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(At least, thats how I remembered it for many years.
But what really stuck out wasnt just Kongs terrifying rampage through the city.
That whipsawing effect, between revulsion and tenderness, wasnt exactly subtle.
Even my 5-year-old brain could grasp it.
Kong was scary, and sad.
And somehow the scariness made the sadness sadder, and the sadness made the scariness scarier.
Attitudes change, ideas change, technology changes.
Even the idea of what constitutes a monster, a nebulous concept to begin with, changes.
Nevertheless, monster movies have attempted a series of comebacks in recent years, with mixed results.
But were any of themscary?
As technology has improved, our monsters have gotten more ornate and grotesque but less genuinely terrifying.
Thats not to say that we cant still feel wonder.
Who needs monsters, in other words, when weve got people?
Still, theres something uniquely bone-chilling about a good monster.
Andthe hybrid quality of H.R.
And yet we still see relatively little of them.
Subsequent entries have overexposed the aliens and essentially turned them into a joke.
Among films of somewhat more recent vintage,CloverfieldandThe Misthave also taken this idea to heart.
(Meanwhile, it remains to be seen whetherIthas even shown us its true monster yet.)
There can be exceptions, of course.
So, what distinguishes a monster movie that works from one that doesnt?
So, again we come to this notion ofsadness.
Its interesting to note how many of the classic monsters came with a dose of pathos.
The Mummy was a man looking to reclaim the lover who was stolen from him.
The Phantom of the Opera was just a scarred, lonely romantic driven mad by trauma and betrayal.
Far from tempering the horror, this added layer of melancholy somehow added to it.
Or consider Jennifer KentsThe Babadook,which somehow brings all these elements together.
There, the title monster is chillingly realized through a variety of methods.
Sometimes hes a stop-motion figure, or a paper cutout.
Sometimes hes composited into an old George Melies film.
Sometimes hes a brief reflection, or a looming shadow.
Sometimes hes (literally) an empty suit.
Those old creature features often found that sadness in the monsters themselves; todays vintage finds it within us.
