User Reviews

I watched this film years ago and finally have come to comment on it. The film is a tale of a ape and a woman who decides after the death of Joes mother to take him back to the US. But Joe escapes and hysteria ensues.

The film is a kids movie bringing the tale of King Kong back with a different kind of twist that works if you haven't watched King Kong; there are similarities but Joe has a softer quality almost a human touch to him that makes the audience connect.

The CGI is quite convincing and the way the animal moves is brilliantly done..... A nice kids movie...

Mighty Joe Young starts in Africa where conservationist Professor Gregory O'Hara (Bill Paxton) discovers the existence of Joe Young, a huge 2000 pound giant Ape that has been looked after & cared for by Jill Young (Charlize Theron) ever since their mother's were killed on the same night by poachers twelve years ago. O'Hara is amazed by both Joe & Jill & when poachers return to try & kill Joe he arranges for him to be taken to California where he can be properly protected from poachers in a zoo. At first Joe seems happy enough but once again he comes under threat from poachers & when he runs amok at a dinner party he is considered a threat to the public, it's up to Jill & O'Hara to save Joe before he is either killed by poachers or the authorities...

Directed by Ron Underwood this big budget Disney production was a remake of the same titled Mighty Joe Young (1949), while not terrible I suppose this remake is nowhere near as good as the original & at times I found it a bit of an overly sentimental bore with far too many annoying Disney-esquire touches. The script here sticks to the general storyline of the original but changes a lot of the set-pieces to lacklustre effects like the capturing of Joe is changed from Cowboys lassoing him to blokes in jeeps & the fantastic climax set in a nightclub where Joe fights Lions & then saves children in a burning orphanage is replaced with a walk around Hollywood & saving a kid on a burning ferris wheel. While the CGI effects are excellent there's a certain coldness to the action & adventure scenes while the character's are terrible with some annoying comic relief & a really sickening romance between the two leads & lots of moralising about the evils of poaching & the perils of locking animals up in cages rather than letting run free & the parallels that has with our own lives as we too are locked up in cages & it's just that we call them houses. At almost two hours Mighty Joe Young is a bit too long, there's too much mushy Hollywood sentiment including a cringe worthy ending in which random members of the public all decide to give money to rehouse Joe & this remake doesn't have the magical fantastical quality of the original & if I am honest feels lie a poor man's King Kong (1933) with it's slightly weird central relationship between a giant Ape & a pretty blonde woman. Having said that it's watchable I suppose & the effects are good.

As already mentioned the CGI effects are very good as are the practical effects created by Rick Baker who was along with his team nominated for an Oscar but lost out to What Dreams May Come (1998). This being a squeaky clean Disney family film there's no violence & even the main villain doesn't get much of a send-off. Charlize Theron's attempt to portray a character who has never been to civilisation & spent her entire life in the jungles of Africa is hopeless & she comes across as some ball American blonde anyway.

With a supposed budget of about $90,000,000 this had a lot of money spent on it & it show's with great effects & ambitious set-pieces although the finished product doesn't come across as exciting on screen due to the awful music & lack of imagination that isn't the fault of the effects work which is impressive. The acting is bland & I usually quite like Bill Paxton but not in a family film such as this.

Mighty Joe Young is a remake that isn't as good as the original & comes across as a second rate King Kong, hell even the ridiculous King Kong Lives (1986) is better than this. Basically a King Kong wannabe that doesn't cut the mustard & isn't as good as the original Mighty Joe Young either but is still watchable on a corny level.

Mighty Joe Young tells the tale of a young woman named Jill Young(Charize Theron)who's an owner of a giant gorilla named Joe and his environment is in danger. So it's up to Jill and Bill Paxton's charcther to travel to Los Angeles so that Joe can have a normal life. But when the evil poachers( who killed Jill's mother ) tracks both her and Bill Paxton's charcther down. Will Joe ever be safe?

Overall the story to this is very good,the music is very good and the cast is also very good. I saw it a few times before on TV and it was on Film 4 today. I may never know why this got a low rating cause I seen nothing wrong with it. Overall I really enjoyed this movie and I also was shocked that the gorilla wasn't a real gorilla AT ALL,he was a animatronic created by Rick Baker.Awesome effects. The music was done by the late James Horner(Titanic,Bicentennial Man to name a few) which was both haunting and beautiful especially the windpipe song which had me in tears.

My verdict watch it.

9/10

I remember when it came out, never got around to seeing it save for a bit on TV years later. I liked it fine after picking up the cheapie Walmart CD of this today.

What works well: Mighty Joe, F/X and 'performance'. Good stuff by the CGI guys, guys in suits and puppets.

Bill Paxton-plays Bill Paxton.

Charlize Theron-pretty young and nothing great here, but okay. Doesn't look like someone raised in Rwanda or whatever though ya know? (Yes I know she was born in South Africa. Not in the bush though...).

Fun supporting work by familiar faces ala Regina King and David Paymer.

Fun Cameos by Terry Moore and Ray Harryhausen.

The finale on the burning Ferris Wheel was well done too.

What doesn't work? Baddie-maybe we need to see more of him? Hard to see the poaching run in the opening scenes on my DVD.

Rather formulaic, right to the Zoo-guys helping Mighty Joe escape.(Paymer, King) we have seen this 1000 times.

Overall nothing great but a worthy family type movie, the orig. is better though.

**1/2 outta ****

The main problems I had with this is not Joe himself, but sadly, the overall story as well as the acting and effects. Despite the implausibility of a gorilla like Joe, he's the only character with any redeeming quality and he's not even real. The 1940's version with the Harryhousen effects are far better than this uninspired outing.

The underlying message that this movie and others like it love to convey is 1- that animals are still on this earth solely for our amusement, regardless of the well meaning intentions of a few, and 2-never underestimate the blind stupidity of people in large groups.

Basically an oversized ape is taken from the only habitat he's ever known and where he's felt safe all his life and thrown into a fake man-made enclosure on the other side of the world for tourists to gawk at and the media to milk until the next flavour of the month presents itself.

During a gala event where Joe is to be displayed in front of high society types, things take a turn for the worse and as usual Joe, like any other wild animal, reacts violently,however as several people with more money than sense got hurt in the ensuing melee the typical consensus is to lock him away to be euthanized.

To wrap up, Joe is freed from prison, the poachers trying to kill him are defeated, Joe redeems himself by saving a child from a fire and he ends up roaming free again back in Africa. It's a very syrupy and artificial and kids won't see that it's full of holes but this just isn't enjoyable on any level for anyone over 10 years old.

There's lots of silly and deliberate attempts at generating cheap laughs whether it be a sports car getting trampled or a Mercedes getting trashed. It's all very obvious as is the teary premature death of Joe, which even blind Freddy could see coming. A box office bomb if ever there was and it's not hard to see why. A total miss.

This remake of Mighty Joe Young updates the story to present day but keeps the same plot beats, and dresses it in state of the art special effects.

The story - misunderstood ape in the city, hunted, but redeems himself by heroic action during calamity - works as well as it did in the original, and is augmented by wicked hunters.

Charlize Theron and Bill Paxton are attractive leads, but the film belongs to Joe. He is achieved by a mix of animatronics and CGI (and, I suspect, the occasional bloke in an ape suit), but he succeeds as a character who displays emotion and engages audience sympathetic.

This bright, colourful film is a charming and exciting family movie.