Konga - Terrore su Londra

Konga is a film about a giant gorilla. It was obviously trying to emulate an earlier film by the name of King Kong but the two films are so different.

Michael Gough plays a mad scientist who gives Konga a growth serum. He gets Konga to do his bidding throughout the film but things spiral out of control eventually.

The film is totally crazy and it's fun seeing the actors so straight faced. Michael Gough as Doctor Decker is so obviously a nutter but no-one (even the police who question him) seems to notice much. Eventually, Konga becomes uncontrollable and goes on a rampage. So what does London do? Does it call in fighter jets? No. It calls in the local police and a few dozen soldiers. If it was up to me I'd clear the city and send the fighter jets in.

The film is an absolute lesson in buffoonry. It's also not very scientifically accurate. Now I'm no scientist but I have learned a bit in my long life. Michael Gough brings a CHIMPANZEE from the jungle and injects him with growth serum but instead of the CHIMPANZEE becoming a bigger CHIMPANZEE, he actually becomes a GORILLA. So for all his bravado, Doctor Decker didn't realise that his serum actually caused the chimp to become a different animal entirely.

But, that's what I like about films like this. Don't you just love a film that is scientifically inaccurate and crazy. Check it out.

I very much enjoyed Konga when I first saw it in a theatre at about the age of nine, and surprisingly enjoyed it almost as much on television. The plot is the standard issue mad scientist who comes up with a growth serum that makes a creature large which then goes on a rampage formula, set in England this time. The creature here is an ape who just happens to be called Konga (hint..hint), which gives one a sense of the degree of subtlety in the film.

If one can call scenery chewing magisterial I think it's fair to say that Michael Gough, as the mad scientist in this one, does it with an authority worthy of at the very least a knighthood, if not a lordship. The special effects are, alas, dreadful even for a modestly budgeted film such as this, but no matter. Gough is the whole show, and his performance is of such profligacy as to bring a round of applause from Messrs. Zucco and Atwill, were they still with us.

Even though the story is fairly interesting, I can't help but look at this film as a cheap rip off of the classic King Kong. Michael Gough does a decent job playing the crazed Doctor Decker who wants to eliminate everyone who he feels has wronged him. He also is obsessed with one of his young, voluptuous students. His obsessions lead him to the breaking point and this helps to make this a fairly interesting story. Too bad it is undone by the horrible effects, especially the old "man in the cheap gorilla suit" gimmick. I guess the budget didn't allow for decent effects like stop motion animation. However, despite cheapness of it, this film will always remain a guilty pleasure of mine.

***Plot Points Ahead, or my interpretation of those plot points***

What can you say about a cute funny little chimpanzee who grows up to be a not so funny giant Gorilla? That he was once young and beautiful? That he loved bananas? That he once played carefree in the jungle, only to journey to England to become the star of his own feature film? That they surrounded him with some of the worst over- acting ever to grace a horror film? That his toy doll people were not much fun to play with? That he had to die to be returned to his former lovable monkey self? Oh the horror of it all!

For most of this film, when the wicked Dr. Decker, played with a giant side order of ham by Michael Gough, injects that poor Chimpanzee with his nasty super grow essence of hulk formula, it is just plain stupid, boring, ridiculous, and dumb. Apparently the good Doctor also sees the new formula as sort of a viagra type grow drug, because he suddenly gets the hots for a young college student. He's got it bad, really bad, so much so that he sends Konga out to kill a young male college student who has the hots for the same gal. And that guy didn't even have any of the drug. When the doctor's female assistant who apparently has the hots for the good doctor also, (guess she sees him making good use of the drug also) finds out about all this nonsense, she overdoses poor Konga with this super steroid, thinking Konga will rip the good doctor and/or the college girl to shreds. Instead she only manages in getting herself killed, and letting a gigantic Konga loose on London and an unsuspecting movie going public. Konga has a little jealousy streak of his own, does away with the college girl, then carries the good Dr. through London. At First, all the people run hurriedly away, but eventually they reach the end of the studio back lot and can't go any further, so they stop to gawk and stare. At this point, Konga realizes he doesn't have the good doctor in his hand after all, but a wooden doll, so angrily he throws the doll to the ground, which must have been under some kind of magic spell because it suddenly turns back into the now very dead doctor. Unfortunately for Konga, the movie has reached it's budget limit, so unable to tear down any buildings or step on any gawking spectators, the police show up and fire one million shots at him, none of them actually hitting him. This is all too much for the poor Konga, who drops dead of a heart attack and shrinks back to the innocent chimpanzee he was at the beginning. I'm not sure how they shrunk the man in the ape suit but I think he died and shrunk into a dead chimpanzee suit because the fellow is nowhere to be found. Shakespeare should have written such a tragedy.

Till Next Time With tongue held firmly in cheek Next Class Please

This film is incredible in many ways. It has an outlandish story about a scientist who returns from Africa having been presumed lost who has found a botanical secret to growth in humans and other animals through injections of serums made from seedlings brought back from the jungle which he injects into a small chimp he also brings back from Africa that he uses as his primate guinea pig which after several injections(and murders of people standing in the scientist's way) grows to epic proportions and brings an end to his creator's dreams. Whew! It has one of the cruelest, unsympathetic protagonists in film, played with aplomb and panache by an overlooked Michael Gough. This man is on cruise control along his evil highway to glory and sexual satisfaction, at one point shooting his house cat at close range rather than have it possibly ruining his scientific discovery. Gough is incredible and his performance is worth a look at the film alone. The other actors are credible and the guy in the ape suit is believable till the last act. Wait till you see this King-Kong sized ape holding Gough and his assistant. When he throws the assistant to the ground, you can tell it is nothing more than a doll! Camp...camp and more camp!