Vintage Review Spotlight :: Ray Harryhausen Presents the Wildest Round-Up Ever in The Valley of Gwangi (1969)

 Our story begins at the turn of the last century down in Mexico, where a broken down circus barely ekes out a living touring the small villages along the Rio Grande. Enter Tuck Kirby (Franciscus), a former stuntman for this one-lung outfit, who now buys acts for Buffalo Bill's renown Wild West Show. There to purchase Omar the Wonder Horse, whose act is diving off a high platform into a blazing pool of water, Tuck runs right into a brick wall when T.J. Breckenridge -- the show's owner, Omar's rider, and Tuck's former flame -- refuses to sell. Not one to give up that easily, Tuck keeps pressing and pushing her buttons. Turns out there's still the teeniest hint of a romantic spark between these two, and in the ensuing battle to fan the flames, and to see who gets to be on top, T.J. (Golan) reveals that Omar can't be sold because he's an integral part of the show's new main attraction, and then unveils El Diablo: the World's Tiniest Horse.

Absolutely gob-smacked by the sight of the cat-sized creature, and taking note of the little horse's strange cloven hooves, Tuck soon gets an earful as T.J. can't help but gloat over her new guaranteed money-maker. Asked where it came from, T.J. reveals it was captured by Carlos (Gustavo Rojo) somewhere in THE FORBIDDEN VALLEY!. Given to T.J. as a sign of affection, the jealous Carlos is none to happy about the rekindling romance between these two former lovebirds and refuses to divulge anything else. Actually, he can't. In truth, it was Carlos's brother who defied the old gypsy curse to avoid THE FORBIDDEN VALLEY! and captured the animal -- but the curse lived up to its rep, and he barely made it out of that profane place with his prized captive. Mortally wounded, the last words he speaks to his brother is a warning, a warning of just one word: Gwangi...

It's kind of ironic that it was England's Hammer Studios that got master movie animator Ray Harryhausen back in the dinosaur business. For it was the same studio's gothic horror-shows that sounded the death-knell on the resurgent sci-fi boom of the 1950's and effectively brought an end to all those giant monster movies. (With one notable exception over in Japan.) But when they hired Harryhausen to provide the F/X for One Million Years B.C., with the film's resulting box-office success, dinosaurs were suddenly back in vogue. And that's why after a string of successful fantasy yarns based on the myths and legends of old, Harryhausen's long time creative partner, producer Charles H. Schneer, decided that their next collaborative project should also be set in prehistoric times.

Looking back to his own past for a suitable concept to fit the bill, Harryhausen recalled a certain aborted project by his one-time mentor, Willis H. O'Brien (pictured above), called Gwangi -- a Native American word for "big lizard." After the success of King Kong, O'Brien dreamed up several more fantastic F/X driven pieces, including one about a group of rodeo cowboys who venture into a hidden valley, where, after discovering that it's inhabited by dinosaurs, in perhaps the wildest round-up scene ever conceived, they try to rope and capture an Allosaurus. Unlike his other unrealized project, War Eagles, Gwangi was well into the pre-production stage before RKO pulled the plug over budgetary concerns. But part of Gwangi still managed to survive, when several set-pieces were incorporated into Mighty Joe Young, including the team-roping sequence and a climactic battle between the gorilla and several lions. And it was while animating the sequence where the wranglers attempt to lasso the big ape that O'Brien gave Harryhausen a copy of the Gwangi script.

Twenty years later, Harryhausen unearthed the old screenplay in his garage; and after dusting it off, he passed it on to Schneer, who immediately gave it his blessing. Entrusting the story to William Bast for a little tweaking and fine-tuning, Schneer then went to work assembling the cast and crew for the tentatively titled The Valley Where Time Stood Sill. Harryhausen, meanwhile put pen to paper, dreaming up several creature-concepts and some amazing action-sequences for what would eventually turn out to be the most intensive F/X-driven project of the animator's career. How did it turn out? Check out our full review of The Valley of Gwangi at 3B Theater for a full debriefing.

What is it about Ray Harryhausen’s films that compel us to break out the Play-Doh and make some dinosaurs of our own? I myself was similarly addled by this imagination fuel. And though my dreams of being a creature animator never really went any further than that, I am eternally grateful for all the awe and wonder, the enchantment and the terror, Harryhausen has inspired over the years. That, and providing a conduit, a permanent link, to that sense of childhood curiosity, open-mindedness, and astonishment. And I encourage you all to watch these films -- or watch 'em again, to reconnect, and marvel as his animated creatures come to life. And not only come to life, but truly interact with the "other" actors, leaving us with another imponderable question: How in the hell does he do that?

Other Points of Interest: 

Full review of The Valley of Gwangi at 3B Theater. 

 Poster campaign for The Valley of Gwangi at the Archive. 

Newspaper ads for The Valley of Gwangi at the Morgue. 

The Valley of Gwangi (1969) Morningside Productions :: Warner Brothers/Seven Arts / P: Charles H. Schneer / AP: Ray Harryhausen / D: James O’Connolly / W: William Bast / C: Erwin Hillier / E: Henry Richardson / M: Jerome Moross / S: James Franciscus, Gila Golan, Richard Carlson, Laurence Naismith, Gustavo Rojo, Freda Jackson, Dennis Kilbane, Mario De Barros, Curtis Arden

Vintage Review Spotlight :: Gojira vs. Godzilla! Who Will Be Crowned King of the Monsters! Either Way, We Win!

Way back in the year 2000, after the world breathed a huge sigh of relief over the whole Y2K whiff and eBay found itself burdened by a sudden glut of mint, never-removed from the box gas-masks and survival rations, I was both relieved and excited for the impending premiere of Godzilla 2000, marking the Big G's return to the American cineplex after a fifteen year hiatus -- with no Matthew Broderick, Dean Devilin, or Roland Emmerich anywhere in sight. Woo to the Hoo! Also, way back then, I decided it was high time I finally reviewed our hero's debut film -- both of them: the original Gojira and the domestically re-tooled Godzilla King of the Monsters. And this I did, and a good time was had by all.

Coming just nine years after the atom bombs fell to end World War II, and directed by a man who witnessed firsthand the destruction and devastation those bombs caused, these, and several other factors and influences converged by chance, circumstance and a little bad luck to create the film Gojira. Seems fledgling producer Tomoyuki Tanaka was in some trouble when his current Indonesian based film fell apart over some hassles concerning the necessary work-permit visas. With a cast, crew and money to spend but no movie to expend them on, during the flight back to Japan, Tanaka, while looking at the vast Pacific below, began wondering what beasties might be lurking just below the surface and hit upon an idea. Only two years prior Japanese cinemas had been hit with the original King Kong for the first time and The Beast from 20000 Fathoms soon followed to much box-office success, making it no small wonder, then, that Tanaka decided Japan needed a giant monster of its very own.

At the time of Gojira's release back in 1954, somber message and poignant symbolism aside, Toho Studios was taking a huge financial risk by putting that much money into what was essentially just a giant monster movie. And even though the end-result proved a big hit in Japan, to help defray some of the production costs, the studio opened an office in Los Angeles to help find and secure American distributors for all of their films. (Remember, Toho's Seven Samurai was released the same year.) Serendipitously, in Hollywood, with the major studios imploding, several smaller, independent companies were crawling out of the woodwork looking for a piece of the box-office pie, willing to snatch up almost anything. Honestly, looking overseas for more product made far better sense financially for these smaller companies; distributing already made films meant less expense and more profits, right? And with the resurgent sci-fi and monster boom of the 1950's already well-cemented, taking on a film like Gojira and turning it into Godzilla was an absolute no-brainer.

Look, I'm not breaking any new ground by stating that even though both films share a lot of the same footage they wound up being two completely different films. One, an allegory for mankind's retribution from the  atomic bomb personified, the other a wild creature feature with lots of mayhem and destruction. The former featuring a fraying love-triangle, the other featuring a guy who talks to the back of a lot of other people's heads. And I love them both unconditionally on their own merits. And if you'd like to know more about my thoughts on the history, making of, and meaning of this burgeoning franchise that's very dear to me, follow on through to the full reviews with the links provided below.

Other Points of Interest:

Full film review of Gojira at 3B Theater.

Poster campaign for Gojira at the Archive.

Full film review of Godzilla King of the Monsters at 3B Theater.

Poster campaign for Godzilla King of the Monsters at the Archive.

For the record, the whole thing will probably make a lot more sense if you start with the Gojira review first. Now get to stompin'!
   

Gojira (1954) Toho Eiga Company / P: Tomoyuki Tanaka / D: Ishirô Honda / W: Ishirô Honda, Shigeru Kayama, Takeo Murata / C: Masao Tamai / E: Kazuji Taira / M: Akira Ifukube / S: Takashi Shimura, Momoko Kôchi, Akihiko Hirata, Akira Takarada

Godzilla: King of the Monsters (1956) Toho Company :: Jewell Enterprises Inc. :: Embassy Pictures Corporation :: TransWorld Releasing Corp. / EP: Joseph E. Levine, Terry Turner / P: Tomoyuki Tanaka, Edward B. Barison, Richard Kay, Harry Rybnick / D: Ishirô Honda, Terry O. Morse / W: Ishirô Honda, Shigeru Kayama, Takeo Murata, Al C. Ward / C: Masao Tamai / E: Kazuji Taira, Terry O. Morse / M: Akira Ifukube / S: Raymond Burr, Takashi Shimura, Momoko Kôchi, Akihiko Hirata, Akira Takarada, Frank Iwanaga

Vintage Review Spotlight :: Muscles and Mayhem x 3 :: Pietro Francisi's Hercules, Samson and Ulysses (1965)

For several weeks a giant sea serpent has laid siege on the coastal village of Ithaca, causing several fishermen, tired of being the beast's personal buffet, to petition King Leyeritis for some much needed help. Luckily for them, Hercules just happens to be reveling in the King's Court and gladly volunteers to help slay the monster. His bestest chum, Ulysses (Cerusico), also volunteers to go; and as the boys and their small crew prepare to set sail, leaving their worried womenfolk behind, they promise to be back before the sun sets. And with that, after Herc easily pulls up the giant stone anchor, they're off -- right into the teeth of a vicious storm! Then, to make matters even worse, the lookout spies the sea monster and raises the alarm (-- and so help me, I'm not making this up, but that "sea serpent" sure looks like an otter to me). Moving quickly, Herc harpoons the beast and tries to reel it in, but the beast proves too strong and, instead, drags them farther and farther out onto a dark and turbulent sea.

The next morning, as wreckage from their boat washes ashore, a carrier pigeon arrives bearing news, assuring all the expedition is okay -- well, if being reduced to floating around on what's barely left of the ship means "okay" -- but they might be out to sea a little while longer than originally anticipated. Cast adrift, what's left of the hungry crew wants to eat the remaining pigeons and threatens mutiny. But as Herc chucks them all in the drink to cool off, land is spotted. But the Greeks are unfamiliar with the native flora and fauna -- but eat it anyway. They also attract the attention of a very large and cantankerous bull. And when the beast charges them, Hercules counters, bopping the bovine on the head several times, killing it. They eat that, too. Then, they follow a path and come upon a village and, judging by the native garb, Hercules conjectures they must be in the land Judea.

  

Soon spotted, the villagers eye these new strangers warily -- especially a very large native, Samson (Lloyd), who watches them from the shadows, fearing they might be Philistine spies sent to kill him. And I think we all know where this is heading, right? Right...

Hercules, Samson and Ulysses (1965) was another one of those movies that evaded my grasp for far, far too long. I caught my first glimpse of it over a decade ago after stumbling home from the bar one night, drunk as a skunk, as one normally was after stumbling home from the bar, and kicked on the old boob-tube in time to see some kind of period piece on one of the Super-Stations, where a village was in the process of being massacred by a bunch of baddies. Through my booze induced fog, I watched as people were brazenly crucified against their houses, strung up, burned out, and the rest drug off in chains. Despite this carnage, I kinda faded in and out after that, but clearly remembered watching a muscle-bound hero exact some tasty revenge for those peasants in an equally spectacular fashion. And as this mind-boggling spectacle of carnage and flying boulders continued I realized two things: one, judging by the beefy hero and dubbed voices, this had to be some kind of Italian Hercules movie. And two, this, in my stupor, could quite possibly be the greatest freakin' movie ever made! And then I promptly passed out in the recliner before the movie ended.

Come the dawn, I added more misery to my hangover by kicking myself for not recording the end of the movie. Hell, I didn't even know what it was called. But checking the local TV listings in the paper confirmed I wasn't seeing double due to the booze; there were two musclemen in this thing, running amok. Maybe even three...

And thus, I spent the next decade trying to track down a copy of Hercules, Samson and Ulysses, which was finally accomplished when I bought a VHS dub off of eBay around 2005. When it arrived, the original source of the dub proved to be Video Search of Miami, a gray-market service that had also allowed me to catch Guillio Questi's total mind-f*ck of movie, Death Laid an Egg (1968). And when I finally sat down and watched the whole thing, you ask, Was it as good you remembered? Well, the answer to that is, no, it wasn't. Nope. It was better.

Director and screenwriter Pietro Francisci popularized these muscles and mayhem movies when his Hercules (1958) and Hercules Unchained (1959) were imported to the States in the late 1950s with surprising box-office success. Which, of course, brought on a rash of imitators to cash in. Goliath, Samson, Ulysses, Maciste -- the son of Hercules, and Atlas all had their separate vehicles, but the most popular protagonist was still Hercules. And of couse, when your scriptwriter gets even more bereft of ideas, they started teaming them up. And that's exactly what Francisci did by teaming up our three stalwart heroes. But, by all rights, the proper title of this film should probably have been Hercules, Samson and Delilah as Cerusico's Ulysses disappears for over half the movie and provides nothing but comedy relief. I mean, after all, it is Liana Orfei's vamping and scheming that provides the lever and fulcrum that moves this plot along.

And in the good news department, you no longer have to rely on crappy, pan-n-scan bootlegs of this gonzoidal flick either, as the Warner Archives has the film available for purchase on DVD. And not only is the film presented in its proper aspect ratio, the print is a massive improvement over anything I've seen. In fact, it's so good we can see the mythical sea-serpent who triggered this whole mess is not an otter as first perceived but is actually a sea lion. ROAR! And so, with both Hercules and Hercules, Samson and Ulysses available in a proper, restored format, one holds out hope that more of these hair-brained epics get the same treatment.

Until then, you could do a lot worse than taking the plunge on a movie with giant monsters, stuffed animal wrestling, bull head-butting, the greatest village massacre ever committed to film, crucifixions, hangings, impalement, raping, pillaging, deadly arrow barrages, spear-chucking, incredible stunt work (both human and equestrian); and that's not even getting to the laughable dubbing, cartoony sound-effects, Delilah's erotic serpentine whip dance of the cobra, the evil Philistine king, who puts the bastard in dastardly villain, the converted German SS helmets of his lackeys, two beefy guys beating the living snot out of each other, and the complete and utter destruction of not one, but two, great stone temples. We're talking some major Styrofoam-boulder-chucking-fu, here, people. Go. Watch this. Now!

Other Points of Interest:

Full film review of Hercules, Samson and Ulysses at 3B Theater.

Poster campaign for Hercules, Samson and Ulysses at the Archive.

Hercules, Samson and Ulysses a/k/a Ercole sfida Sansone (1965) I.C.D. :: MGM / P: Joseph Fryd / D: Pietro Francisci / W: Pietro Francisci / C: Silvano Ippoliti / E: Pietro Francisci / M: Francesco Lavagnino / S: Kirk Morris, Richard Lloyd, Liana Orfei, Aldo Giuffrè, Enzo Cerusico, Diletta D’Andrea

Vintage Review Spotlight :: Charles B. Pierce's The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972)

Back in the summer of 1971 it was a slow news day at the offices of the Texarkana Gazette and Daily News, when reporter Jim Powell received a phone call from his friend, Dave Hall. Hall was the news director at Texarkana's KTFS radio station, who had received word that something strange was going on up the road a ways in the little town of Fouke, Arkansas. With nothing else to cover, after both newsmen made their way to Fouke, the news trail led them to Bob Ford's house, where he and his family were quickly packing all their belongings into a U-Haul, determined to vacate the area as soon as possible. Obviously, the family was scared. But why? Well, seems that the night before, some thing had come out of the swamp and attacked them!

Powell went on to report that while Ford was out hunting, he was drawn back to the house because of his wife's sudden cries for help. Moving quickly, he arrived in time to take a few shots at a large, hairy creature, with "eyes as big as silver dollars that burned coal red" prowling around the yard, driving it off into the trees. But the creature kept coming back, and this time it tried to break into the house until Ford, despite injuries received battling the creature, including crashing through a door to escape it, managed to drive the creature away again. Abandoning the house, the family took him to a hospital in Texarkana, where he was treated for shock and abrasions. The next day, the only evidence found around the house were some strange footprints and a few broken off saplings. Ford swears he hit the creature, several times, but no evidence of blood was found. The reporter didn't know if he believed the fantastic story, but Powell wrote it up and filed it anyway. Amazingly enough, both the AP and UPI wire services picked up the newsflash and the tale of "The Fouke Monster" soon became a national sensation, and the little town of Fouke was soon overrun with monster hunters, hoping to catch a glimpse of America's newest folk legend. But like its cousin, the Sasquatch, the creature remained maddeningly elusive.


Now, the attack on the Ford family wasn't the first appearance of this strange creature. No. There had been sightings of the beast as far back as 1940; walking along the creek bed here, crossing the road there, slaughtering a few pigs now and again, and at least one documented case of the thing attacking someone while they were taking a crap in an outhouse. Some say it's all a hoax. Others say it's a gorilla that escaped from a derailed circus train. Who knows for sure. But sometimes, usually at night, something big and hairy crawls out of the wetlands along the Boggy Creek and prowls the house-trailers and shot-gun shacks of Fouke, growling and shrieking and making a general nuisance of itself.


One individual who wanted to cash-in on and exploit this new phenomenon was Texarkana's very own entrepreneur, Charles B. "Chuck" Pierce. Pierce was an advertising pitchman by trade, and once the bug bit him, in true independent filmmaking fashion, borrowed money from a friend's trucking company, commandeered an old camera, formed a crew out of mostly high school students, and then set out to make a movie about the creature, Tracking the Fouke Monster. Implementing a documentary style of filmmaking, and using eye-witness testimonials as the basis for his narrative, Pierce added an air of authenticity by having the locals narrate the dramatic reenactments of their harrowing encounters with some truly fascinating results. To read the rest of the review, click here.

Other Points of Interest:

Newspaper ads at Scenes from the Morgue.

Poster campaign at the Archives.

The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972) P&L Productions :: Howco International Pictures / EP: L.W. Ledwell / P: Charles B. Pierce / AP: Earl E. Smith / D: Charles B. Pierce / W: Earl E. Smith / C: Charles B. Pierce / E: Tom Boutross / M: Jaime Mendoza-Nava / S: Vern Stierman, Chuck Pierce Jr., William Stumpp, Willie E. Smith, John P. Hixon, Louise Searcy

Vintage Review Spotlight :: James Landis' The Sadist (1963)

I freely admit as a Nebraskan, we as a State, an entire entity, have an inferiority complex. We hayseeds and shit-kickers have a chip on our shoulder the size of Lake McConaughy (-- buy a map and look it up!) and rabidly defend our place in the Union by hoping our lack of uniqueness somehow makes us unique. What else do we have to be proud of? Our biggest claim to fame is having one of the dullest stretches of any Interstate; Johnny Carson, Marlon Brando, Henry Fonda, James Coburn, and a lot of other famous people were born here (-- but I point out they all left); and the schizophrenic weather, with all four seasons known to occur within the span of a few minutes, aren't really tourist attractions, either.

And then there's that whole Charlie Starkweather thing. E'yup, we had the Nation's first fugitive spree killer. Yay us. For those few who are unfamiliar with this yahoo, back in 1958, nineteen year-old Starkweather and Caril Fugate, his fourteen year-old girlfriend, terrorized the heartland as they blazed a trail through five States, leaving another trail of dead bodies behind them -- eleven people all together, including Fugate's parents and baby sister, whom Chuckles beat to death -- before finally being caught. My mother, who was twelve years old when these two were running amok, honestly doesn't like talking about it all that much; it scared her pretty good. What little she recollected was that the deadly couple were [allegedly] spotted in the nearby town of Hastings at one point -- as I'm sure they were [allegedly spotted] in every town at the time, and how her folks kept both doors locked and a shotgun, also locked and loaded, stationed by each. Everyone was scared, for this was a whole different kind of gun nut than, say, outlaw bandits like Bonnie and Clyde, or John Dillinger, who came before them.


After they were finally caught, Fugate turned against her boyfriend, claiming to be a hostage the whole time, but nobody bought her story. For their crimes, Starkweather got the electric chair, Fugate got a life sentence, and teenage delinquency had taken a new, and dangerously lethal turn. And advocates against things like rock and roll music, violence in the media, and the decline of moral values had a new poster couple to vilify as a new phrase entered our pop-culture lexicon: the thrill-killer.


Over the subsequent years, Starkweather and Fugate's homicidal relationship served as the basis for several films, most notably Terrence Mallick's Badlands, and its influence spawned a whole genre in the 1990's about trailer-trash with guns with films like Kalifornia and Oliver Stone's Natural Born Crackers -- erk, I mean, Natural Born Killers. Still, Badlands debuted almost fifteen years after Charlie got the chair. Seems mainstream Hollywood was reluctant to tackle the sore subject of this new breed of mass murderer; and while they wouldn't touch the likes of Starkweather, Richard Speck or Charles Whitman with a ten-foot pole, many a smaller, independent production companies were, forgive me, quicker on the trigger. And one of the first fledgling adaptations came out in 1963 by the anti-dynamic duo of Arch Hall Sr. and Arch Hall Jr. And judging by what they'd done before, cinematically speaking, you never would have guessed they'd have this good a movie in them. Coming on the heels of EEGAH!, their giant caveman on the loose epic, came this criminally underrated gem of a film: an honest study in unbridled brutality and mounting terror called The Sadist...

For the rest of the review, click here.

The Sadist (1963) Fairway International Pictures / P: L. Steven Snyder / D: James Landis / W: James Landis / C: Vilmos Zsigmond / E: Anthony M. Lanza / S: Arch Hall Jr., Marilyn Manning, Helen Hovey, Richard Alden, Don Russell