• "King Kong" (1933) is justly one of the most famous creature features of all time, and it's still gripping, from the early frames, where we meet obsessive filmmaker Carl Denham (Robert Armstrong) and his recruiting of actress Ann Darrow (Fay Wray) to their journey to Kong Island and the unexpected horrors they encounter to their ultimately capturing Kong and bringing him to New York City.

The film remains superb in every respect, with fabulous special effects by the great Willis O'Brien, and the bonus features here are also quite mesmerizing, especially a re-creation of the lost "spider-pit" sequence that was removed from the film early on by Cooper himself. This reconstruction was an expensive, time-consuming undertaking all by itself, led by the hand of Peter Jackson (the Oscar-winning "Lord of the Rings" filmmaker, whose own remake of "King Kong" opens next month).

There's also an audio commentary featuring the great Ray Harryhausen, a fine stop-motion filmmaker in his own right ("The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad," "Jason and the Argonauts"), and vintage audio interviews with Cooper and Wray.

— "The Son of Kong" (1933) is a kinder, gentler "Kong," which was rushed out the same year. Armstrong returns as Denham, returning to Kong Island and finding his lighter-coated son, in what plays much of the way more like a sweet children's picture. Enjoyable on its own but quite different from the first film.

— "Mighty Joe Young" (1949) is sort of "Kong" goes West, also more family-friendly, with Harryhausen working with O'Brien for the special effects. Terry Moore stars in this one, and the title character is sort of Kong as a pet, with similar themes but a gentler tone. Good fun.

Bonus features on this film include an audio commentary with Moore and Harryhausen, and two new making-of featurettes.

Extras: Full frame, trailers, subtitle options (English, French, Spanish), chapters.

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E-mail: hicks@desnews.com