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Before there was CGI there was something more wonderful. The magical world of Ray Harryhausen. Harryhausen’s films (and even though he didn’t direct them, they were HIS films) consisted of retellings of mythological tales with monsters as vivid as any child’s imagination. This boxed set collects a number of Harryhausen’s classic films (and a couple not so classic ones as well) that features larger than life characters fighting larger than life creatures. “Jason and the Argonauts” takes the Greek myth of Jason and his search for the golden fleece, embellishes it with some truly amazing creatures and vividly brings the world of Jason to life. While this wouldn’t be the only venture into Greek mythology, it would be the best. It’s also probably Harryhausen’s most complete film. With a number of strong performances by veteran English actors (including Nigel Green as Hercules), “Jason” has a perfect, spicy score by Bernard Herrmann that brings this legend to life. The fight with the skeletons that concludes “Jason” is still amazing particularly if you consider that one man animated these skeletons and that actors had to fight creatures that weren’t there and look convincing. It’s not an easy task. “The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad” and “The Golden Voyage of Sinbad” are both classic Harryhausen tales freely adapting the character from Burton’s “1001 Arabian Nights”. In the former school teacher Kerwin Matthews takes on the role of Sinbad. His swashbuckling is pretty darn convincing even if his acting isn’t. In this tale Sinbad must journey to an island named Colossus(so named because of the tribe of Cyclops that live on the island) to retrieve a cure for his fiance the princess. An evil magician (Torin Thatcher hamming it up)with plans of his own shrinks the princess (Kathryn Grant, later, Kathryn Crosby) Sinbad has agreed to marry to force Sinbad to return to the island.

In “The Golden Voyage of Sinbad” John Philip Law adds a levity to Sinbad’s swashbuckling ways. Law, a better actor than Matthews, brings Sinbad to life and if his sword fighting isn’t quite as good as Matthews, his Sinbad enlivens the story. Sinbad must fight an evil sorcerer Koura (Tom Baker of Dr. Who fame) over a talisman that Sinbad possesses. The colorful and marvelous production design and production values make “Golden Voyage” a superior production to “Seventh”. Although the story tends to drag a bit towards the middle and the monsters aren’t quite as inspired as in the first film, the animation is top notch and the performances exceptionally good.. The weakest of the Sinbad trilogy is the last “Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger”. Patrick Wayne is a colorless Sinbad in film that seems to rehash many of the plot strands from previous films. When Sinbad wants to marry the Princess of Charnak (the lovely Jane Seymour) he goes to the wonderful city to ask her brother the prince for her hand in marriage. Chaos, however, has broken out in the city. It seems that Prince Kasim has been turned into a baboon by his evil step-mother the witch Zenobia (Margaret Whiting). Sinbad must travel to the arctic circle to find the cure in an ancient pyramid. Sam Wanamaker’s direction lacks energy and the performances range from amateurish (Wayne) to over-the-top (Whiting).

“The 3 Worlds of Gulliver” is a watered down but enjoyable adaptation of Jonathan Swift’s satire. Kerwin Matthews once again stars in this imaginative film directed with style by Jack Sher (who also co-wrote the script with Arthur Ross). While the creatures aren’t as outrageous as those in other Harryhausen films, they work very well in this well made film. Featuring a handsome production design and witty performances, “Gulliver” is only undermined by the out of place musical numbers forced into the film.

For some reason “7th Voyage” is presented in a widescreen format. The film was shot in full screen and, as a result, some of the image at the to and bottom of the frame has been cropped. Evidently there’s also a stereo soundtrack available in Columbia Tristar’s vault but the mono soundtrack (which has been remastered) has been used here. “Jason”, on the other hand, was shot in widescreen (or at least matted for widescreen presentation).

The DVD for “Jason” presents the film in both widescreen and full screen formats. Both look exceptionally good with crisp images and bright, vivid colors. “Golden Voyage” appears a bit dark compared to the other films but then I seem to recall it as dark when it appeared in theaters. The presentation here is quite good although the film could have been adjusted so that the film wouldn’t appear as dark as it does here. “Gulliver” looks very good with bright colors, nice clarity and sharpness considering the age of the film and use of matte paintings and optical effects in the film. “Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger” looks good although there’s quite a bit of analog blemishes in the form of hair, dirt, etc. This may be unavoidable due to the multiple exposures used for Harryhausen’s visual effects. The image quality has remarkable clarity considering the amount of optical effects and animation matted into the live action of the film. All the films are presented in anamorphic widescreen for high resolution picture quality. Even though most of the soundtracks are in mono, they’ve been cleaned up considerably for these releases and sound pretty darn good. ---

There’s two interviews featured on “7th Voyage” that focus on the making of that film and, curiously, “Jason”. There’s also a visual effects featurette focusing on Harryhausen’s work and “The Ray Harryhausen Chronicles” that discusses his various features. Talent files on the main actors, the original theatrical trailers and theatrical poster are presented as well. “Jason” sports an interview with director Jon Landis and the original theatrical trailer. The only thing missing from “Jason” that would make it complete are the still photos showing the rehearsals for the climatic fight with the skeletons. These were animated and presented on the Criterion laserdisc for “Jason” about a decade ago but aren’t included here. For an example of how bad the film could look, compare the trailer to the film. “This is Dynamation”, “The Harryhausen Chronicles” and a “Making-of” featurette form the extras for “Gulliver”. “Golden Voyage” strangely enough features a featurette for “The 3 Worlds of Gulliver” as well as “Mysterious Island” and “Earth vs. The Flying Saucer”. My guess is that these featurettes came to light when each of these films were released and were put on the DVDs to provide extra value. We also have vintage advertising, a theatrical trailer, talent files for the actors and production notes. For “Eye of the Tiger” there’s the same “This is Dynamation” featurette that appeared previously, the same episode of “The Ray Harryhausen Chronicles”, talent films, the two theatrical trailers for the film and production notes. There was room for improvement on some of the extras here. For example, I think it would have been appropriate to have featurettes on Bernard Hermann and Miklos Rozsa and their collaboration with Harryhausen on the films. My only other criticism is that in putting this set together, I would have suggested Columbia Tristar release only the films on a dual layered disc with the extras packaged together on a sixth disc. ---