This poor-man's "Seventh Voyage of Sinbad" is not without it's charm, but the bizarre musical version is the one to find! Sure it's a mess, but WHAT a mess! If you're a fan of strange live-action children's musicals like the K. Gordon Murray Mexican releases ("Santa Clause", "Little Red Riding Hood Meets The Monsters", etc.) then you'll want to track down the musical version for this movie. Luckily I have my copy that I had taped from cable tv in the early 1980s.
Faerie tales as they were meant to be
Jacky Rowan has just ended a bad relationship. Soon after, she witnesses a murder. When visiting her best friend Kate Hazel the next day, Jacky is sure of nothing except wondering what in her life is real. She is about to find out.
The only proof of what she saw: a red cap belonging to the murder victim, and a mysterious Harley rider not even Kate can see. Soon both women find themselves caught up in a quest that becomes more real than either imagined. Monteal in October transforms into the faerie kingdon of Kinrowan in the weeks before Samhaine.
Spurred on by the enigmatic Gruagagh, Jacky, Kate and the hob Finn must rescue Lorana, daughter of the Laird if Kinrowan They are aided by the faeries Arkan and Eilian- and Jacky's magical name. Those insistent bikers constantly appear to put a stop to any effort. The girls have stumbled(?) into the perpetual battle between the Courts of Faerie.
This is one in a series of retellings of fairy tales put out by Ace Books. While De Lint's storytelling is in keeping with his talents, still it is a retelling of two basic tales. There were a few nice additions (Judith), and a resolution that I did not anticipate. Best of all, this is how Faerie should be portrayed: dangerous, ambivalent and always with consequences. Disney did not invent them.
"He closed his eyes, not to shut out the sight of what lay in front of him, but to seek counsel inside. He let his inner turmoil rise and fret, caught each fear and loosed it from inside him like so many freed birds until only silence lay there, deep and soothing. And filled with possibilities. They lay like threads in front of his closed eyes, going every which way, unraveling into pasts and presents and times yet to come. He couldn't work them, couldn't weave them, that was for other hands more skilled than his,but he could take one thread, one possibility, and tie his need to it, then send it forth from his silence like a summoning call."
Family fantasy with scary creatures
Jack The Giant Killer is a great family fantasy movie. I've never seen the musical version, but it sounds like a hideous botch-up, and I can't believe people are disappointed because this DVD is of the original version and not some re-hash that had nothing to do with the production's original intention.
I think the film is excellent just the way it is. It's the tale of a simple farmer (Jack) who gets caught up in an evil wizard's plans to abduct a beautiful princess to be his bride. I've heard it said that the musical version was created to tone down some of the film's more frightening moments, and I can see why younger childeren could get nightmares after watching some sequences. There are several such scenes. Early on in the film, the princess is having a party and one of her birthday gifts is a miniature dancing jester in a musical box. Creepy enough to watch as it is, this ugly thing comes alive after dark and grows into a hideous giant demon. In another scene, ghostly flying witches descend on a ship to try and seize the princess, who is being smuggled away to a secret location to protect her. This sequence, involving some very freaky apparitions, genuinely frightened me as a child, especially the moment when the ghost in the guise of a skeleton in a wedding dress surprised the princess in a small dark cabin. Eek!
The animated monsters are of variable quality, ranging from the enlarged music box demon (the best) to the sea serpent that appears near the end (the worst). Maybe the money started to run out towards the end of the film! But the plot is engaging and never dull, mostly involving Jacks battle with the hammy but evil King Pendragon who has designs on the princess and is sending all these monsters to kidnap her, but also involving sub-plots such as the part where the princess is turned evil by a spell from Pendragon and almost double-crosses Jack - until the spell is broken.
All in all, tremendous fun. Yes it does look a bit dated now, and a lot of kids aren't going to be enthralled this easily any more, but it can still give an hour and a half's worth of solid entertainment.
A skeleton grabs a sword and slashes viciously at Sinbad. A 9-foot-tall Neanderthal man fights to the death with a saber-toothed tiger. All the while, the boys and girls in the fourth row forget about their popcorn and are hypnotized by the images on the screen. It's hard to believe so many years have passed since the last Sinbad movie held kids spellbound at Saturday matinees. The movies were never perfect, with stories that were sometimes little more than frameworks to drape Ray Harryhausen's special effects over. The performances left a bit to be desired at times, and the direction could be a bit choppy. What they did accomplish, however, was to give countless 8- and 10-year-olds their first taste of the magic that motion pictures were really capable of. Those grade-schoolers, of... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Kerwin - Wayne - Law - Ray Harryhausen DVD Release Date: Released the 11 July 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Arguably the most intelligently written film to feature the masterful stop-motion animation of Ray Harryhausen, Jason and the Argonauts is a colorful adventure that takes full advantage of Harryhausen's "Dynarama" process. Inspired by the Greek myth, the story begins when the fearless explorer Jason (Todd Armstrong) returns to the kingdom of Thessaly to make his rightful claim to the throne, but the gods proclaim that he must first find the magical Golden Fleece. Consulting Hera, the queen of gods, Jason recruits the brave Argonauts to crew his ship, and they embark on their eventful journey. Along the way they encounter a variety of mythic creatures, including the 100-foot bronze god Talos, the batlike Harpies, the seven-headed reptilian Hydra, and an army of skeletons wielding... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Todd Armstrong - Nancy Kovack Director(s): Don Chaffey DVD Release Date: Released the 07 November 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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The Magic Sword is STAGGERINGLY awful. The acting, the papier-mache monsters, the glowing sword, the "Irish" accent that comes and goes - it's jaw-droppingly awful. The movie has conehead people but they don't bother tucking the actors' real hair in so they have these pink cones on their head with a straight line where the plastic cone ends - like they're wearing conehead hats with hair coming out. The heroine actually says "Oh! I'm so happy I can't even think!" If you get a kick out of really terrible movies, you'll love this. More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Basil Rathbone DVD Release Date: Released the 04 November 2003 Usually ships within 24 hours
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Raquel Welch in a two-piece fur bikini. That and the title is pretty much all anyone needs to know. If that indeed isn't enough, there are the dinosaurs of technician-artist Ray Harryhausen (along with some superimposed iguanas), and a prologue that tells you all you want to know about this "brutal world." Want more? There are volcanoes, barehanded wrestling with warthogs, and rival, subhuman, cannibalistic tribes--Lord, the list goes on and on! The portrait of humankind isn't the most flattering: we're petty, greedy, we grunt a lot, and we don't play well with others. Welch portrays a cavewoman from the tribe of the Blondes trying to make a life for herself with an outcast from the tribe of the Brunettes, which doesn't sit well with anybody. --Keith SimantonMore Info about this DVD Actor(s): Raquel Welch Director(s): Don Chaffey DVD Release Date: Released the 09 March 2004 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Fans of '50s science fiction should be pleased by this "big bug" chiller, which offers a fine showcase for the talents of special effects master Willis O'Brien (King Kong). The Black Scorpion follows closely in the multiple footsteps of Them!, produced three years earlier by the same company (Warner Bros.)--again, giant insects threaten mankind, though here a volcano is responsible for unleashing them, and the metropolis in peril is Mexico City. Though direction, acting, and scripting aren't on par with Them!, O'Brien's title creatures (which sport implausible yet creepy faces) are memorably monstrous, especially during hero Richard Denning's visit to their nightmarish underground lair. Warner Bros.' DVD features a surprising amount of extras for an older... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Edward Ludwig DVD Release Date: Released the 21 October 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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