‘Metal Gear’ Creator on Why ‘Kong: Skull Island’ Redefines Monster Movies
Hideo Kojima, creator of the Metal Gear Solid series of games, is a huge fan of film and has already written two essays for Glixel sharing his insights into blockbusters. His latest on Kong: Skull Island comes from an especially interesting perspective as the film’s director, Jordan Vogt-Roberts, has been attached to the movie adaptation of Metal Gear Solid for the past three years.
In his latest article Kojima argues that the film looks to the famous Japanese monster movies of old as a major influence and this this offers a new take on the over-sized simian.
“Previous Kong movies have been about pulling what is essentially a god from another civilization, and then dominating that god through western capitalist culture. In this movie, Kong is portrayed as a monster from beginning to end, and that is why Kong: Skull Island works so well,” says Kojima.
“It’s clear that this is the first interpretation of the Kong story that has been influenced by years of Japanese monster movies. For example, in both Mothra in 1966 and Gappa: The Triphibian Monster in 1967, the monsters that come to the city from a remote island are never sacrificed and eventually return to their home islands alive.”
He also notes that in this version of the King Kong story the greatest threat to the human characters isn’t Kong himself but the deadly environment around them and that its hard to present a mythic beast like Kong to a world accustomed to Google Earth.
“In 2017, the net connects everything, and anything can be instantly Googled, eliminating any mystery. Thanks to Google Earth we can see every corner of the globe from our phones, and it’s against this backdrop that the movie attempts to instill some fear and respect for the unknown,” he says.
For more of Kojima’s unique take on the movie head on over to Glixel.