7th Voyage of Sinbad, The (DVD)

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Though that talking ship's figurehead in 1974's "Golden Voyage of Sinbad" was pretty cool, a stronger villain and a superior assortment of Ray Harryhausen creatures makes "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" (1958) the best of the Sinbad films.

Of course, in the broader context, that's probably not saying much. After all, these were B-movies, starring mostly no-names and shot on the cheap. The dialogue was often so clunky that you couldn't tell if it was the line or the delivery that made it so campy--which is to say, unintentionally laughable. It was a guy named Ray Harryhausen who made the films fun. Without his stop-motion antics, those movies wouldn't have spoken to a generation the way that they have.

Harryhausen, who collaborated with "King Kong" stop-motion animator Willis O'Brien on a 1949 variation, "Mighty Joe Young," and went solo four years later with "The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms," pioneered a technique he dubbed Dynamation. Essentially, Harryhausen split the background and foreground so that the stop-motion could be "sandwiched." And Harryhausen's "Jason and the Argonauts" (1963), with its battling skeletons, had to have been the inspiration for the bony battles in Disney's first "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie. Filmmakers like Steven Spielberg and George Lucas also have been clearly influenced by Harryhausen's special effects, and if you've watched "Monsters, Inc." perhaps you noticed that John Lasseter & Co. paid tribute to the King of Creatures by naming a café that the monsters eat at "Harryhausens."

As John J. Puccio pointed out in his review, though this may pale in comparison to the 1940 remake of "The Thief of Bagdad," it's hard to resist "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad," in part because the villain is so diabolically credible. Torin Thatcher plays an evil magician who shrinks Princess Parisa (Kathryn Grant, who would become Mrs. Bing Crosby) down to pocket size. Needless to say, this doesn't sit well with Sinbad the Sailor, especially because he's supposed to marry the princess. He learns from the magician, Sokurah, that the only way to restore her to her proper height is to obtain pieces of eggshell from a rare two-headed bird that's only found on the island of Colossa. Now, this just happens to be the island fortress of the evil magician, who accompanies Sinbad and his sailors on a journey that includes screeching sirens and a tug-o-war with a magic lamp that houses a boy-man Genie (Richard Eyer), who can help their cause.

The two-headed Roc is probably one of the coolest of Harryhausen's island menaces. Also on the island is a gigantic one-eyed, one-horned, giant (purple) people eater--though I'm kidding about the color. This guy will eat anyone, and he grabs one of Sinbad's sailors and pops him on the rotisserie quick as you can say "Help me" (which this guy does, sounding a lot like Vincent Price in "The Fly"). Other dangers on the island include a sword- and shield-wielding skeleton who would become the prototype for the legion of skeleton warriors in "Jason and the Argonauts," and a fire-breathing dragon. But for sheer laughs, it's hard to beat the screaming men aboard the ship as they pass by sirens. B-movies were good for as many unintentional laughs as they were cool monsters, and this one scores big on all counts. Kids saw them in the movie theaters with friends, and the best way to watch these films is still with a group of friends.

A bad script made "Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger" (1977) a real burden for stars Patrick Wayne and Jane Seymour to bear, but this screenplay from Ken Kolb (who would go on to write a number of episodes for "The Wild Wild West" TV show) at least gives us a structure that has plenty of dramatic tension built into it. The lines may be no better than any of the B-movies, but with strong characters and a strong plotline you hardly notice . . . or care. And the direction is capably handled by a B-movie giant by the name of Nathan Juran, whose resume of campy films is almost mind-boggling. This is the same guy who, after directing Ronald and Nancy Reagan in their only film together ("Hellcats of the Navy," 1957), gave us "The Deadly Mantis," "20 Million Miles to Earth", "The Brain from Planet Arous," and "Attack of the 50 Foot Woman." Not surprisingly, he also would go on to direct 13 episodes for the campy "Lost in Space" TV series. This guy knows how fun B-movies are supposed to be, and "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" is all the better because of it.