Col_Pladoh said:
Right, Colonel!
From my very early childhood I recall from the film THIEF OF BAGHDAD (I think), where Sindbad was swinging on a line from a giant spider's web, fighting it, sending it falling into a deep pit in which octopi were waiting to devour it. Don't know if that oldie was Harryhausen's work, but his skeletons were indeed what I visualized for the D&D monster of that name. Ray did some very good work using the technology available then.
The old film that holds up the best IMo is the original KING KONG, though. What a great movie that was!
Cheers,
Gary
King Kong was done by Willis O'Brien, who was later Harryhausen's mentor and collaborator. Both Harryhausen and O'Brien (Obie, for short) appear as major characters in Greg Bear's wonderful book
Dinosaur Summer, set in 1948 in a world where A.C. Doyle's Professor Challenger really lived, and really did find the Lost World. Anyway, Harryhausen worked on the effects for
Mighty Joe Young, and worked with O'Brien on that film.
The Thief of Bagdad's, from 1940, might be the film you're thinking of. The effects, which were groundbreaking at the time, were done by Lawrence W. Butler and Tom Howard. The former worked on the effects on films such as
Things to Come, as well as films whose effects were more subtle, such as
Casablanca. The latter worked on many films also, such as 1963's
The Haunting, and apparently was photographic effects supervisor on
2001. In addition, some of the matte paintings were done by Peter Ellenshaw, who is a famous matte painter - he worked on films like
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and
The Black Hole, and is the father of Harrison Ellenshaw, who did matte painting for many films, perhaps most especially
Star Wars, but also worked on
The Black Hole with his dad, and continues to work today.
I knew a lot of this stuff, but not all of it; I found the details over at IMDB.com.
