The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters
2007 Directed by Seth Gordon
Synopsis
Don't get chumpatized
In this hilarious arcade showdown, a humble novice goes head-to-head against the reigning Donkey Kong champ in a confrontation that rocks the gaming world to its processors! For over 20 years, Billy Mitchell has owned the throne of the Donkey Kong world. No one could beat his top score until now. Newcomer Steve Wiebe claims to have beaten the unbeatable, but Mitchell isn't ready to relinquish his crown without a fight. Go behind the barrels as the two battle it out in a vicious war to earn the title of the true King of Kong.
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Some people have said that the way the filmmakers put The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters together has in result caused Billy Mitchell to come out as a villain of sorts, which makes me wonder if it was a rumor spread but the "fans" or "henchmen" of Billy Mitchell, the people he has doing all of his dirty work and fueling his paranoia. The only person who causes Billy Mitchell to look like a villain is Billy Mitchell. I do not need a documentary format to piece the facts together, he is a reprehensible spoilsport in his own making.
Steve Wiebe put himself out there on several occasions, even calling Billy Mitchell to personally invite him to a…
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This is a documentary with very clear ideas about whose side it's on. It plays out in classic sports movie style - the reigning champ and the underdog challenger, the highs, the lows, the victories and defeats. All that's missing is a montage of Steve Wiebe punching a side of beef.
Billy Mitchell does himself no favours by modelling his look on Fisher Stevens' villain in Hackers and delivering a series of glowering looks to camera as he talks his talk. Against that, Wiebe can't help but come across as a decent guy.
Along the way, it lifts the lid on the internecine squabbling of the various cliques and cabals in the competitive arcade gaming world - clandestine phone calls,…
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A really enjoyable documentaryesque story about champion Donkey Kong players. You couldn’t ask for a better cast. The biggest let down comes when researching the real events afterwards and being uncertain whether what you’ve watched was a documentary or a dramatisation... I appreciate the effort to turn the story into a story for the screen, but I’m uneasy about a rewriting of history.
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Billy Mitchell isn't even the first Billy Mitchell that comes up in Wikipedia.
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Billy Mitchell can go fuck himself. That is all.
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Billy Mitchell a perfectionist who has everything going for him, and everything going his way.
Steve wiebe a man who just never quite made himself the man he wanted to be, baseball, basketball, musician, but it was one game that will divine him and bring him into a world of greatest high scores.
At the beginning of the movie you kind of think this is a bit stupid all this tension and drama over a retro arcade game from the coin op world, but as it goes on you forget about that troublesome gorilla, and focus on the ultimate underdog story.
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A suprisingly good film. I later became addicted to playing the classic arcade game Donkey Kong.
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Just amazing, I was edge of the seat and laughing my ass off at the same time, it was great, it has this ambivalent feel where you think how can they take this so seriously and at the same time you think it's great they found something they can be this passionate about.
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One of my favorite documentaries. Seth Gordon manages to take the obsolete sub-culture of competitive classic video games and weave a tale full of intrigue, betrayal, politicizing and strife. All of the footage adds to the narrative, something few documentarians achieve.
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Great documentary on competitive gaming. The director follows a few gamers and we really get to learn their back stories and motivations.
I found the most interesting aspect was how the director manipulated our attitudes to different players throughout. A documentary doesn't have to be objective, it just has to be entertaining.
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Probably my favorite documentary. Think Rocky with Video Games.
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Billy Mitchell represents all that is wrong with the world today. Team Wiebe!!
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4th time watching maybe? So damn good. Great. Just great.
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Billy Mitchell is a right bastard
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To me, The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters is one of the top 5 greatest documentaries ever made. A feverishly addictive 79 minutes, that's only flaw is that it should be 8 hours, because I can honestly watch it forever.
When it comes to these sort of quirky cult-documentaries the only other movie that beats it is American Movie, but the both of them contain the strangest, most delusional, hilarious characters who are so defined and memorable, with some of the most quotable dialogue in film.The narrative fashion is so exciting and adventurous, the sides of good and evil so perfectly executed, and it's all real.
The protagonist Steve Wiebe is the "aw-shucks", humble, Jimmy Stewart sort…