The Reelist is a column featuring Kristen Page-Kirby’s musings on movies. For Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday’s review of “Kong: Skull Island,” click here.

An action movie that comes out in March, has a relatively short running time and is based on an existing franchise is almost sure to suck.

Almost. Because “Kong: Skull Island” doesn’t.

Dear readers, it could have been so bad. A group of people (Tom Hiddleston, Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, John Goodman and a whole lot of cannon fodder) go to a mysterious island. In true American style, they immediately begin bombing it for oil. Sorry — for science. Science. This irritates a bunch of giant monsters, including our titular ape. This leads to people getting killed in so many different ways that you can practically hear the brainstorming session (“What if the lizard has a giant tongue that can grab the guy?” “Bird things rip his arm off!” “Personally, I feel that the classic squoosh is always a good option”). “Kong” is the cinematic representation of the phrase “GORILLA! F— YEAH!”

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It’s pretty clear that director Jordan Vogt-Roberts (“The Kings of Summer”) knew where “Kong” could go wrong, and he avoided those traps. He lets us see Kong — an astounding feat of CGI that mixes muscled power with soulful, communicative eyes — less than 10 minutes into the film, rather than dragging it out to a big reveal. The movie is brisk, with a nice rhythm that keeps the action coming without being overwhelming. The fight scenes are creatively staged and, while it’s easy to see most of the scares coming, they’re never manipulative.

All of that, though, simply means that Vogt-Roberts didn’t make a bad movie. He embraced what a King Kong movie should be, and took that to its highest level. The tropes are there (people with mysterious pasts, people with ulterior motives), but they’re embraced with a wink that walks right up to the edge of self-consciousness. The movie takes place right after the end of the Vietnam War. Why? So you can get lots of shots of soldiers working out to classic rock. Tom Hiddleston basically poses his way through the film like it’s a monster-infested American Eagle catalog, while Samuel L. Jackson is at his Samuel L. Jackson-iest.

There are cliched lines delivered in ponderous tones (which you’d expect in a King Kong movie), immediately followed by Kong awesomely ripping something apart and yelling about it (also expected). Instead of trying to subvert expectations — a problem that has plagued modern monster movies, the best example being 2014’s terrible “Godzilla” — “Kong: Skull Island” polishes them until they gleam. Really, “Kong” is like an excellent drag queen in movie form: a blend of camp, exaggeration and craftsmanship so engaging that you know it’s not real, but the facade is so fun to watch that it doesn’t matter. It’s even worth shelling out the cash for the immersive, swooping Imax 3-D version, though those subject to motion sickness should save their money or bring a barf bag.

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“Kong: Skull Island” doesn’t pretend it’s anything that it’s not (a movie about a giant gorilla who is here to eat bananas and smash helicopters, and he’s all out of bananas). More than that, it’s a joyful celebration of what it is, and that joy comes through the screen. It doesn’t just avoid pitfalls — it soars over them.

More Reelists from Kristen Page-Kirby

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‘The Lego Batman Movie’ delivers just the hero we need right now

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