be one of their friends (or at least teammates…) from high school.   The lizard seeks a "master," and finds it in a truly reptilian personality, Allison's grandfather (Michael Hogan).

The Cult-TV Faces of: Lizards

Identified by Dave Colohan: The Gorn from Star Trek: "Arena."

Identified by Dave Colohan: The Lizard from Spider-Man (1967)

Identified by Dave Colohan: "The Sentry" from Kolchak: The Night Stalker.

4

Identified by Dave Colohan: Lulu from The Land of the Lost.

Identified by Dave Colohan: The Imperious Leader from Battlestar Galactica.

Identified by Dave Colohan: Buck Rogers: "Mark of the Saurian."

Identified by Dave Colohan: Diana (Jane Badler) from V.

Identified by Carl: The Selay of ST: TNG: "Lonely Among Us."

10

Identified by Carl: Tosk on DS9: "Captive Pursuit."

12

Identified by Carl: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: "Reptile Boy."

Identified by woodchuckgod: A Scarran on Farscape.

Identified by Carl: The X-Files: "Alone."

Identified by Carl: Star Trek: Enterprise.

Identified by Dave Colohan: Anna from V (2009).

18

Identified by Dave Colohan: A Silurian from the new Doctor Who.

Television and Cinema Verities #47

"I'm a Roger Corman baby. Just keep rolling, baby. You've got to get something on there. Maybe it's right. Maybe it's wrong. Maybe you can fix it later. Maybe you can't. You can't imagine the things that come up when you're making a movie where you've got to adjust on the spot."

- Jack Nicholson discusses his beginnings in Roger Corman's low-budget cinema, at MTV News in 2007.

Cult-TV Blogging: The Starlost: "The Pisces" (October 13, 1973)

It strikes me, at this relatively early juncture in the episode retrospective, that The Starlost (1973 – 1974) episodes that work best are those that don’t push too hard in terms of action, and the ones that don’t feature Devon, Garth and Rachel in diametric opposition to hostile cultures and foes. 

In part this is because our heroes aren’t trained warriors or scientists.  They boast no expertise in fact, and know relatively little about their world.  To believe that these farmers from Cypress Corners can overcome entrenched power in biosphere after biosphere stretches the imagination to its breaking point.

For whatever its flaws, “Lazarus from the Mist” avoided this problem.  That episode boasted a sense of grace and humanity about it.  The story was about a man awakened from a cryonic vault, reckoning with his own death, and with the death of all those he had loved.  Garth, Devon and Rachel needed only respond as caring, sympathetic human beings.

“The Pisces” is another perhaps better-than-average episode of The Starlost, and it follows the example set down by “Lazarus from the Mist.”  It’s a human tragedy, and there aren’t any real bad guys to fight or defeat.  There are no cultures to set right, either.   Instead, the episode is all about people confronting unpleasant reality.

Here, a small spaceship called the Pisces returns to the Ark after over four hundred years away.  Unfortunately, the ship’s crew -- consisting of Col. Garoway (Lloyd Bochner), Navigator Teale (Carol Lazare), and Janice (Diana Barrington) -- has been through a “time dilation,” and believes that only ten years 

have passed in its absence.  The crew is shocked to learn families, friends and all lovers are long gone. 

Devon (Keir Dullea) attempts to explain the situation, but finds that the crew is reluctant to face reality.  Soon, medical scans reveal that Garoway and his crew are also suffering deleterious biological effects from the time dilation.  They suddenly lapse into durations sleep because their bodies are, essentially, hundreds of years old.  Only by returning through the time dilation can this condition be repaired. 

And no, you shouldn’t make a joke about how viewers of The Starlost may also suffer from this sudden, unexpected narcolepsy while watching, though there’s a ring of truth to the observation…

Anyway, at episode’s end, the crew leaves the Ark aboard the Pisces, perhaps to return to Earth after all this time.

“The Pisces” sounds like a straight-forward story, and indeed it is.  Operating on a low-budget, perhaps it was wise of The Starlost production team not to stretch resources too much, and focus on basics.  Like “Lazarus from the Mist,” the story is impressive in the sense that it doesn’t feel the need to be about anything particularly grand or epic.

There are some continuity points worth noting, however.  As the episode starts, we see that Devon, Garth and Rachel have apparently taken up residence in a sort of quarters/apartment near the docking bay.  We never saw them find these particular quarters.  The episode just begins with them resting there.

Secondly, this is the first episode in which Devon and his friends actually leave the Ark.  They travel for a time aboard the Pisces (a new miniature for the series, by the way), and at last get to see Earth Ship Ark from a distance, including a destroyed reactor tank.

Other than the human elements of the story I’ve mentioned above, about the only thing that bears further comment here is that it is growing a little suspicious that no one from the Ark’s operational heyday, not Col. Garoway here, and not the doctor from “Lazarus from the Mist,” helps Devon right the Ark’s course and avoid a collision with that “class G Star.” 

This aspect of the series is becoming positively Gilligan’s Island-esque.

Next week: “The Children of Methuselah.”

Saturday Morning Cult-TV Blogging: Land of the Lost: "Blackout" (November 29, 1975)

The final episode of Land of the Lost’s second season is called “Blackout,” and alas, it’s a bit of a retread. 

“Blackout” is essentially the same story as seen in “The Longest Day” and “One of Our Pylons is Missing.”  

In all three of these stories, something goes wrong with the smooth functioning of the Land of the Lost, and the Marshalls must step in and set things right, usually with some push-back from the (ignorant) Sleestak.  It’s a story about environmentalism, essentially, and shepherding the land wisely so that all may profit and prosper from it.

In “Blackout,” the Sleestak have made use of the secret second clock pylon to freeze time during the night.  They have done this foolish thing so that the the Altrusian moths, which fertilize Sleestak eggs, can proliferate in number, and thousands of Sleestak eggs will hatch.   Eternal night, they believe, will restore the Sleestak race to its former glory.

However, the Sleestak haven’t realized that without the warmth of the sun, the temperature will drop, and the moths will die out quickly.  In trying to improve their existence, the Sleestak have only endangered it.  Again, it's not difficult to read this as a metaphor for misuse of the environment.

Enik (Walker Edmiston) visits the Marshalls after questioning the Library of Skulls, and seeks Marshall’s help in convincing the Sleestaks of their error.  Because Rick Marshall has saved the Sleestak in the past, he can return to the Lost City on this occasion under the protection of a clause called “Altrusian Grace.”

As expected, the Marshalls set things right in the end, and all is well.

In all, “Blackout” is a safe, predictable and rather unsatisfying end to a strong season of this Sid and Marty Krofft series.  Stand-out episodes include “The Zarn,” “The Musician,” “Split Personality,” and the outstanding “The Pylon Express.”  

There have been some stinkers too (“Nice Day,” for instance), but overall the series offers many strong installments in its sophomore sortie.  What I like most about the second season is that it stretches the boundaries of the land, with episodes about Altrusia’s strange, pulsing heart (“One of Our Pylons is Missing,”) and a periodic portal between worlds (“The Pylon Express”).  Even in the weaker episodes there is a sense of consistency and order to this universe.

The third season of Land of the Lost -- which I start blogging next week -- absolutely changes the game.  Rick Marshall (Spencer Milligan) disappears from the series, replaced by Uncle Jack (Ron Harper), and many shifts in terms of continuity occur. 

But we’ll get to all that soon enough…

Next week: “After Shock.”

Thanksgiving Blogging: Godzilla (1954)

When I decided to feature Godzilla (1954) as part of my Thanksgiving monster-thon, I had an important decision to make. 

Should I review the Americanized Godzilla: King of Monsters -- which is the film I would have seen on WOR-9 TV in the seventies, and eighties -- or the original, unaltered Japanese version, which wasn’t released on DVD until 2004?

With apologies to nostalgia, I decided to choose the better film: the searing, gut-wrenching Japanese original.  Even today, it packs a visceral punch.

And after a diet of several King Kong movies, which concern, overall, an adventurous escape from modern life, it was a bit of a shock to countenance the grave, lugubrious, even mournful Godzilla.  

This is an unremittingly dark film, dominated by unsettling images of widespread destruction and human suffering.  Those images of disaster – and of a city on fire – are all the more uncomfortable because of Japanese and American history in the 20^th century.

I realize that many folks associate Godzilla movies (especially of the 1970s) with kiddie-matinees, rubber monsters, abundantly-obvious model-work and the like. Yet the original Godzilla endures as nothing less than an atomic age nightmare, and it is anything but juvenile. 

There are two galvanizing incidents roiling beneath the surface of this monster movie.  The first is the atomic bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima by America in August of 1945.  Today, these are still the only instances of nuclear warfare in human history. 

The second is the detonation of a 15-megaton American H-Bomb on Bikini Atoll, which irradiated 7,000 square miles of ocean.  The entire crew of a Japanese tuna boat, Lucky Dragon, later developed radiation sickness.

Godzilla mastermind and director Ishiro Honda utilizes these historical incidents as the seeds of his fantastic but meaningful story.   

As the film opens, nuclear testing near Japan has awakened a prehistoric goliath, or “deep sea organism,” a dinosaur-like creature with the power to emit radioactive fire breath.  Upon Godzilla’s awakening, several small fishing boats are destroyed at sea, their crews murdered in blinding, white-hot flashes.

A paleontologist, Dr. Yamane (Takashi Shimura), conducts research and determines Godzilla’s origin in the Jurassic Age.  He follows the monster’s (over-sized) trail to Odo Island, where the locals recount old legends of the monster Godzilla: a creature that lived in the ocean and fed on humanity to survive.  In ages past, the islanders conducted a kind of “exorcism” ritual (with native girls as sacrifices…) to appease Godzilla.

While Godzilla moves irrevocably closer to mainland Japan, the government establishes a “Counter Godzilla Headquarters” whose first gambit is to destroy the beast at sea with depth charges.  When that move fails to stop the beast’s progress, a second defense gambit is devised. It involves the construction of an electric fence along the coast to ensnare Godzilla.

That defense attempt fails as well, and Godzilla reduces most of Tokyo to rubble in a night of unending fire and smoke.  Dr. Yamane’s daughter, Emiko (Momoko Kochi), however, knows of a secret that could reverse Japan’s fortunes. 

Her former betrothed, Dr. Serizawa (Ahihiko Hirata) has developed a weapon even more deadly than atomic bombs, a so-called “oxygen destroyer.”  He has sworn her to secrecy about the device however, because he fears it will be taken out of his hands, and used on an international, even global scale.

With Godzilla’s reign of destruction unstopped, however, Serizawa must re-consider using the doomsday weapon.  He knows if he uses it, however, he must also die with Godzilla, so the oxygen destroyer will never be used again by mankind…

Godzilla commences with the strange mystery at sea regarding the sinking of several Japanese fishing ships (reflecting the Lucky Dragon incident), and then moves into a tale of epic destruction and survival.  One facet of the film that remains so effective, even today, is the almost whirlwind, documentary approach to the narrative.  Early on, Dr. Yamane delivers a briefing about Godzilla’s possible origins and nature, and it’s like we’re sitting in on a university lecture. 

Also, there’s a heated discussion -- or fight -- in the halls of Japanese government about whether or not to reveal Godzilla’s nature to the public.  These and other similar moments feel like the audience is eavesdropping on real conferences and legislatures.   It’s quite unique how the film “moves” from one plot to another with these meetings, briefings and other formal moments.  The characters, though very interesting (particularly in the love triangle of Ogata/Emiko/Serizawa) don’t dictate the flow of the story in any meaningful way until the final act.  That’s important, because this fact plays into the epic feel of the drama.  These men and women -- and all of Japan indeed -- are swept into a story beyond their control.

Beyond the documentary approach, Godzilla utilizes its atomic bogeyman as a metaphor or signifier for nuclear destruction, and accordingly many of the images feel like authentic documentary footage from the Hiroshima or Nagasaki aftermath.  For instance, at one point there is a long, deliberate pan across a ruined, twisted, formerly-urban landscape.  The scene is one of total desolation, a testament to the searing power of nuclear weapons (or Godzilla’s fire breath, as the case may be). 

A city once stood there, but now only twisted metal remains.

Shortly after that revelatory shot, other footage reveals doctors and nurses moving dozens of patients on stretchers into a make-shift hospital or recovery center.  The scene is one of human suffering on an almost impossible-to-believe scale.  The impression given is of a perpetual war-zone, a blazing hell on earth.

Godzilla pretty plainly uses the aftermath of Nagasaki and Hiroshima as its formative imagery, recalling a real-life nuclear terror not even a full decade in the past at the time of its production.   

 At one point, the detonations are even alluded to, albeit subtly, with a mother and daughter facing jeopardy from Godzilla.  The mother tells her daughter (bleakly…) that they are going to join the girl’s father in Heaven.  The inference is that he died at Nagasaki or Hiroshima.

The Honda film also reflects the dawning nuclear age in another trenchant way, namely in the character of Dr. Serizawa.  Pretty plainly, he is a surrogate for J. Robert Oppenheimer, the theoretical physicist who worked at the Manhattan Project and is known, historically as “The Father of the Atomic Bomb.”  According to interviews, Oppenheimer once remarked, after witnessing a test atomic bomb detonation that he had “become death” and a “destroyer of worlds.”  In a sense, Godzilla is Oppenheimer’s child, then.

Dr Serizawa in Godzilla is acutely aware that he might suffer the same fate as Oppenheimer, and may be remembered the same way…and he doesn’t want that.  His Oxygen-Destroyer is more destructive, more monstrous even than the H-Bomb, and Serizawa knows that it very rapidly would become the object of a new international arms race.  He makes a moral, individual decision, however, and decides that knowledge of the weapon should die with him (after he has burned his notes).  A second, post-nuclear arms race is thus averted through his individual sense of right and wrong, and his willingness to sacrifice himself.  

If Godzilla is a warning about the dangers of Pandora’s Box opened in the Atomic Age, then Serizawa himself is an indicator that the box can only be shut via the auspices of individual conscience.  Even though Serizawa has created something of monstrous destructive potential, he nonetheless possesses the moral barometer to see his work destroyed, not unloosed on the world.

Unfortunately, as the film’s ending reminds viewers, not all men are as noble or moral as Serizawa was.  As long as nuclear tests persist, Dr. Yamane warns, other “Godzillas” could rise up to threaten human civilization.

If this final warning sounds preachy to you, it may be because you haven’t just finished viewing the film.  Godzilla’s scorching imagery -- a world of black-and-white but mostly black -- earns the filmmaker the right to ponder big philosophical issues at the denouement.  Above all else, the movie serves as a cautionary tale for an age where the future of nuclear war was unwritten.

Many Godzilla movies have come and gone since this one premiered.  I remember seeing the less-than-satisfactory (though fun) Godzilla 1985 at the Center Theater in Bloomfield, New Jersey, for instance.   

However, this first film -- light on rubber monster suits and heavy on fire, blinding-light and suffering -- remains an indelible viewing experience.  Some have called Honda’s Godzilla a “grotesque” work of art.  

But I wonder if that descriptor isn’t a commentary on mankind more than it is Godzilla.

Movie Trailer: Gojira! (1954)

Happy Thanksgiving!

May you all have a wonderful holiday today, filled with joy, happiness, love, turkey...and monster movies.  (And don't forget to tune back in tomorrow for my review of Godzilla [1954]).

Thanksgiving Blogging: Mighty Joe Young (1944)

In several significant ways, Mighty Joe Young (1949) might be described as the “most evolved” of the Merian C. Cooper/Ernest Schoedsack giant ape films of the 1930s and 1940s.

In part this is so because the third (and last) film in the cycle understands that audience sympathies rest with the exploited main character, a kindly gorilla named Joe, and not with the humans who exploit him for financial gain.

And in part this is so because this film depicts the female lead character, Jill Young (Terry Moore) as more than a screaming ninny.  The feisty Jill can see beyond Joe’s intimidating physicality -- in part because she raised him -- and recognize that he is an intelligent creature worthy of dignity and respect.  Jill is no mere damsel in distress, but rather a very human woman trying to do the right thing, and honor the important relationships in her life, both with Joe, and with promoter Max O’Hara (Robert Armstrong again), the man who brought her “fame and fortune” in Hollywood.

These elements, along with an exciting chase and nail-biting finale, make Mighty Joe Young a solid addition to the King Kong canon, even if the film doesn’t actually concern Kong or his progeny.

Mighty Joe Young begins with little Jill Young (Moore) living on her father’s farm in Africa.  She trades a baby gorilla for several trinkets, including a flashlight, and decides to raise the ape she names “Joe.”  Her father objects to this course of action, worrying that the gorilla will one day grow into a fierce animal and menace. 

But Jill prevails, and a friendship is born.

Twelve years later, Max O’Hara (Armstrong) plots to make his next Hollywood night club, “The Golden Safari,” a runaway success.  He strikes on the idea of going on a dangerous safari in Africa with cowboy, Gregg (Ben Johnson) in tow.  Once there, they collect man-eating lions and other animals, and then unexpectedly encounter a fully-grown gorilla, Joe.  Max urges Jill to sign a contract making the ape and his master the newest (permanent) attractions at the Golden Safari.

Back in Hollywood, Joe grows increasingly depressed by the nightly festivities in the club, and his near-continual entrapment in a too-small cage.  Jill sees the gorilla suffering, and attempts to get out of her contract with Max.  He sweet-talks her back into compliance, and the Mighty Joe Young show continues for a whopping seventeen weeks.

Then, one night, a trio of obnoxious drunks release Joe from his cage, feed him champagne, and watch as the gorilla trashes the club from top to bottom.  Deemed a public safety menace by a judge, Joe is ordered executed.  Realizing what he has done to Jill and Joe, Max O’Hara teams up with Gregg and Jill to free the ape from captivity, and return him to his home in Africa.

On the way to freedom, however, Gregg, Jill, and Joe spy a disaster in the making.  An orphanage is burning down fast, and three children are trapped upstairs with no hope of escape. 

One last time, it’s Joe to the rescue…

Although there are no prehistoric monsters on hand in Mighty Joe Young, the film nonetheless perfects (or evolves) the King Kong formula.  Max O’Hara -- the familiar showman character -- undergoes his transformation from exploiter to defender in one movie, not two (as was the case with Carl Denham), and the movie also makes the point that there is something worse than imprisonment…the loss of dignity. 

Here, Joe undergoes a horrible humiliation when a nightclub routine requires Jill to dress up as an organ grinder, and Joe as her monkey.  Then, the unruly crowd is encouraged to throw giant coins at Joe while he catches them in his cap.   One drunk gets out of hand and tosses a glass champagne bottle at the ape.  This is a miserable moment for Joe, one which reduces the noble beast to the level of carnival freak.

Joe goes wild soon after this humiliation and destroys Max’s night club, but he finds redemption by saving the imperiled children at the burning orphanage.  Again, this kind of redemption was something denied Kong in the original film (though awarded to his son, in The Son of Kong).

Though it is impossible to argue that Mighty Joe Young is more spectacular or exciting than King Kong was, one can certainly detect how a very similar story (with similar characters) is more completely and emotionally told here.   Some may consider that comment a heretical remark in terms of cinema history, but at least three of the four leads in Mighty Joe Young -- Max, Jill, and Joe himself -- are treated with greater humanity than their counterparts were in King Kong. 

While there’s nothing as awe-inspiring as a battle with a T-Rex in this film, Mighty Joe Young nonetheless satisfies on a purely human level.  No one in King Kong really listened to their conscience, at least until it was far too late.  Here, the characters all make difficult personal decisions to repair the breach, and honor their friendship with Joe.

I had not seen Mighty Joe Young in several years before this recent viewing, and was delighted to find the film so engaging, and so action-packed. My wife watched this one with me, and was on the edge of her seat during the finale at the orphanage.  She told me that if Joe died, I should just turn the movie off right then, because she couldn’t handle it.

That in-the-moment exclamation/protest reveals how successfully Mighty Joe Young works on an emotional level. It’s not the Beauty and the Beast epic or prehistoric safari that King Kong is, but it’s a damned exciting and engaging adventure film with some fine special effects (from Willis O'Brien and Ray Harryhausen).

The very next night after I watched Mighty Joe Young with Kathryn, I watched it again with my six-year old son, Joel, and now it’s his new favorite movie.  

Movie Trailer: Mighty Joe Young (1949)

Thanksgiving Blogging: The Son of Kong (1933)

The conventional wisdom regarding this sequel is that The Son of Kong (1933) is a not-very-good, not- very-memorable follow-up to the enormously successful and enormously beloved original King Kong (1933). 

It’s easy to see why critics, scholars, and some fans feel this way about the film.  The sequel is but a brief seventy minutes long, two of the original stars -- Bruce Cabot and Fay Wray -- are missing-in-action, and the film was produced on an extraordinarily low-budget.  

Furthermore, King Kong is a spectacular, a non-stop rollercoaster ride of action and spectacle, and The Son of Kong…is not.

And yet despite these deficits The Son of Kong is an intriguing little movie, primarily because it focuses almost obsessively on Carl Denham (Robert Armstrong), the man who brought Kong back to modernity because he wanted to give that jaded world a sense of “wonder.”

Denham has been repaid for that act, however, as The Son of Kong opens, with law-suits, public condemnation, and grand jury indictment.  His original desire to “escape” modernity, has, in fact, brought the bureaucracy of modernity crashing down upon him.

We also learn early in The Son of Kong that Denham feels guilty regarding Kong’s death, and wishes -- for his own sake and Kong’s -- that he had never visited Skull Island in the first place. 

This is all very interesting, very human material, and there is likely more focus on characterization and character development in The Son of Kong than in all of King Kong.  Robert Armstrong is terrific and charismatic again as Carl Denham, but he shows many more shades of the man here than he was able to reveal in the original Kong.

With its lead character dwelling in self-hatred and guilt, and facing a future of legal entanglements, The Son of Kong depicts a more dissolute, sleazier world than did its predecessor.  In short order, Denham and Captain Englehart (Frank Reichert) slink out of New York Harbor on the Venture not in search of great adventure this time, but in search of a job -- any job -- in the East Indies.

In far-flung Dakang, they settle in at a tiny port and meet another fallen Western entertainer, Peterson, and his lovely daughter, La Belle Helene (Helen Mack).  Both are going nowhere, and have no future save for the next (sparsely populated) show.

Denham and Englehart also meet the troublesome Captain Nils Helstrom (John Marston), the very man who first sold Denham the map to Kong’s island. Helstrom -- a murderer -- is looking for a way to escape Dakang too and soon he, Denham, Englehart, and Helene head to Kong’s island in search of a legendary treasure.

On Skull Island, Denham and Helene encounter a young giant ape, Kong Junior.  He’s more playful than his father, but no less fierce when it comes to fighting dinosaurs.  After Denham and Helene save Kong Jr. from a quicksand trap, he defends them from a giant bear, a four-legged dinosaur carnivore, and other grave threats. 

After the giant ape helps Denham retrieve the legendary treasure from a secret temple, an earthquake sinks the island, and Kong Jr. gives his life to save Denham.

While it’s true that the pleasures of The Son of Kong are relatively mild in comparison to King Kong, some are certainly worth noting.  I love the first act in particular, set in a corner of the world where people go to disappear.  There are some great deep-focus shots in the local bar, which sell beautifully the nature of the people living in that environment.  

I also admire the fact that the sequel attempts to make a human judgment about what happened to Kong in New York City…a subject the original film did not broach. 

Here, Denham admits that he owes Kong’s family “something,” and when he takes care of Kong Jr.’s injuries, he notes that the act is “sort of an apology.”   

These moments reveal Denham’s humanity and decency, and also acknowledge the audience’s (quite correct) feelings that King Kong was badly exploited in the first film.  This movie rehabilitates Carl Denham, one might assert, and that’s a worthy enterprise for a sequel.

The stop-motion effects of The Son of Kong are certainly as impressive as those of its predecessor, and the film suffers mainly in the final act when, out-of-the-blue, an earthquake arrives to, literally end the movie.  The earthquake comes from out-of-the-blue, and stops the movie’s development cold, skipping essentially from the beginning of the third act (arrival on the island and discovery of the treasure…) right to the denouement, Kong Jr’s sad death, and the ape’s heroic sacrifice to rescue Denham. 

Those valedictory images of heroic Kong Jr. holding Denham aloft above the swirling ocean waves as Skull Island sinks below the roiling surface are arguably as powerful as any image in King Kong, but in some sense they have not adequately been prepared for or built-up to.  The moment of Kong Jr’s death is powerful, but could have been infinitely more so if the film actually spent more than twenty or so minutes in the company of the mighty ape.

The Son of Kong’s final “happy ending,” that Denham and Helene will marry and share the proceeds from the island’s treasure, also fails to ring true.  Even a huge payday isn’t going to take away a grand jury indictment for Denham.  Plus, Carl has once again looted Skull Island for a resource or treasure by which he hopes to profit…an act which in some sense hampers his character’s development and maturity.  He's still, even after everything that's happened, a profiteer.

But taken in total The Son of Kong is a charming little monster movie, a good dessert after King Kong’s main course.  The sequel boasts some real humanity, and represents a turning point in the Cooper/Schoedsack saga because it is the first big ape film to suggest sympathy for the central animal, and to recognize that the exploitation of natural resources like Kong results only in destruction for everyone.

Also, I must admit that on a personal note, I get a kick out of one idea in The Son of Kong that is often not even considered in terms of sequels.  In essence, this humble movie acknowledges that King Kong was the main event, and that this is a smaller, perhaps less important story in the same universe.  That kind of modesty is, at the very least, refreshing.  It also seems realistic, to some degree.  Sequels traditionally get bigger and bolder, and more outrageous.

But how do you create a sequel bigger than a giant ape climbing the Empire State Building? 

I submit that The Son of Kong’s human, if small potatoes approach, works just fine.