Son of Kong 1933

Ernest B. Schoedsack and Merian C. Cooper's King Kong (33) was not only one of the most successful films of it era, it became something of a phenomenon whose influence can be felt throughout popular culture, not just in films as diverse as Inoshiro Honda's Gojira (54) and Jim Sharman's The Rocky Horror Picture Show (75). Kong himself, much to the filmmakers' surprise, took on a life of his own as a cultural icon, with different societies conferring their own status and meaning onto the figure of the giant ape.
As the production was one of the few outright smash hits that RKO had during its turbulent existence, the studio were obviously very keen to exploit this success as quickly as possible and to this end reunited many of the cast and crew from the original production to quickly and cheaply (at $290,000, less than half the budget allocated to the earlier work) make a sequel. Astonishingly, despite the technical complexity of the project, The Son of Kong debuted a mere eight months after the premier of its parent.