The Valley Of Gwangi Reviews

Not the best Harryhausen Offering, but...

Worth a rent if you like classic dynamation cinema. The story does take a little while to get to full momentum but when it does it's sure to please. What i found a shame was gwangi's colour tint change (purple at some points). The aweful elephant cries as it gets attacked by gwangi in the arena does sadly sound very poor (horn sound). Interestingly enough, the sequence where the cowboys try to capture gwangi in the forbidden zone actually took 6 months to perfect. Very impressive stuff when you consider when this film was made (1969). What a shame the film was a flop when released. Recommended for fans only!

See James Franciscus without the orangutan make up. Wonder at the crappy special effects we used to find impressive. Cheer as annoying characters are eaten one at a time. This is worth watching.

Advanced for its time

These days SFX are handled by CGI, but Harryhausen mastered the art of stop-go animation, and this film is a classic of this method. The integration of the animated models and the live action is very good, and the featurette explaining how the animation was done for this film with compliments given by Industrial Light and Magic (the CGI company founded by George Lucas) is very informative.

The film itself has the common moral theme of greed ending in disaster, a common monster movie line (as also seen in Gorgo). The acting is good for its time, perhaps modern films move at a slightly faster pace.

Half decent dinosaur movie

After a slow start, where the film is basically a cowboy film featuring a tiny horse, the dinosaurs appear. Good SFX for the time, (think 1 million years BC), make for an entertaining dino-flick, spoiled only by the slow start and the fact that the dinosaur growls 'Gwangi' at one point!

[Highly rated reviewer]

"King Kong" Goes Western

Okay, so there's no giant ape - only 'Gwangi' a giant something-o-saurus - but the storyline is essentially the same as 'King Kong', i.e. humans discover giant creature, capture it, bring it back to civilisation, show it, it all goes pear-shaped, the giant creature escapes, causes mayhem and is ultimately killed. The film is only watchable for Ray Harryhausen's excellent (for its time) stop-motion effects - the stand out scene being the capture of Gwangi (watch the 7 minute ILM tribute documentary for a mind-boggling explanation of how it was filmed). The actors are all pretty bland in comparison (even given the Technicolor 'glow'), although it is funny to watch the crowds of extras flocking about as the terrible Gwangi takes his revenge for being captured - Go Gwangi, Go Gwangi!!

Bit dated

Wasn't bad but seemed very dated.

Genius, Jurassic Park owes it big time

This is one of the best Harryhausen films. Usually, in films like ‘Earth Vs The Flying Saucers’ or ‘Beast From 20,000 Fathoms’ etc, the story and acting is lame but the film is saved by the genius of Ray Harryhausen.

The Valley Of Gwangi, however, is the big daddy of them all. Is it daft? Of course. Is a lot of the acting fairly wooden? Certainly. But here not all the acting is shaky. The story is so audacious it's a delight. The sky high concept is cowboys meet dinosaurs as a struggling rodeo company discovers a lost valley in which the eponymous Gwangi, a carnivorous dinosaur lives alongside pterodactyls, triceratops, etc. The script doesn't frontload them though, taking its time to build characters and rivalries and flesh out the story in a way rarely done in these films.

The effects are stunning. You can see the influence of King Kong on Harryhausen and the influence of Gwangi on Dennis Muren and the effects wizards behind Jurassic Park. There are a few scenes that are lifted wholesale from this in JP.

There is also a good documentary, ‘Return to the Valley’, on the disc in which many of modern effects guys and filmmakers talk about the enduring influence of Gwangi. This film is truly an historic moment in Harryhausen's legendary career.

Not to be missed.

good ole classic

dispite the movie being old as i am it had momments of enjoyment and excitement and action still appealing to children and adults. its not jurrasic park but you know what i mean.