Neil Marshall

There are monsters, giant creatures and exotic sights aplenty in Kong: Skull Island, but it could have had pirates. Lots of dinosaurs. And maybe Gollum himself, Andy Serkis. That is, if Neil Marshall had taken his cinematic trip to Skull Island. In 2013 it was reported that Marshall – writer/director of Dog Soldiers, The Descent and Doomsday – was trying to mount his own Kong movie, based on the novel Kong: King of Skull Island, which was officially licensed by the estate of Merian C. Cooper, who wrote, produced and directed the original 1933 King Kong. The film rights to Kong have traditionally been tricky due to Cooper’s failure to properly secure them back in the day. (BirthMoviesDeath.com gives an excellent explanation here.) He did, however, copyright the novelization of the movie. So an official sequel (ignoring the Son of Kong sequel) was licensed, and in 2005 King of Skull Island was released, which was written by Joe DeVito (visit DeVito’s website for more official Kong stuff) and Brad Strickland. The official synopsis: “In 1933, American showman Carl Denham returned from a mysterious, hidden island with a priceless treasure. A treasure not gold or jewels, but the island’s barbaric god, a monstrous anthropoid called ‘Kong.’ The savage giant escaped and wreaked havoc among the man-made canyons of Manhattan, but within hours of the giant ape’s death his body – and Carl Denham – disappeared. Twenty-five years later, the son of Carl Denham makes a shocking discovery that leads him back to the site of his father’s greatest adventure and to the answers that will unlock the century’s greatest mystery and history’s greatest miracle.” Marshall acquired the rights and penned a screenplay with another writer, but Universal wasn’t interested at the time (remember, this was before the studio remade Godzilla and started seriously developing a shared universe for its giant monsters). In a 2015 interview with CHUD.com, he discusses his version, saying that it would […]