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Parents' Guide to

King Kong (1933)

By Charles Cassady Jr., Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 10+

Violent but beloved old-school monster movie.

Movie NR 1933 100 minutes
King Kong (1933) Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Community Reviews

age 9+

Based on 8 parent reviews

age 10+

Great family movie.

There's a lot of action but it's not graphic at all

This title has:

Great messages
age 14+

Very amazing!

Pg-13: destruction and some violence

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (8 ):
Kids say (27 ):

Though it was remade in 2005 by director Peter Jackson with all the modern talent and special effects of the 21st century, this classic monster movie moves at a lightning pace. While the stop-motion animation seems primitive, the 1933 version of King Kong still very watchable. The savage Kong has a primal fury about him that makes him a real threat, even if his lovelorn looks to Anne turn him into a slightly more sympathetic monster.

The human characters are fairly one-dimensional by comparison. Anne screams a lot, famously so, faints, and that's about it for her womanly survival skills. Denham doesn't seem to have learned any lessons in the end. Modern black activists have denounced the old-school portrayal of face-painted, bone-wearing tribesmen, though Skull Island natives fight back against the rampaging gorilla-god, and a black baby is one of the few characters of any color snatched safely from beneath the primate's trampling feet.

Movie Details

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