Legend has it that the bigwigs at United Artists turned down Ray Harryhausen's pitch for the classic "7th Voyage of Sinbad", forcing him to go back to his home studio, Columbia. "7th Voyage" was a risky proposition at the time, needing a much larger budget than Harryhausen had ever accessed for various reasons including Technicolor (this would be his first color feature). UA and production director Edward Small passed on the film. Columbia finally acceded the necessary budget to Harryhausen and the rest is history. Not surprisingly, "Sinbad" became one of the top ten money-making movies of 1958, leaving the bigwigs at UA grinding their teeth since they threw the opportunity to finance it away. Four years later in 1962, United Artists attempted to make an adventure/fantasy of their own to cash in on the success of "Sinbad". No matter that "Jack" is nearly a carbon copy of "Sinbad" in plot, the studio had the audacity to hire the director, hero, and villain from "Sinbad" to appear in this poor imitation of someone else's success.
Nathan Juran directed, while Kerwin Mathews became Jack, and Torin Thatcher phones in his villain, Pendragon. Unfortunately, the film suffers from the same penny-pinching that saw "Sinbad" thrown away. Not being able to afford the services of Harryhausen, the special effects animators could not effectively pull off the various giants and other creatures effectively. The stop motion animators were the very young Wah Chang, Jim Danforth and David Pal. The derivative designs of the giants are obviously taken from "Voyage's" Cyclops. There are not one, but two reptilian-squid monsters on view, a sea serpent and the Wyvern seen in the film's climax. Naturally, the two-headed faux Cyclops giant has to battle the sea serpent in a very rubbery ode to the Cyclops vs dragon fight in "Voyage". It appears to be played for laughs instead of terror.
"Jack" isn't all bad, there are several interesting things to see here. The attack of the witches on the ship at sea, filmed using a lurid purple overlay. The witches themselves are phosphorescent, done in day-glo hues of green and blue. This same effect was used years before in Disney's "Darby O'Gill" to produce the Banshee. There are economical cartoon animations for flames here and there, and a better princess than "Sinbad" had. Judi Meredith actually outshines Kathryn Grant especially when transformed into an agent of darkness by Pendragon. The Wyvern creature, while as cartoonish as the other monsters is the best realized and supplies a satisfying end to Jack's adventures. On the downside, this flick crams the most annoying leprechaun ever seen on film down your throat. Throw in a lost boy who becomes a chimpanzee, a Viking who becomes a dog, magical coins, a least one demon who looks suspiciously like Satan, and an army of hollow men. Whew. Still, watching that superimposed rhyming leprechaun played by Don Beddoe prance away over a rainbow is a bit much. Where's he going? Oz? "Jack" didn't fare well at the box office since the public realized they'd already seen this before. It was subsequently withdrawn and forgotten, most notably because Columbia sued UA over copyright infringement. However,in a burst of total surrealism United Artists re-issued the film some years later as a musical (!!!) and an obvious ploy to attempt seeking out whatever cash the mangled new version could earn. Unfortunately for the public, this wreck had the most terrible songs sung over the original film. This version was given new titles that looked like a child's drawings and was not widely seen. It did turn up on an Disney cable channel back in the early 80s, which is where I saw/taped it. It's a curio worth seeking out if you can stand listening to it, especially the climactic fight between Jack and the Wyvern which is overlaid with someone squalling "You can do it! lalalalalala You can do it!" which has a number of interpretations. In this case, however, one would guess the crooning is supposed to infer Jack's mental processes as he hacks the wing off the Wyvern.
Not an unpleasant way to spend a rainy afternoon, especially if you've not seen "7th Voyage of Sinbad".
Nathan Juran directed, while Kerwin Mathews became Jack, and Torin Thatcher phones in his villain, Pendragon. Unfortunately, the film suffers from the same penny-pinching that saw "Sinbad" thrown away. Not being able to afford the services of Harryhausen, the special effects animators could not effectively pull off the various giants and other creatures effectively. The stop motion animators were the very young Wah Chang, Jim Danforth and David Pal. The derivative designs of the giants are obviously taken from "Voyage's" Cyclops. There are not one, but two reptilian-squid monsters on view, a sea serpent and the Wyvern seen in the film's climax. Naturally, the two-headed faux Cyclops giant has to battle the sea serpent in a very rubbery ode to the Cyclops vs dragon fight in "Voyage". It appears to be played for laughs instead of terror.
"Jack" isn't all bad, there are several interesting things to see here. The attack of the witches on the ship at sea, filmed using a lurid purple overlay. The witches themselves are phosphorescent, done in day-glo hues of green and blue. This same effect was used years before in Disney's "Darby O'Gill" to produce the Banshee. There are economical cartoon animations for flames here and there, and a better princess than "Sinbad" had. Judi Meredith actually outshines Kathryn Grant especially when transformed into an agent of darkness by Pendragon. The Wyvern creature, while as cartoonish as the other monsters is the best realized and supplies a satisfying end to Jack's adventures. On the downside, this flick crams the most annoying leprechaun ever seen on film down your throat. Throw in a lost boy who becomes a chimpanzee, a Viking who becomes a dog, magical coins, a least one demon who looks suspiciously like Satan, and an army of hollow men. Whew. Still, watching that superimposed rhyming leprechaun played by Don Beddoe prance away over a rainbow is a bit much. Where's he going? Oz? "Jack" didn't fare well at the box office since the public realized they'd already seen this before. It was subsequently withdrawn and forgotten, most notably because Columbia sued UA over copyright infringement. However,in a burst of total surrealism United Artists re-issued the film some years later as a musical (!!!) and an obvious ploy to attempt seeking out whatever cash the mangled new version could earn. Unfortunately for the public, this wreck had the most terrible songs sung over the original film. This version was given new titles that looked like a child's drawings and was not widely seen. It did turn up on an Disney cable channel back in the early 80s, which is where I saw/taped it. It's a curio worth seeking out if you can stand listening to it, especially the climactic fight between Jack and the Wyvern which is overlaid with someone squalling "You can do it! lalalalalala You can do it!" which has a number of interpretations. In this case, however, one would guess the crooning is supposed to infer Jack's mental processes as he hacks the wing off the Wyvern.
Not an unpleasant way to spend a rainy afternoon, especially if you've not seen "7th Voyage of Sinbad".