Mighty Joe Young 🎥 1998 Movie Info

Plot Summary

As a child, Jill Young and her primatologist mother, Ruth, study mountain gorillas in the Virunga mountains of the Uganda. Jill names an infant gorilla “Joe”. As Andrei Strasser leads a group of poachers to storm the mountains, Ruth’s friend and leader of the village, Kweli, alerts her to the men as she is putting Jill to bed. Ruth heads into the mountains and Jill follows. Strasser murders Joe’s mother and shoots Ruth. Joe bites off Strasser’s thumb and index finger on his right hand, and Strasser swears revenge. As Ruth dies, she has Jill promise to protect Joe from poachers at all costs.

Twelve years later in 1998, Gregg O’Hara, a wildlife refuge director at a Los Angeles animal conservatory, comes to Africa to study and catalog animals near the Pangani Mountains. During his expedition, his guides help him capture a leopard for blood sampling. When the locals attempt to poach the animal, Joe, now grown nearly 15 feet tall and weighing over 2,000 pounds, emerges from the jungle to free the creature. After the men regroup, they use their vehicles to pursue Joe across the plains, hoping to secure a blood sample. Joe uses his immense size to disable the vehicles and nearly kill his pursuers, after which they collect what remains of their gear and retreat, but Gregg chooses to follow Joe into the jungle further.

Once inside, Joe ambushes and terrifies Gregg, until he is saved by a now-grown Jill, who calms Joe. Gregg later goes to find Joe again, and witnesses his bond with Jill. While initially untrusting of Gregg, Jill is finally convinced by him to relocate Joe to the institute in Los Angeles for his own safety. At the conservatory, the refuge staff places Jill in charge of Joe once the director sees how she manages him so well.

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