The King of Kong. (********8/10)
Yesterday, I had a conversation with Christian, one of our tech guys. He was wearing a Splinter Cell hat, and I asked him if that had been a Tom Clancy book before it had become a Tom Clancy video game. This led to a very long discussion about the four different Splinter Cell games, their story lines, which ones were most interesting, which were bleak, and what other PC games were similar. Something called Day of Sex. Or Deus Ex. I couldn’t tell, Christian talks very fast. Now, during this whole conversation, I had very little idea what he was talking about. I have never played any of these games. But I was very interested. Clearly, this is a man who is very into these games, and listening to someone discuss something they love is always a good conversation. And sure, it’s a little nerdy. But there are an awful lot of people who are similarly nerdy about these very same games. So it’s a little nerdy, it’s not scary nerdy.
I went home yesterday and watched a movie about the scary nerdy. The crazy, over-the-top, maddeningly geeky world of video games. And not Splinter Cell or Day of Sex or Doom or Grand Theft Auto or whatever. Old-school games. The ones I have actually played at some point in my life at some arcade during lunch hour in Grade 7. Pac-Man, Q-Bert, and of course, Donkey Kong! There is a guy, apparently, named Billy Mitchell, somewhere in the United States, who is an absolute legend in the world of old-school arcade games. He is the first man ever to have a perfect score in Pac-Man. He is the world record holder in Donkey Kong. In fact, he holds down five spots in the world records of video games. He is the Tiger Woods, the Michael Jordan, the Babe Ruth of arcade games! And these are not my words. These are the words of the twenty or thirty people who still inhabit this arcade game world, to whom Billy Mitchell is an absolute God.
And Billy Mitchell apparently sees himself as some kind of deity also. During the documentary King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, he compares himself to the Red Baron. (Richtofen clocked 89 kills in WWI, the closest pilot had 24. Mitchell is that much better, says Mitchell.) The fact that his numbers are wrong is irrelevant. So don’t bother pointing that out to me, I am already aware of the story of Billy Bishop. However, Billy Bishop is a very apt comparison to Billy Mitchell in this movie. There was intense controversy in World War I when Billy Bishop claimed to have taken off in his plane before dawn, conducted a solitary raid in German territory, and claimed to have destroyed several planes on the ground before getting shot at and returning to his base. These alleged kills added to his total, but they happened in very suspicious circumstances, and many people believed that Bishop had invented the story. And in the King of Kong, Billy Mitchell makes a very similar claim, that causes enormous controversy. I won’t divulge the details, because I hope you watch this movie.
Mitchell also makes other bizarre claims. He says that whatever he says will be controversial, like the abortion issue, because he is just that huge and that important in the video game world. You roll your eyes and sigh, until you realize he isn’t bluffing! To these other weirdos, his word is like that of God himself! The nerds in the arcade compare him to Tiger, Jordan, they suggest that he should be the next one on a Wheaties box, that he should have Olyumpic medals, and they ALL call him the most luminous superstar. One guy compares him - quite seriously - to a Jedi. I couldn’t make this up. And why? Because in 1985, Billy Mitchell set a record in Donkey Kong that, like Joe DiMaggio’s 1941 hitting streak, was believed to be unassailable. This is a record that will never be broken. But wait! Maybe someone has a lot of time on their hands and wants to make a run at it? Well, lo and behold, here comes Steve Wiebe, a teacher who happened to have a lot of time on his hands.
Steve Wiebe breaks Mitchell’s record. He sends the videotape of the record-breaking game to the world authority on video games. The world of nerds goes nuts! (I must say though, that compared to these arcade guys, Wiebe seems like the most socially well-adjusted person on Earth.) So what happens? Billy Mitchell, God, has been taken down! Well, we had better make damn sure. So - again, I am not making this up - the video game authority sends two “judges” to Wiebe’s house, where his Donkey Kong game is set up in his garage. They force their way into his garage, and dismantle his machine! I won’t explain any more about this movie, because, again, I really hope that people watch this film. I will say this - the Mitchell - Wiebe showdown is billed by the geeks as Mantel - Maris, Yankees - Red Sox, Lakers - Celtics, and Darth - Luke. I will also say this: Seeing a name appear on the screen beside the words “Donkey Kong expert”, as though that is this gentleman’s actual job, is hilarious.
The best line in the movie:
“We don’t see too many DDGs in here.”
“DDGs?”
“Drop Dead Gorgeous. Uh, girls.”