Valley of the Gwangi, as long as you're easily satisfied, is a movie to enjoy in spite of itself. It's a light-hearted but leaden-footed dinosaur adventure film, with a group of turn-of-the- century cowboys versus a gwangi. The idea is fun, the acting is adequate (with one exception), the script is workmanlike and the direction is dull. It seems to take forever to get to the good stuff. What it has going for it, starting half way through the movie, is the gwangi - an allosaurus - that seems to be constantly angry. The joy of the movie is that this giant, meat-eating, top-of-the-food chain creature is brought to life by the stop-motion artistry of Ray Harryhausen.
Down Mexico way at the turn of the century, T. J. Breckenridge (Gila Golan) stars in and manages a ramshackle circus, Champ Connors (Richard Carlson) and a handful of American and Mexican cowboys help out. Old flame Tuck Kirby (James Franciscus) shows up and wants to buy T. J.'s wonder horse, Omar. No way, says T. J. And she tells him that she's got an even better horse act ready to be introduced...a tiny horse-like creature she purchased with no questions asked. But eccentric Professor Horace Bromley (Lawrence Naismith), a paleontologist who is determined to prove his theory of the humanoids, identifies the whinnying little thing as an eohippus, an ancestor of the horse, which supposedly has been extinct for millions of years. When gypsies steal the eohippus to return it to a hidden valley, off in pursuit goes T. J., Tuck, Champ and the Professor, aided by Lope, a ten-year-old Mexican lad and two wranglers from T. J.'s circus. And finally, after nearly 50 minutes, the 96-minute movie really starts.
The movie, thanks to Ray Harryhausen, gives us the goods with three first-rate scenes. There's the entrance to the valley on horseback, with some strange scenery and then a quick attack by a pterodactyl that scoops up Lope. Lope's rescue is something to see. There's the great set piece of cowboys versus the angry allosaurus, with the gwangi raging after cowboy ordeurves and the cowboys regrouping to lasso the gwangi, then the gwangi breaking free to have a life-or-death battle with a oneceratops (or whatever a one-horned triceratops is called). And finally there's the raging gwangi tearing apart the Mexican town (climaxing inside a burning cathedral) where he was brought to be the lead attraction for T. J.'s circus.
Nothing about the movie is first-rate...except these three scenes. They're rousers. Franciscus does an okay job as a generic, happy-go-lucky cowboy hero and Richard Carlson, now 57, has aged into a cross between Pete Postlethwaite and Randolph Scott. He's fine but nothing special as T. J.'s protective circus manager. Gila Golan, however, is a lush young woman who can barely act, much less ride a horse. She made a handful of films. I'd swear she was dubbed.
In some ways, The Valley of the Gwangi, with it's turn of the century setting and cowboys roping a dinosaur, is charming. If only it had better actors and a smarter first-half script.
To see a handful of brave souls do amusing battle with various Harryhausen creatures, try Mysterious Island. It even has Captain Nemo, as well as some considerably better actors, such as Joan Greenwood and Herbert Lom, For grinning, vicious, clattering skeletons waving swords around, you can't do better than Harryhausen's Jason and the Argonauts.
Along with Ray Harryhausen, the movie owes a lot to Jerome Moross who composed the film score. He uses echoes from his great score for The Big Country to make Valley of the Gwangi more impressive than it deserves, especially in the cowboys-versus-gwangi set piece. So four stars with Harryhausen (and Moross). Three stars without them.
Now if you really want to see how to capture a gwangi, or at least a Tyrannosaurus Rex, I'd recommend you watch Prehistoric Park and the adventures of Nigel Marvin.
Down Mexico way at the turn of the century, T. J. Breckenridge (Gila Golan) stars in and manages a ramshackle circus, Champ Connors (Richard Carlson) and a handful of American and Mexican cowboys help out. Old flame Tuck Kirby (James Franciscus) shows up and wants to buy T. J.'s wonder horse, Omar. No way, says T. J. And she tells him that she's got an even better horse act ready to be introduced...a tiny horse-like creature she purchased with no questions asked. But eccentric Professor Horace Bromley (Lawrence Naismith), a paleontologist who is determined to prove his theory of the humanoids, identifies the whinnying little thing as an eohippus, an ancestor of the horse, which supposedly has been extinct for millions of years. When gypsies steal the eohippus to return it to a hidden valley, off in pursuit goes T. J., Tuck, Champ and the Professor, aided by Lope, a ten-year-old Mexican lad and two wranglers from T. J.'s circus. And finally, after nearly 50 minutes, the 96-minute movie really starts.
The movie, thanks to Ray Harryhausen, gives us the goods with three first-rate scenes. There's the entrance to the valley on horseback, with some strange scenery and then a quick attack by a pterodactyl that scoops up Lope. Lope's rescue is something to see. There's the great set piece of cowboys versus the angry allosaurus, with the gwangi raging after cowboy ordeurves and the cowboys regrouping to lasso the gwangi, then the gwangi breaking free to have a life-or-death battle with a oneceratops (or whatever a one-horned triceratops is called). And finally there's the raging gwangi tearing apart the Mexican town (climaxing inside a burning cathedral) where he was brought to be the lead attraction for T. J.'s circus.
Nothing about the movie is first-rate...except these three scenes. They're rousers. Franciscus does an okay job as a generic, happy-go-lucky cowboy hero and Richard Carlson, now 57, has aged into a cross between Pete Postlethwaite and Randolph Scott. He's fine but nothing special as T. J.'s protective circus manager. Gila Golan, however, is a lush young woman who can barely act, much less ride a horse. She made a handful of films. I'd swear she was dubbed.
In some ways, The Valley of the Gwangi, with it's turn of the century setting and cowboys roping a dinosaur, is charming. If only it had better actors and a smarter first-half script.
To see a handful of brave souls do amusing battle with various Harryhausen creatures, try Mysterious Island. It even has Captain Nemo, as well as some considerably better actors, such as Joan Greenwood and Herbert Lom, For grinning, vicious, clattering skeletons waving swords around, you can't do better than Harryhausen's Jason and the Argonauts.
Along with Ray Harryhausen, the movie owes a lot to Jerome Moross who composed the film score. He uses echoes from his great score for The Big Country to make Valley of the Gwangi more impressive than it deserves, especially in the cowboys-versus-gwangi set piece. So four stars with Harryhausen (and Moross). Three stars without them.
Now if you really want to see how to capture a gwangi, or at least a Tyrannosaurus Rex, I'd recommend you watch Prehistoric Park and the adventures of Nigel Marvin.