Michael Crichton’s books have been turned into movies many times, and most of those adaptations have been successful. While films like The 13th Warrior, Sphere, and Timeline weren’t hits, The Andromeda Strain, Disclosure, The Great Train Robbery, and especially Jurassic Park all performed well. Beyond adaptations of his novels, Crichton also worked directly on several films, co-writing Twister, writing and directing Coma (with Michael Douglas), and doing both for the popular film Westworld. However, there’s one movie that stands out as being truly bad, yet surprisingly fun to watch.
Congo is a prime example of a ‘so bad it’s good’ movie – wonderfully cast, but utterly ridiculous. It’s a truly memorable film from the 1990s, and a guilty pleasure for many viewers.
If Congo Was Just Trying to Be Fun and Funny, It Succeeded
Given that Congo was released two years after Jurassic Park, it’s safe to say it wouldn’t have been made without the success of Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster film. Similar to how the Jurassic Park movie simplified the original novel, Congo also takes liberties with its source material – even more so, in fact.
The book Congo is essentially a story about a race between tech companies to find diamonds in the legendary Lost City of Zinj. While the movie also features the lost city and its treasures, it focuses on a single expedition with a variety of different goals. A key difference is what the diamonds are used for: in the book, they’re for making computer chips, but in the movie, they power laser guns and a satellite.
Both the book and the movie feature frightening gorillas, but their origins differ. In the book, these gorillas are a hybrid of human and chimpanzee DNA. The movie’s gorillas are simply large, intimidating apes created to guard diamonds, though they eventually discover they aren’t safe from either lasers or lava.
The film Congo generally follows the plot of the book, though with some changes. However, the movie and book have very different feels. The book, like many of Michael Crichton’s novels, is filled with technical explanations, while the movie prioritizes a fast-paced, action-packed adventure.
The film doesn’t try to be serious, unlike the book. This is clear from the script, which contains silly lines like “Stop eating my sesame cake!” and “I’m your great white hunter for this trip, though I happen to be Black.”
The movie’s playful spirit is best embodied by the character Herkermer Homolka, created specifically for the film. Tim Curry, a fantastic actor, fully grasped the tone and delivered a wonderfully over-the-top performance. He clearly understood the kind of movie he was in and leaned into it completely. It’s surprisingly upsetting to see even this minor villain defeated by one of the diamond-protecting gorillas.
Look, Congo isn’t trying to be some masterpiece, and honestly, it’s not. It’s a lot like Anaconda in that way. But just like I enjoyed Jon Voight in Anaconda, I find myself really enjoying C. Thomas Howell’s performance in Congo. Plus, that Bruce Campbell cameo is a fun bonus! It’s just a really fun, big-budget adventure movie, and we don’t get many of those anymore – it feels like that style of film disappeared after the 90s.
https://comicbook.com/movies/list/5-great-1980s-action-movies-nobody-talks-about/embed/#
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2025-10-22 01:43