The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958)

Directed by Nathan H. Juran. Starring Kerwin Matthews, Torin Thatcher, Kathryn Grant, Alec Mango, Harold Kasket, Richard Eyer, Alfred Brown.

Sinbad the Sailor (Matthews) reluctantly joins forces with scheming magician Thatcher to save his lady love Grant, who has been shrunk down to only a few inches tall (typical relationship obstacles…); they travel to the island of Colossa and do battle with rocs, cyclops, and more. Enthralling fantasy adventure with Ray Harryhausen’s eye-popping stop-motion DynaMation effects, plentiful sword and sorcery ensuring that even the most restless of viewers won’t get bored. Even by genre standards, the performances and conversations tend to be forgettable (or memorable in unfortunate ways), but Matthews still cuts a heroic figure and Thatcher is a reasonably sinister heavy. Exciting score by Bernard Herrmann. Doesn’t actually resemble the seventh and final voyage of Sinbad at all, but why complain? First (and easily the best) of three Sinbad movies from Columbia using Harryhausen’s animation process.

80/100