Harryhausen Lamp Lit Again

 

Presentation As Always Makes The Difference

First impressions are often wrong, specifically mine in the seventies of latter-day Sinbad, his Golden Voyage (1974), and Eye of the Tiger (1977). Ignoring the pair for going on fifty years since, finally giving both another go courtesy Indicator Blu-Rays, showed how strict adhere to early formed opinions is a way to miss much that is good, was good all along but for pig-head insistence that a thing once dismissed must forever be so. Golden Voyage this week was the reveal of why it withered in 1974: I had seen it at our wretched College Park Cinema, known burial ground for films better experienced anywhere else. I came away from Sinbad to decry, of all things, Ray Harryhausen for staging fx against too-dark backgrounds … caves, ships at night, wherever light was not. Came long delayed dawn --- the College Park’s projection, like most theatres then and since, was dim to point of invisibility. We had merely adjusted to a lousy standard for watching. Bright lit shows of Smokey and the Bandit sort of got by, but Sinbad unless bathed in sun would not register as it should. Indicator fixes all this, made me know I had unfairly judged Sinbad and its creator. How refreshing to capture a good experience from ash of ones too long thought bad, for reasons peculiar to a single venue and failure to recognize the problem for what it was.

Not saying these are unclaimed classics, but there is plenty to like about 70’s Sinbad. First is Harryhausen skill developed even from favorites that brought him fame. Watching amounts to waiting game between creatures he creates, Easter Eggs spotted through narrative barely got by without them. Fans understood that from start and knew the wait was worthwhile, this more so as we aged and (hopefully) became more patient. “Lesser” Harryhausen is nothing to do with Harryhausen, but with story and what lacks in terms of human participation, his effects top drawer no matter what. Ray rushing a job or doing less than his best was never an option. I reacquainted too with The Valley of Gwangi of long-ago Liberty attendance (1969) where at least the image was discernable (they had a Monte Cristo-like projectionist who seemed never to emerge from his forty-year confinement in the booth). Having rejected more of genre offers by then, I sat a first hour wondering how James Franciscus merited sixty cent admission, dinosaurs when they came largely lost to memory. Clouds upon revisit parted however as with Sinbad, Gwangi clearly off King Kong blueprint, characters/exposition to start, slow trek toward title Valley, then dinosaurs amok to the end, one loose in town to terrorize a la the ‘33 ape, a same scheme using same visual technique, this time in color. I did not sense the borrowing in 1969 but might have appreciated The Valley of Gwangi more given that perception. If we grade films based upon dinosaur content, which all of us should, then Gwangi will punch any ticket, be it sixty cents or whatever Warners wants for its DVD.

Harryhausen’s best support came from composers, specifically Bernard Herrmann, whose magic was potent as Ray’s, and helpful to fill vessel that was story, direction, acting, whenever stop-motion creatures were offscreen. If we credit Herrmann for much of Psycho effect, which most do, then let him take bows for Seventh Voyage/Sinbad, Mysterious Island, Jason, plus a lion’s share for comparative weak sister that was The Three Worlds of Gulliver. Miklos Rozsa stood in to score The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, lending it flavor of long-past The Thief of Bagdad (1940), which Harryhausen knew and loved from childhood, so much so that I’m sure he chose Rozsa for this commission. The Harryhausens really are a continuum from fantasy as presented during the thirties and forties. We could wish Hammer had put Harryhausen in effects charge of their 1965 She remake, as here was exotica he revered since 1935 and the RKO original. To rewrite history further would see Harryhausen manning The War of the Worlds, for which he did preliminarily work, but Paramount in 1953 chose in-house completion, frankly not to imaginative extent he would have brought to the project. I’d enjoy Disney’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea better had Ray driven the giant squid instead of WD crew hoisting up a big-scale prop and spending inordinate time and resource to ambulate the thing. Imagine Harryhausen turned loose with even a fraction of money spent here. What a squid sensation he would have composed, plus further monsters lacking as the Nautilus lumbered from sea to sea for 127 minutes.

Critical establishment ignored Harryhausen unduly, wrong-thinking his projects were childish. Maybe they were, and remain so, but soft spine that was stories were never the point, RH set-pieces always a light switched on or off, watchers adjourned to snack bars, loo, or smoking loge until stop-motions restarted. Why not nominate a Harryhausen creation for “Best Actor,” or Actress (his gorgon)? I kid not here. Most people did not understand what Harryhausen went through to achieve his results. I could hardly have walked out of One Million Years B.C. in summer 1966 to explain how Ray did it. I just knew that he had, and we were the happier for watching. B.C. anticipation was so great as to make me attend Mary Poppins two weeks earlier just for being told a trailer for the Harryhausen show would be shown in addition. A reader comment to Greenbriar summed up distinction best: We see Harryhausen fingerprints in the clay. The human factor thrives in all his non-human characters. I’m stunned by their expressiveness, even where I know from past viewings to expect it. Sacrifice for his art obliged the Master to do virtually all of work in private, the better to concentrate and guard secrets of his trade. If it is possible for any of us to leave behind that which will last permanent, Harryhausen did so.

Actor Tom Baker, interviewed for the Indicator Golden Voyage disc, once asked Ray why he stopped after Clash of the Titans, to which RH replied, I didn’t want to be alone anymore. Imagine being shut up in a workspace, by yourself, for year or two it took to complete a feature. Yes, he was there to supervise shooting, but the close job was done solitary. I’ll cop to impatience with Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, half through before I began speeding through clunky talk-talk to apply brakes whenever a next monster showed up. Harryhausen movies were determinably G-rated, which caused some to feel they had grown out of the game as 70’s loomed, myself included, but as said earlier, even late ones play OK thanks to Blu-Ray enhance, a surrender to the inner child full accomplished on my part. Extras among the Indicator discs include 8mm versions sold by Columbia for most all the Harryhausen group, eight or so minutes of best stuff for fans to watch over and again at home. These may well have been a best bargain in film collecting at the time.