Rotten Tomatoes
Cancel Movies Tv shows FanStore News Showtimes

Konga

Play trailer Poster for Konga Released Mar 22, 1961 1h 30m Sci-Fi Mystery & Thriller Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
43% Tomatometer 7 Reviews 14% Popcornmeter 1,000+ Ratings
A botanist's experiments with primates and plant serum transform a lovable chimpanzee into a giant killer gorilla.
Watch on Prime Video Stream Now

Where to Watch

Konga

Critics Reviews

View All (7) Critics Reviews
Matt Brunson Film Frenzy Herman Cohen met with success by producing and (under pseudonyms) writing the 1957 hits I Was a Teenage Werewolf and I Was a Teenage Frankenstein, so why not go for the hat-trick by unleashing I Was a Teenage Gorilla onto an unsuspecting world? Rated: 2.5/4 Dec 9, 2019 Full Review Naila Scargill Exquisite Terror A hoot from beginning to end, this is sheer B-movie lunacy of remarkably bad proportions, and all the more essential for it. Feb 28, 2019 Full Review Sean Axmaker Turner Classic Movies Online Konga is a giant ape movie to be sure but Gough's Dr. Decker is a mad scientist in the mode of Peter Cushing's Dr. Frankenstein from Hammer's series... Apr 28, 2007 Full Review Phil Hall Film Threat Get in shape, ape! Rated: 3/5 Dec 17, 2005 Full Review Keith Breese Filmcritic.com if you're one of those sadomasochistic cinephiles looking for raspberries this is a sure fire winner. Rated: 1/5 Dec 11, 2005 Full Review Dennis Schwartz Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews A deliciously silly monster film for only the lovers of dreadful films. Rated: C Feb 1, 2004 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

View All (34) audience reviews
CodyZamboni Movie is silly, campy, cheesy, with cheap fx, and filmed in color. It's part mad scientist horror movie and part King Kong rip off. All add up to a big mess. Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 07/29/23 Full Review Michael C If there is one word to describe "Konga", it is mediocre. While I do not think the movie is terrible, I just felt it was dull and unoriginal. The movie's strongest point is the late Michael Gough. His performance helps make "Konga" at least watchable. The movie does have some good points I will admit. The special effects are rather impressive even by today's standards. The movie also has a very good production design. Not the best I have ever seen, but not the worst either. The main story of the movie is nothing we have not seen before. Dr. Charles Decker (Michael Gough's character.) discovers a serum that can grow plants and animals to enormous size. He then uses the serum on his pet chimpanzee Konga turning him into a giant and ferocious gorilla. He thinks he can then use Konga to dispatch his enemies or those he thinks stands in the way of his experiments. he thinks he can control Konga and nothing will ever go wrong, until.... In the end, "Konga" is worth seeing once just for Michael Gough's performance. Overall, it is just another forgettable throwaway of a movie. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 03/23/23 Full Review DanTheMan 2 The epitome of a B-movie, Konga came about from producer Herman Cohen's long-standing love for the original King Kong. It's shlocky all over with wonderfully overwrought nonsense sprinkled throughout but equal parts routine Kongsploitation hackwork where the goods are few and far between. Dr Decker comes back from Africa after a year, presumed dead. During that year, he came across a way of growing plants and animals to an enormous size. He brings back a baby chimpanzee to test out his theory. As he has many enemies at home, he decides to use his chimp, 'Konga' to get rid of them. Then Konga grows to gigantic proportions and wreaks havoc all over the city of London! One of four monster films released in 1961, Konga joins the ranks of the equally British Godzilla film Gorgo, Denmark's only kaiju film Reptilicus and of course Mothra. At its heart is a tale of science abuse coupled with personal grudges and proposals of marriage, a wealthy dose of undercooked and half-baked ideas from writer Aben Kandel (the man behind the likes of Trog). Konga is perhaps best known today for its more successful comic book run drawn by the later legendary Marvel writer Steve Ditko cause the movie leaves a lot of missed potential as it saunters along. Director John Lemont's biggest film, it's rather baffling that Cohen would hire a man more proficient in small crime films to direct his big-budgeted King Kong homage. His direction is extremely crude, the ape suit is incredibly shabby and the terrible optically enlarged scenes with the chimpanzee rampaging have justly accorded Konga a cult status. The music by Gerard Schurmann is typical of the music you'd find on TV at the time, almost like it's ripped right from The Avengers. It's only really the performance of Michael Gough that enlivens Konga in any way. He fires up the film with such a wonderfully arrogant performance and a suitably charismatic walk bespoke of Gough and his villainous charms. The other major credit must be for poor Paul Stockman stuck inside the Konga suit. Overall, Konga is inept, silly, and a ludicrously enjoyable monster movie with its intense British charms shining through a lot of its problems. The low-fi charm of watching a man in a bad gorilla suit stomping across the London skyline doesn't get old, but it could be better. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 02/16/23 Full Review Audience Member You bad, hairy ape, movie! Such a cheesy movie, chimpanzees don't grow up into gorillas, they are a separate species of apes all together. Also, this plot is so lazy and seems to rip off better movies such as King Kong. Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars 01/13/23 Full Review Audience Member If you're looking for a King Kong knock-off that you'll enjoy regardless of how terrible it is, then Konga is the right movie for you. This cheesy movie contains bad writing, illogical plot, not so special visual effects, and bad costume design. You know what people say. Monkey see...monkey poo. In other words zero out of five stars! Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars 02/18/23 Full Review Audience Member Rubbish, 1961 or not, Absolute Rubbish. Rated 1 out of 5 stars 02/08/23 Full Review Read all reviews
Konga

My Rating

Read More Read Less POST RATING WRITE A REVIEW EDIT REVIEW

Cast & Crew

Die, Monster, Die! 78% 39% Die, Monster, Die! Watchlist The Andromeda Strain 68% 72% The Andromeda Strain Watchlist Seconds 79% 87% Seconds Watchlist The Giant Behemoth 17% 28% The Giant Behemoth Watchlist Soylent Green 70% 70% Soylent Green Watchlist Discover more movies and TV shows. View More

Movie Info

Synopsis A botanist's experiments with primates and plant serum transform a lovable chimpanzee into a giant killer gorilla.
Director
John Lemont
Screenwriter
Aben Kandel
Production Co
Alta Vista Productions
Genre
Sci-Fi, Mystery & Thriller
Original Language
British English
Release Date (Theaters)
Mar 22, 1961, Limited
Release Date (Streaming)
May 16, 2017
Runtime
1h 30m
Most Popular at Home Now