<Tr> <Th> Budget </Th> <Td> $672,000 ($12 million adjusted for inflation) </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Th> Box office </Th> <Td> $2.8 million ($51 million adjusted for inflation) </Td> </Tr> <P> King Kong is a 1933 American pre-Code monster adventure film directed and produced by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack . The screenplay by James Ashmore Creelman and Ruth Rose was from an idea conceived by Cooper and Edgar Wallace . It stars Fay Wray, Bruce Cabot and Robert Armstrong, and opened in New York City on March 2, 1933, to rave reviews . It has been ranked by Rotten Tomatoes as the greatest horror film of all time and the twentieth greatest film of all time . </P> <P> The film tells of a gigantic, prehistoric, island - dwelling ape called Kong who dies in an attempt to possess a beautiful young woman . King Kong is especially noted for its stop - motion animation by Willis O'Brien and a groundbreaking musical score by Max Steiner . In 1991, it was deemed "culturally, historically and aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry . It has been remade twice, in 1976 and 2005, while a reboot, Kong: Skull Island, was released in 2017 . </P>

Who played the female lead in the 1933 film king kong