The Valley Of Gwangi

THE VALLEY OF GWANGI was not well explored in 1969, when visitor numbers staggered into 108th place and critics were busy digesting Midnight Cowboy, Easy Rider, Z and The Wild Bunch. Outstanding stop-motion special effects from the legendary Ray Harryhausen earn a guest pass from fans of his work, but other than his now-nostalgic creature creations and some Spanish scenery (with a few views of the natural architecture of the leading lady) the dinosaur parker is pretty lame in the writing, directing and acting departments. ‘Gwangi’, however, is one pretty cool Allosaurus.

“In all my travels I never seen anything like that two-ton lizard. If we could just get him back alive.” Will we ever learn?

Early 1900’s, down Mexico way. Lovely stunt rider ‘T.J. Breckenridge’ (Gila Golan, with costumes that wouldn’t be allowed outside of a French bordello) top bills a traveling circus run by irascible ‘Champ Connors’ (50’s monster vet Richard Carlson, in sourpuss mode). Her ambitious ex, cowpoky stuntman-stud ‘Tuck Kirby’ (James Franciscus, who seems to be working on a Charlton Heston impression) wants back into her good whatever, especially when she shows him her special find, a cute-as-cute-gets critter she calls ‘El Diablo’. Passing Brit paleontologist ‘Horace Bromley’ (Laurence Naismith, on leave from Jason And The Argonauts) informs T.J. and Tuck that the animal is horse ancestor Eohippus. But they’re extinct. Hmm…

After forty minutes of boring exposition we gallop to the lost valley and the Jurassic chomper of the title. Then the good stuff starts. Sure, the wee Eohippus is something any little kid (or my considerably grown sisters, for example) would adopt faster than they could exclaim “Bambi meets Babe!” But ‘Forbidden Valley’ (pre-cursed by a one-eyed Gypsy harridan) also holds a Pteranodon, an Omithomonis (who knew?) and a Styracosaurus (trusty Tricerotops grazing some other lost ravine), all at the mercy of the perpetually pissed Gwangi, a 14-foot-tall Allosaurus that looks to weigh about the same as a half-dozen random Walmart shoppers.

Gila Lollogwangi, dressed for arrest

Harryhausen’s mentor Willis O’Brien had conceived the basic setup in the early 1940’s as ‘The Valley Of The Mists’, a follow-up to the success of the mighty King Kong. Similar terrain was first in 1949’s winner Mighty Joe Young, then in 1956 with the less-regaled The Beast Of Hollow Mountain. The latter was shot in Mexico, while in The Valley Of Gwangi our southern neighbor is doubled by Spain’s scenery, the shoot taking place around Almeria and the Tabernas Desert and Cuenca, in the city’s lavish Catetral de la Encarnación. In those intervening years Harryhausen had teamed with producer Charles H. Schneer on a batch of eight adventure & effects rousers. Together again, while this time direction was turned over to Jim O’Connolly (Berserk!) and the script to TV scribe William Bast. Schneer was disappointed by O’Connolly, and Bast soured on both, whining “the director was monumentally stupid. Charlie opted for someone who matched his own insensitivity. O’Connolly started tampering with the script as they were leaving. I thought, ‘This is going to be a mess’.” That’s a pantload, considering how limp Bast’s writing is. Shot in 1967, meticulous work on the effects saw release delayed until the summer of ’69. Jerome Moross added some oomph with his music score, which bears more than passing resemblance to the epic job he whipped up for The Big Country. Post-dubbing of dialogue does none of the actors any favors. *

For a generation basted by the marvels of CGI, the visuals of Gwangi and the other beasts look, well, prehistoric, but those old enough to remember how enchanted we were as kids seeing Harryhausen magic in Mysterious Island, Jason And The Argonauts and the like will note the expertise deployed in this romp. The snore-talking first half is a chore, the second delivers the goods. Those panicky crowd scenes are well done, too, almost as wild as the ones from reptilian fave Gorgo.

95 minutes, with Freda Jackson (as the curse-spitting Romani) and Gustavo Rojo (destined to be Gwangi munchbrunch). While a money dud on first release (stuck sharing screens with The Girl On A Motorcycle, so much for Warner’s faith in it), re-releases on double bills with silliness like When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth had it ultimately making $1,900,000.

* This was the last acting done by the beauteous Gila Golan, who called it quits after parts in five movies (best remembered for Our Man Flint) and two TV shows. For Gwangi her strong Israeli accent was dubbed (it’s glaringly obvious) by a voice actress who remains nameless, though it was not the usual go-to lady dubber Nikki van der Zyl, occupied with four other 1969 flicks including On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, her 6th of eleven 007 gigs. Gila’s retirement at 29 was made more bearable by marrying a man who became Columbia studios largest stockholder.

Franciscus had the bad luck in 1969 to be Marooned, but he recovered action mojo in 1970 for Beneath The Planet Of The Apes, where he did get to work with Charlton Heston (and presumably polish his impression).

It was also the last dinosaur hunt for Ray Harryhausen, who continued to play his trade with mythic monsters in The Golden Voyage Of Sinbad, Sinbad And The Eye Of The Tiger and Clash Of The Titans.