RICHARD LUTZ emerges from a midsummer slumber to find out what’s hot on the box when it comes to movies.
I was right and ready and fresh as rain to tell you about Hollywood iconography- this week de Niro, Orson Welles and Alec Guinness all rear their pretty heads in Raging Bull, The Third Man and The Ladykillers (the proper one from 1955).
But what catches my eye deep in the listings that are flown in by homing pigeon to my Hebridean eyrie but a movie that turned me on to films as a little kid: The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (Fri; 11.40 More4). Wow, what a kids’ film this is.
It’s a bigtime visual feast for any boy or girl, whether it’s a toweringly old one like me or a 3 year continually cornfed on CGI.
First and foremost, this 1958 movie has Ray Harryhausen special effect monsters-you know, the stop motion ones that all seem jerky now but are still a treat to watch.
It has a great fantasy story about how the mythical Sinbad, sailing to Baghdad (someone give the scriptwriter a map for god’s sake), runs across a Cyclops, a fire breathing dragon, a sword wielding skeleton, a genie in a bottle and a shrinking princess (played by Katheryn Grant, latterly Mrs Bing Crosby). Plus a real bad baddie with a bald head.
And last but not least you have a real life macho actor playing Sinbad by the name of…get this..Kerwin Mathews.
So, forget de Niro, Welles and Guinness. This movie will bring out the child in you. And, really, what else is film for?