Jordan Vogt-Roberts on bringing Kong into the Vietnam era and making a different kind of giant ape movie.
Den of Geek: What were the things you wanted to see in your dream King Kong movie?
Did you have kind of a little list in your head?
Jordan Vogt-Roberts:The first thing was just the general pitch that I wanted to seeApocalypse Nowwith King Kong.
I want to see a Vietnam War movie with monsters.
I wanted to see these crazyPlanet Earthmoments.
Then, the quiet moment of him chewing it after the fact and just lingering with him.
I wanted to see creatures that I felt I hadnt seen before and had a spirituality to them.
I wanted to see Kong as a lonely god.
What I didnt want to see was things that I felt I had seen before.
So much of whats out there just feels redundant.
As opposed to wonder.
As opposed to being okay with not knowing.
What does it do to you?
All our little wars like Vietnam or whatever, look pretty puny when faced with things like this.
Then, being confronted with something greater than themselves and saying, What are we doing right now?
Youre confronted with a myth and youre confronted with a god.
What were some monster movies when you were growing up that really struck a chord with you?
My dad would let us just go to the video store and bring back these strange movies.
Some of which were not great or weird.
The one that really kind of melted my brain wasJason and the Argonauts.
So I went down the Harryhausen route.
That stuff really, really had an impact on me.
Those skeletons fighting I couldnt believe it when I was seeing it.
Thats stuff was pretty enormous for me.
Yeah, early on I knew that was the intent.
A movie that is self-contained and exists on its own merit.
My job is to also serve as those people and confirm that that stuff works.
I just have to sort of constantly remind people at times, were not telling that story.
Sometimes there is this desire to say, Well, maybe we should … Maybe we should get it … Its like, Guys, we are not playing this story.
Were not playing this game.
If we half-ass it, were going to look like idiots.
He spends the entire movie building that.
Why would we half-ass that?
That was the number one thing for me, not telling that story.
I dont think it fits with modern times in the same way.
That was just one of the things that was most uninteresting to me.
Going back to New York also just didnt really interest me.
Look, there are fundamentals of filmmaking.
You never have enough money and you never have enough daylight.
Filmmaking is filmmaking though.
Its like driving a car.
Obviously youre very proud of this movie.
I would continuing to riff off the specific scene that starts it.
Id make like the $30 million version of that movie.
Thats the movie Id be most interested in.
Kong: Skull Islandis out in theaters this Friday (March 10).
