"The Guy in the Gorilla Suit"

[Dave Monroe]

Also from the new issue (#16, "The Stockholm
Syndrome") of Hermenaut ...

http://www.hermenaut.com/

Which, again, ISN'T online yet, see also, perhaps even
esp., "The Guy in the Gorilla Suit" by Gavin McNett
(pp. 58-68) ...

"It's King Kong, released in 1933, which seems best to
amrk the dilatory transitional point in the
metaphorical finction of the GGS [Guy in a Gorilla
Suit] in American society.  Although still transported
to civilization in a cage only to escape and wreak
havoc, Kong's gorilla-as-African-demigod had become
impossibly huge: a stop-motion model of a monster who
would have been physically unable to ravish the blonde
Venus he carried off.  King Kong also emerged in the
film as a surprisingly sympathetic character--an
innocent who by all rights should have been allowed to
remain in the jungle, and who, ultimately, wanted only
to be loved.  In 1962, Japanese audiences cheered on
King Kong (a GGS, not a model) as he saved Tokyo from
the radioactive Gojira (trans. 'gorilla-whale,' a.k.a.
Godzilla [Guy in a Godzilla Suit?]), in Godzilla vs.
King Kong.  Godzilla, of course, represented the
destructive forces of man-made technology; thanks to
Hiroshima, by the 1960s the GGS had come to seem
downright lovable." (p. 161)

This, by the way, is one of the best little pieces on
anything, esp. guys in gorilla suits, I've read ever. 
Well worth lookiMuch, of course, on race, humanity, et
al.  The issue is well worth picking up, articles on,
say, the "Vancouverization" of television (esp. SF),
The Quiet American (Greene, Mankiewicz), "Hermenaut of
the Month" Theodor Adorno, and an hilarious piece
where staffers set up a dunking booth at Burning Man. 
The best part is where there's a "Critical Theorist"
in the tank: "'Hey, modern primitive!' the CT jeers. 
'In the universally mediated world, everything
experienced in "primary" terms is cultural preformed!'
 POW!  He's in the water."  But, of course, I'm on his
side ...



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