Konga (1961)

Alfred from BATMAN pimps a chimp!

Konga (1961)
Director: John Lemont
Written by: Herman Cohen, Aben Kandel

Our movie opens with an airplane crash in the jungle. We soon learn (thanks to the ever-helpful newspaper vendors) that a Famous Botanist was on board. A year later, a newsie informs us that the Famous Botanist has been found alive, and proves this by pointing to a paper with the headline “Famous Botanist Found Alive” (it was either a slow news day or botanists were the Spice Girls of the early ’60s).

Soon Famous Botanist Charles Decker (Michael Gough), accompanied by a baby chimp that he fondles incessantly, returns home to Margaret (Margo Johns), his “housekeeper, secretary, assistant, and good friend.” Margaret quickly picks up on the peculiar closeness between Decker and the chimp, and gets jealous. Decker tells her that little Konga is very important to his plans, and implies that in a showdown between Margaret and Konga, Margaret would be the one donated to the petting zoo. He also explains that while he was lost in Africa, he discovered “the link in evolution between animal and plant life,” which turns out to be the Venus Flytrap. Soon Decker has a whole greenhouse full of giant Venus Flytraps, and is now ready for the next phase of his experiment—injecting his good buddy Konga with flytrap juice. The results are astounding, transforming Konga from a baby chimp into...an adult chimp!

Back at the university, Decker attempts to sexually harass a blonde and busty co-ed named Sandra, but he’s interrupted by a summons from the Dean, who objects to Decker’s wild evolutionary theories. Decker protests that they are perfectly good theories, and that “Ultimately, I will be able to change the shape of human beings!” (Just like Jenny Craig!) The Dean exclaims, “Charles, you’re mad!”

Decker goes home to whine to Margaret about the mean dean, then suddenly cries out, “Please leave; I want to be alone with Konga.” Margaret looks troubled as she departs, possibly to seek expert advice. (“Dear Abby, my relationship is being threatened by a chimp...”)

Alone at last, Decker shoots up Konga with more flytrap juice. The picture wavers, and Konga becomes...a man in a bad gorilla costume! Decker reminds Konga that “We know each other much better than the world suspects,” (um, okay), and has Konga seal their love by strangling the Dean.

Later, in an attempt to prove that she’s more fun than a whole barrel of mutated chimps, Margaret throws a party at Decker’s place. In attendance is Professor Tagore, who, in the strangest coincidence ever, is also doing research into Venus Flytrap juice. Decker realizes that Tagore will soon be able to produce his own killer chimp, so he pays a call on Tagore, taking Konga along for the ride. Each scientist tries to one-up the other with stories about how well their mutations are proceeding, until finally a pair of ape arms burst through the shelving behind Tagore and strangle him.

The next day Decker takes his botany class on a field trip. He loads the students into the ape-mobile, but tells Sandra he needs her to ride in the cab with him. Bob, Sandra’s boyfriend, asks if he can sit up front too, but is quickly put in his place, which is the back of the van with the other To Sir with Love rejects. Bob’s friends try to cheer him up by making ribald comments about what Sandra and Decker are probably doing.

A sudden downpour puts an end to the excursion, but Bob stays behind to confront Decker. He tells Decker to leave Sandra alone, “or else!” Decker takes this as a threat, and slaps Bob. Bob punches Decker and sneers, “You’ll probably have me expelled for this.”

Uh, no, Bob, he’ll just have his gorilla strangle you.

While Decker is trying to read his morning paper, Margaret flounces around, perturbed about something (I know you men can relate to this). “What are you having with your poached egg?” she demands. “Murder?” Decker tries to play the old game of denying that he, personally, murdered Bob, and makes her define “murder” and “Bob,” but you can tell his heart isn’t in it. Decker admits that he did have Bob whacked, but purely in the interest of science. And to allay suspicion, he has invited his murder victim’s girlfriend to dinner.

After dessert, Decker offers to show Sandra his greenhouse. Sandra is clearly in mourning, as evidenced by her short, extremely tight skirt and her clingy, low-cut orange sweater. Decker says he wants her to assist him with his “greatest discovery.” Sweet, innocent, stupid Sandra says, “But you already have a very capable assistant!” Decker replies, “I require more that just a laboratory assistant. I need you! To be with me!”

Margaret, who has been eavesdropping from the bushes, is none too thrilled to hear this, and runs off.

Decker is pawing Sandra in earnest now, as she bleats something about feeling faint and wanting to leave. Decker says she can’t until she promises to “work” with him. She says no. He says she must, since he is her teacher and it’s part of his benefits package.

Margaret gives Konga a Sid Vicious-style overdose of flytrap juice, and suddenly Konga is 20 feet tall! He reaches down towards Margaret and picks up a red-headed doll (possibly Barbie’s friend, Midge).

Meanwhile, Sandra is still fighting for her honor. Konga watches all this and decides to make the point that no means no, so he bursts through the glass, reaches an enormous paw down towards Decker, and picks up a Ken doll.

The people of London seem quite calm at the sight of a 50-foot ape strolling down the street, no doubt because making a fuss would be rude. Eventually Konga gets annoyed at their typical British understatement and swats at them, causing the bystanders to run and scream (but quite politely).

Konga reaches Big Ben, London’s answer to the Empire State Building, and stops. (“Hey, look—he’s stopped,” the exposition extra exclaims.) Everybody stands and stares at Konga. Konga stares back. Everyone looks at their watches and waits for something to happen so the movie can end.

At last, we have some action—a few soldiers climb out of a truck. They fire rifles, machine guns, and mortars, but apparently not at Konga. By this time, however, Konga is fed up, so he throws Decker at them and falls down dead. Then, in an unexpected twist, Konga’s body suddenly becomes...a toy chimpanzee! In a tableau evoking the tragic final scene of Romeo and Juliet, the dead sock monkey lays beside the bloody corpse of Decker, making us realize how sad it is that the love of a man and his chimp has to end this way.

Although the message is subtle (typical British understatement), this is the cinema’s most eloquent evocation of that old aphorism, “People who mutate chimps shouldn’t molest co-eds in glass houses.” Something like that. The point is, Konga represents the last gasp of the Toni Home Perm School of Science. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, it should be pointed out that we ourselves work from home, but if one of our assignments goes awry, we can just hit the Delete key, and no one’s the wiser. However, if there was a good chance that a failed movie summary would abduct and carry us to a major tourist attraction, where it would roar and shake us violently like a rag doll while the army fired bazookas and flamethrowers at us and tourists took snapshots and videos as TV station helicopters hovered overhead, beaming live images of the fracas coast-to-coast, then we’d probably put some pants on before settling down to work.

We’d also consider moving out of the downtown area. Because after all, if Konga had gone on a rampage in the village of Grommet-on-Treacle instead of near Big Ben, then he might have upset a costermonger’s cart, maybe bruised a few cabbages, but the Army certainly wouldn’t have gotten involved, and Charles would have been free to chalk the whole thing up to experience, and return to his research into co-ed molestation. Or, as he no doubt put it more eloquently in his grant application, he aimed to “use the Venus flytrap to set a honeytrap for Venus.” Say what you will about Charles (and I say that as a Famous Botanist he made for a Weird Primatologist), one thing is clear: his tautologies were tight.

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