King Kong is a fictional character, a giant movie monster resembling a colossal gorilla, that has appeared in several movies since 1933. An American film crew, led by Carl Denham, captures Kong and takes him to New York City to be exhibited as the "Eighth Wonder of the World." Kong escapes and climbs the Empire State Building (the World Trade Center in the 1976 remake) as Denham comments, "It was beauty that killed the beast," for he climbs the building in the first place only in an attempt to protect Ann Darrow

As the Disney movie is "inspired by" rather than "based on" the Kipling stories, the character King Louie does not appear in Rudyard Kipling's original book, as orangutans are not native to India. Also, Kipling insists that the Bandar-log, or monkeys, have no king, or any effective leadership. In the book, Mowgli is abducted by a band of nameless and leaderless Bandar-log (monkeys), but the rest of the scene plays out very differently from Disney's version. Bill Peet's original story for the film did not feature King Louie, but did have a bigger Bandar without a tail, who was perhaps meant to be their king.