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"Am I dreaming, or did I see a gorilla and a beautiful dame?" The opening is curiously anticipatory of Au hasard Balthazar, the farm girl in Africa exchanges toys and beads and a filched flashlight for the baby primate in a wicker basket, one orphan helping another. A dozen years later and the furry foundling is two tons of rambunctious muscle, not quite domesticated but devoted to his pal (Terry Moore). Showbiz calls, the hotspot needs a floor show so the entrepreneur (Robert Armstrong) offers a ticket to Hollywood, where the camera sweeps across the ersatz jungle of a nightclub stocked with voodoo dancers and surly lions. ("Dignified. Restrained. Artistic," snaps the owner before donning a twenty-gallon pith helmet.) Ernest B. Schoedsack and Merian C. Cooper back at the crossroads of cinema and safari, a gentle variation of King Kong and a toast to underdog demolishers everywhere. Fame means a tug of war with pelt-clad strongmen, a bombardment of Frisbee-sized coins, your childhood song on a grand piano heaved platform and all. ("Beautiful Dreamer" is the leitmotif.) "Big money for the big monkey." Demoralized in captivity, the behemoth cuts loose with a ferocious binge and is marked for execution, the earnest cowboy (Ben Johnson) helps with the escape. The main event is the passing of the torch from Willis O'Brien to Ray Harryhausen, both imbuing the stop-motion protagonist with poignant expressiveness—riding in the back of a getaway truck, the gorilla spits at pursuers and then idly drums his fingers like Ollie Hardy. The burning orphanage is from Lang's Der Müde Tod, retirement is posited as the artiste's ultimate recompense. "Can you imagine the size of his hangover?" With Frank McHugh, Douglas Fowley, Denis Green, Regis Toomey, Paul Guilfoyle, Nestor Paiva, James Flavin, and Primo Carnera. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |