Jack the Giant Killer (1962)

It was a spiteful rip-off of Ray Harryhausen’s 7th Voyage of Sinbad. The stop-motion animation wizard was shopping for investors when he was turned down by producer Edward Small before the movie was funded by Columbia. Years later after Sinbad was a hit Small decided he could make his own version without Harryhausen, even going so far as to hire the same hero and villain, and the same director!

Harryhausen sued and won but the film had already bombed in theaters. To avoid a total financial loss on the television rights Small retooled the knight and sorcery fantasy as a musical, dubbing the actors voices and manipulating the film to make the actors mouths match the new lyrics!

This didn’t help the fact that the film already boasted some of the worst special effects ever shot in color: lumakeyed goblins that only shoot cartoon fire, unfinished puppetoons that sag like melting play-doh, and a hilarious cross-eyed sea monster you just wanna hug. Harryhausen it ain’t!

So what a surprise under all this camp to find such lovely photography and vivid costumes! Truly fantastic cat-eyed witches, a plush medieval castle in dense textures and tapestries, and colorful lighting that runs the gamut from storybook pictures to soft paintings.