Film

Kong: Skull Island

Name: Kong: Skull Island
Genre: Action, Adventure, Fantasy
Released: 2017
Cast: Tom Hiddleston, Samuel L. Jackson, John Goodman, Brie Larson, Jing Tian

Treasure hunt

A gloriously overstuffed monster movie: Vietnam-era soldiers and scientists chopper into an uncharted island and immediately regret it. Kong himself is less a villain than a landlord evicting bigger, nastier tenants. It's loud, gorgeous, occasionally ridiculous, and never pretends to be anything but a top-tier creature feature with a killer needle-drop soundtrack. Good for a big-screen mood, not for people wanting subtlety.

TMDb rating

3.3

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like big, loud monster spectacle played straight, with a dash of 1970s jungle-adventure swagger and a cast clearly enjoying the ride.

Skip it if you want the ape at the centre of the story; he is more force of nature than character, and long stretches go by with humans running about before the giants properly collide.

What it asks of you: Roughly two hours of steady momentum, mostly light in tone, with the attention going to scenery, set pieces and a few quieter scenes of men marooned and bickering.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Godzilla2014

Same cinematic universe, same appetite for scale-dwarfing awe — Gareth Edwards treats his monster like a force of nature rather than a costume, and the slow reveal pays off huge.

But Human characters are famously thin, and the monster action is more withheld than Kong's constant spectacle.

King Kong2005

Peter Jackson's three-hour love letter to the original, with a Kong who actually has an inner life and a finale that still wrecks people.

But It's a real commitment at over three hours, and the pacing luxuriates in ways Skull Island never does.

Jurassic Park1993

The template for 'expedition arrives on forbidden island, nature reasserts dominance' — still the gold standard for practical-effects awe and dread.

But Slower and talkier by modern blockbuster standards, with none of Kong's nonstop momentum.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Kong: Skull Island

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Apocalypse Now1979

Kong: Skull Island directly quotes Apocalypse Now's Vietnam imagery and its 'obsessed officer' figure; watching the source shows what happens when that same aesthetic is played straight and serious.

The helicopters, the jungle, the unhinged colonel obsessed with a mission gone insane — Skull Island lifts its imagery wholesale from this. Here the same visuals serve a devastating meditation on war and madness instead of a monster romp.

But Slow, hallucinatory, and deliberately uncomfortable — the opposite of a fun Friday-night watch.

Predator1987

A military unit gets picked apart in the jungle by something smarter and meaner than them — the squad-versus-apex-predator structure Kong borrows wholesale.

But Tighter and nastier, with none of the fantastical creature-zoo variety Skull Island offers.

Rampage2018

Dwayne Johnson, a giant albino gorilla, and zero pretensions — pure, cheerful, city-flattening monster silliness.

But Noticeably dumber and cheaper-feeling, with none of Skull Island's visual ambition.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters2019

The MonsterVerse goes full kaiju-brawl mode — if you wanted more giant creatures smashing into each other, this delivers relentlessly.

But Human plotting is even weaker here, and it leans hard into franchise mythology-building.

The Lost World: Jurassic Park1997

A team gets hunted across a hostile island by things bigger than they planned for — messier and pulpier than the original, closer in spirit to Kong.

But Widely considered a step down from its predecessor, with a notoriously silly final act.

Anaconda1997

Gleefully trashy jungle-expedition horror with a giant snake and a cast having way more fun than the material deserves.

But It's schlock through and through — go in for camp, not craft.

Pacific Rim2013

Guillermo del Toro's giant-monsters-versus-giant-robots spectacle shares Kong's sincere, awestruck love of scale and silhouette.

But The human drama is broad and the plot secondary to the spectacle, which some find hollow.

Grizzly Man2005

Both are about people convinced they can study, tame, or coexist with something the island (or wilderness) never agreed to share — one plays it as adventure, the other as documented reality.

Werner Herzog's documentary about a man who believed he could live peacefully among wild grizzlies is funny, tragic, and quietly terrifying about the limits of human understanding of nature.

But No spectacle, no rescue mission — just a slow, sad, real story with an unshakeable ending.

The Host2006

Same monster-movie engine as Kong — expedition/family versus creature, institutions failing everyone — but shrunk to a broke Korean family and used for political satire and real heartbreak instead of blockbuster awe.

A South Korean monster movie about a chaotic family fighting a river creature while government bureaucracy fails them — funnier, angrier, and stranger than any Western kaiju film.

But Subtitled, tonally whiplash-inducing, and more interested in grief and satire than pure spectacle.