Written by: Brian Clemens, Ray
Harryhausen
Directed by: Gordon Hessler
Starring: John Phillip Law, Tom Baker,
Carline Munro
I seriously doubt there ever has been,
and ever will be, another filmmaker as influential as Ray
Harryhausen. His stop motion creations inspired not only generations
of other filmmakers, but paleontologists, archaeologists, biologists,
and all manner of scientists and engineers at an early age to pursue
their dreams and broaden the scope of human knowledge. His work had
such incredible character and made an indelible impact on the
imagination of every awe-stricken child (and a good many grownups
too!) who spent their weekend afternoons watching great fantasy
heroes battle hydras and krakens and living statues. His career will
stand forever as one of the great treasures of popular art and
entertainment. There will likely never be another like him, and
that's too bad. I hope that someday, out of the landscape of
soulless digital animation that passes for special effects these
days, another practical effects master may rise up and inspire my
grandchildren or great grandchildren, but as long as Harryhausen's
work is preserved and remembered, that great creative spirit will
live on.
Our story opens as one of the crew
members of Sinbad's ship spots a small creature flying near the mast
and tries to shoot it down with an arrow. I think this is a neat
touch, that the whole thing starts because of a one-in-a-million
chance of the ship crossing paths with the homunculus in the middle
of the open sea. Sinbad and his men weren't out looking for
adventure. Hell, they were probably on the way home and ready for a
little R&R, but adventure came and found them and being manly men
of action, they sure aren't going to turn it down! The shot misses
but the creature drops the gold medallion it was carrying onto the
deck. Despite a warning from the men that it's an evil omen, Sinbad
decides to keep the thing. You'd think the visions the thing gives
him would be enough to make him throw the damn thing into the ocean,
but his curiosity is up and when a terrible storm blows his ship to a
strange land, he decides to go ashore and see if he can find out what
the amulet is.
Almost immediately he runs afoul of the
evil Prince Koura, the black magician to whom both the amulet and the
creature carrying it belonged. Sinbad manages to escape his
encounter with Koura and make his way to a nearby city, where the
grand vizier has been trying to puzzle out the meaning of an amulet
of his own that turns out to match the contours of Sinbad's
perfectly. The vizier's king died mysteriously not long ago,
although he's sure Koura had something to do with it, as well as the
fireball that destroyed the king's treasury and burned the vizier's
face off. By piecing their two amulets together, they discover that
the whole will form a nautical chart, but even in its incomplete form
there is enough information to point them in the direction of the
legendary land of Lemuria.
While waiting for the tide to turn so
Sinbad can get his ship out of the harbor, a local businessman offers
Sinbad four hundred gold coins to take his useless layabout son on
the voyage and try to make a man of him. Sinbad agrees, but not for
the gold. The man's slave girl has a tattoo on her hand that matches
one Sinbad saw in his visions aboard the ship, and he agrees to take
the boy if he can take the girl too. They set off the next day, with
Koura following close behind aboard a hired ship.
Lemuria turns out to be populated by
what might be the most confused tribe of savages ever. They wear
sort of African-looking face and body paint, but worship Kali, some
of them wear masks that look like ceramic baby doll faces, and their
witch doctor wears a head dress with the face of a Japanese-looking
demon topped with some tiny human skulls and weird stringy hair that
makes me think of some kind of voodoo fetish more than anything. Oh,
and they're all very obviously white guys, but they have green skin
and hair, which makes them look almost exactly like the Swampies from
the Doctor Who serial, “The
Power of Kroll”, from Tom Baker's run on the show.
Now
they discover the reason Koura wants to complete the amulet set.
Throughout the movie, every time he uses his black magic, he ages a
little more, and he's looking pretty decrepit by the time the two
parties reach Lemuria. When he brings the Swampies' statue of Kali
to life in the movie's most impressive set piece, it nearly kills
him, but somewhere on the island is a fountain that acts as a sort of
holy vending machine. The completed amulet will guide the bearer to
the fountain, and for each of the three sections a man throws into
the waters, he will gain youth, a crown of untold riches, and a
shield that turns the user invisible. Thing is, none of the pieces
are marked as to which holy gift they grant. It's kind of like those
nifty toys that come in a shell or bag that you have to put in hot
water to discover which one you got. Sinbad manages to get one of
the pieces away from Koura, but wouldn't you know it, it was just the
lousy crown. Now Koura has the full power of his magic back, as well
as the ability to turn invisible, and there's that pesky one-eyed
centaur running around that he managed to gain control over.
I
haven't seen this movie since I was a little kid, and it struck me
while watching it again that it really doesn't differ that much from
the big fantasy epics of today in terms of story. Everyone complains
about how plotless the two new Titans
movies were, just bouncing from action scene to action scene with
just the barest story to motivate them. Well, these Sinbad flicks
are exactly the same thing. The difference lies in the effects.
Like I said earlier, today's digital effects might occasionally be
more realistic, but they just look dull and lifeless compared to the
bright, glorious Technicolor of yesteryear.
It's
strange that John Phillip Law is so wooden and uncharismatic as
Sinbad, and come to think of it, in a lot of his other roles as well.
Listen to the commentary on the Danger:Diabolik!
DVD some time. He's like the cool bachelor uncle everyone wants to
have, with tons of great stories to tell about his kick ass life and
he does it with such charm. You'd think someone who was so
interesting in real life would have more than a handsome face and
buff muscles to put in front of the camera (and speaking of putting
things in front of the camera, Caroline Munro steals the show with
the sweatiest cleavage in cinema history). Still, even if his line
delivery is a little stiff it's more than made up for by Baker. I
think it's interesting that instead of going full-on gonzo scenery
chomper like most people would with a part like this, he gives Koura
a very serious treatment, full of lethal intelligence and seething
anger. He's not a mustache-twirling supervillain, he's just smarter
than everyone else and he damn well knows it. There are better
Harryhausen movies in terms of monsters (with perhaps the exception
of the sword fight with the Kali statue, which is just flat out
goddamned awesome), but this one wins hands down in terms of the
human villain.
We've
lost one of the greatest movie heroes of all time, but his influence
and the happiness and excitement he gave us will never be forgotten.
Thanks for all the good times, Mr. Harryhausen.
This review is part of a roundtable tribute to Ray Harryhausen. Other entries can be found at:
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