1995 film by Frank Marshall
Congo is a 1995 American science fiction action-adventure film based on the 1980 novel by Michael Crichton. It was directed by Frank Marshall and stars Laura Linney, Dylan Walsh, Ernie Hudson, Grant Heslov, Joe Don Baker and Tim Curry. The film was released on June 9, 1995, by Paramount Pictures.[1][2] It received negative reviews, but performed better than expected at the box office.[3]
Plot
Searching for rare blue diamonds that could enable a revolutionary communications laser, TraviCom employees Charles Travis and Jeffrey Weems discover the ruins of a lost city near a remote volcano in the Congo jungle. Karen Ross, Charles's ex-fiancée and a former CIA operative, and R. B. Travis, Charles's father and the CEO of TraviCom, lose contact with the team while tracking their progress at the company headquarters. A remote camera shows the camp destroyed and strewn with corpses, before an ape-like creature destroys the camera. Travis asks Karen to lead another expedition to the site.
Primatologist Peter Elliott and his assistant Richard teach human communication to a mountain gorilla named Amy, whose sign language is translated into a digitized voice. Peter is concerned by Amy's drawings of jungles and the Eye of Providence, and wants to return her to Africa. Karen and Romanian philanthropist Herkermer Homolka join the expedition.
The group flies to Uganda and meets wilderness guide Monroe Kelly. Military leader Captain Wanta warns them not to trust Homolka and lets them proceed only upon receipt of a large bribe. On their journey via Tanzania and then Zaire, Monroe reveals that Homolka has led previous, disastrous safaris in search of the "Lost City of Zinj". Their plane is shot down as they parachute into the jungle.
A native tribe leads them to Bob Driscoll, a wounded member of Charles's expedition, who dies screaming upon sight of Amy. The group continues by boat, and they learn that Homolka believes Amy can lead them to the mine. They find the ruined camp near the City of Zinj. Richard and some porters are killed by a grey gorilla. The group keeps the gorillas at bay with automated sentry guns.
At daybreak they explore the city, and surmise from hieroglyphs that the inhabitants bred the grey gorillas to guard the mine. At the mine Homolka begins collecting diamonds but is killed by the grey gorillas. Monroe, Karen and Peter flee deeper into the mine, where they discover Jeffrey and Charles's bodies with the latter still holding a giant blue diamond. Karen fits the diamond into a portable laser and uses it to kill several grey gorillas. The volcano erupts, and the four escape as lava floods the city killing the grey gorillas.
Karen reports to Travis and, realizing Travis was only interested in the diamond, destroys the TraviCom satellite. They find a hot-air balloon in one of Travis's wrecked cargo planes. Seeing Amy with a troop of gorillas, Peter bids her goodbye. The three take off in the balloon, and Karen has Peter throw the diamond into the jungle below. Amy watches the departing balloon then joins the other gorillas.
Production
Development and writing
After the success of The First Great Train Robbery, Crichton decided to write a screenplay specifically for Sean Connery as the character Charles Munro, an archetypal "great white hunter" akin to H. Rider Haggard's hero Allan Quatermain.[4] The film was envisioned as an homage to classic pulp adventure tales, and Crichton successfully pitched the movie to 20th Century Fox in 1979 without a fleshed out story.[4] Crichton left the project when he learned that he could not use a real gorilla to portray the character of Amy.[4] It was offered to several directors including Steven Spielberg and John Carpenter.[4] A brief attempt was made to revive the project in the late 1980s.[4] Eventually, Frank Marshall directed the film with little, if any, involvement from Crichton.[4] The film's teaser credits John Patrick Shanley and Crichton as co-screenwriters, but the trailer and the film itself credit Shanley alone.
Originally, Delroy Lindo was set to shoot his scene in the Dominican Republic, but ended up shooting it in Pasadena, California.[5] Jimmy Buffett has a cameo as the pilot of the jet transport.
Release
Marketing
A teaser trailer for Congo debuted in theaters on November 18, 1994, with the release of Star Trek Generations. It was also attached to the VHS release of Forrest Gump. Promotional partners included Taco Bell, Coca-Cola and Kenner Products.[6]
Home media
Congo was released on VHS and LaserDisc on November 21, 1995. The LaserDisc release is THX certified and consists of widescreen and pan and scan fullscreen versions.[7] A widescreen VHS release debuted a year later on September 10, 1996.[8] The DVD was released on July 27, 1999.
Reception
Box office
Congo was estimated to gross $13–$15 million in its opening weekend, but surprised the industry when it grossed $24.6 million for the weekend, placing number one at the US box office ahead of Casper.[9][10] It was overtaken by Batman Forever during its second weekend.[11] In the United States and Canada, the film grossed $81,022,101. The final worldwide gross was $152,022,101 versus a $50,000,000 budget.[12]
Critical response
Rotten Tomatoes retroactively collected 51 reviews to give the film an approval rating of 22%. The site's consensus states: "Mired in campy visual effects and charmless characters, Congo is a suspenseless adventure that betrays little curiosity about the scientific concepts it purports to care about."[13] Metacritic rated it 22/100 based on 19 reviews, meaning "generally unfavorable reviews".[14] Roger Ebert of Chicago Sun-Times rated it 3 out of 4 stars. He called the film a splendid example of a genre no longer much in fashion, the jungle adventure story.[15] It was nominated for seven Golden Raspberry Awards. Hal Hinson of The Washington Post called the film a "Spielberg knockoff...shamelessly lifting themes and ideas from a handful of Steven's greatest hits." He criticized Amy the gorilla as "the most disappointing 'performance' of all" and opined that the supporting actors, Tim Curry and Ernie Hudson, stood out more than the lead actors.[16]
The A.V. Club's Ignatiy Vishnevetsky said Congo was full of "goofy pleasures" like "delectably goofy" lasers and "mutant killer apes", calling it one of the most enjoyable films that came out of the post–Jurassic Park period. He said he enjoyed the film more as a campy comedy than as the thriller the trailers made it out to be, and concluded with "Is Congo a good film? It's certainly a good time."[17]
Accolades
