Why 3-D Isn't As Dead As You Think

Once again, another source, Cheddar News on YouTube, has proclaimed the Final Death of 3-D. Of course, they've done so with a ton of misinformation. What's particularly sad about this is the attempt to educate us about 3-D while knowing nothing about it. So let's go through this once again: 3-D is not as dead as you think or the haters want. Sorry to disappoint the haters.

Let's talk a little about the history for 3-D for a moment. The earliest 3-D experiments date back to at least 1915 with the first feature in 3-D being in 1922. The Cheddar News video does correctly attribute these to being in the anaglyphic (red/cyan) format. There was a mini-boom in the 20s, mostly shorts with a couple of features. Why did it go away in the 20s? I would think mostly because the big experimentation was for sound. Sound and the Great Depression put a kibosh on a number of film experiments at the time, including Widescreen.

During the 1930s, polarized 3-D was being developed. One of the earliest polarized films was shown at the 1939 World's Fair in NY, a stop motion film called In Tune With Tomorrow. It was remade the following year in color as New Dimensions. The shorts were done in dual strip polarized 3-D. According to Cheddar, polarized glasses as yellow and brown as opposed to red and blue. What this proves is that the person doing the video hasn't actually seen any 3-D movies, especially polarized ones. Polarized glasses are clear and made of polarizing filters that are at a 90 degree angle to one another. Yellow and brown indeed.

World War II put a hold on further 3-D experimentation until the 1950s. And frankly, 3-D has pretty much been with us in one way or another ever since. Don't believe me? Let's look at the evidence.

It's generally accepted that Bwana Devil kicked off 3-D in the 1950s, but you can actually take it back a year to the Festival of Britain in 1951. A number of 3-D shorts were shot and shown there and almost all of them ended up in America in early 1953 after the success of Bwana Devil. Bwana Devil and 99% of all the 3D movies of the 50s were done in dual strip polarized 3-D. There were a couple of part 3D Burlesque features in anaglyph, but the mainstream stuff was all polarized. How does dual strip polarized 3-D work? It's shot using two cameras, one for each eye. It's then projected through two projectors. The two projectors have to be in perfect synchronization. The screen has to be an actual silver screen to reflect the light back. And the polarizing filters that the image passes through on the projector have to be changed every few days. They also have to be clean of smudges and fingerprints, as do the glasses. In short, projection of dual strip 3-D was a very precise science and if just one thing went wrong, the whole presentation would blow up.

Naturally, projectionists didn't care to be that precise. If they couldn't get it to sync up right away, they'd just let it go. Even one frame out of sync can lead to headaches and nausea. There reports of film being a full 24 frames--one full second--out of sync. To give you an idea of what that might look like, picture watching House of Wax and your left eye sees a medium shot of Vincent Price and your right eye sees a two shot of Price and Charles Bronson. The theater owners would cheap out as well, painting the screen instead of installing a proper silver screen. The projectionist union demanded two projectionists in a booth for 3-D shows, 3 if the magnetic stereo soundtrack was involved. Theater owners fought that, too. The end result was many shoddy presentations which left patron sick. Audiences began avoiding 3-D movies for this reason.

While all this was going on, 20th Century Fox was developing CinemaScope, a widescreen process that only used a single projector and a special lens. Theater owners, projectionists, and eventually audiences preferred this over the precision of 3-D, so many 3-D movies started getting flat showings only. Universal rolled out one last 3-D movie in 1955, Revenge of the Creature, and that as they say was that.

But not quite. As early as 1957, 3-D movies were being successfully reissued. The first new 3-D movie after Revenge of the Creature was also the first one released in 3-D and CinemaScope: September Storm in 1960. September Storm became the last dual strip 3-D movie. The following year, The Mask became the first of the part 3-D releases, with 3 segments in anaglyphic 3-D. This was followed by a pair of Nudie Cuties also in part 3-D in 1962, The Bellboy and the Playgirls and Paradiso. A third Nudie Cutie, Adam and Six Eves, was shot in 3-D but released flat until it made a 3-D Blu Ray debut last year courtesy of the 3-D Film Archive and Kino. 3-D took another four years off before returning with 1966's The Bubble, the first single strip polarized 3-D film. Single strip 3-D was supposed to solve the problems of projection. Each image was printed on the same strip of film, either side by side or over and under. They were then projected--again on a silver screen--through a special beam splitter. The whole thing should have been idiot-proof. Never underestimate the idiocy of the American projectionist, however. I've seen far too many single strip presentations that were sometimes painfully mis-projected: the wrong type of screen, the wrong type of beam splitter, the beam splitter not put on correctly, as well as the film being cut incorrectly by the projectionists all could and did wreak havoc on unsuspecting audiences for literally decades.

Nonetheless, The Bubble begat a system that was used for decades. It was followed by Paul Naschy's La Marca del Hombre Lobo in 1968, released in the US in 1971 as Frankenstein's Bloody Terror. 1969 gave us the infamous porn The Stewardesses, which set off a decade of similar films. There were some mainstream films in the 70s, including the part 3-D horror film The Flesh and Blood Show,  the 1974 gorefest Andy Warhol's Frankenstein,  the 1976 South Korean Kaiju flick A*P*E, and a couple of Kung Fu movies. While not everything was mainstream, 3-D was still alive and kicking for practically the whole decade.

3-D took a 3 year break before returning with Comin' At Ya! in 1981. That film started a new mini-boom that lasted until 1985 and produced 18 movies in 3-D. Maybe not as much as the 50s boom, but 3-D was very front and center for a few years in the 80s. Why did it die this time? I suspect projectionists had something to do with it as well as the simple fact that all 18 movies are actually terrible movies. The 50s had some bad films, too, but by and large the 50s batch was pretty good. There wasn't a single good movie released in 3-D from 1981 to 1985. I know because I've seen most of them. I can't imagine that the few I haven't seen are much better than the ones I have.

Six years went between 1985's Starchaser: The Legend of Orin and 1991's Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, which was another part 3-D anaglyphic affair. But that's not the full story, either since IMAX 3-D was ramping up starting in the mid-1980s and Disney was having a lot of success with Captain EO at their theme parks. In fact, IMAX 3-D (and porn ironically) carried 3-D through the 90s. And it was an IMAX 3-D release, James Cameron's 2003n Titanic documentary Ghosts of the Abyss, coupled with that same year's part 3-D anaglyphic release of Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over that set the current boom in motion. But even before that there were a few more mainstream releases: a terrible 1995 film called Run For Cover with Adam West in it and a 1997 Charles Band horror comedy called The Creeps. Plus there were 3-D made for video horror films in the late 90s like the atrocious Camp Blood. To say nothing of all the theme park attractions in 3-D like T2 3D: Battle Across Time, Shrek 4-D, MuppetVision 3-D, etc.

Ever since Spy Kids 3-D, there hasn't been a year without 3-D movies. Part of the longevity now seems to be the fact that projection is finally Projectionist-proof. Outside of forgetting to turn the 3-D filter for the projector on (I've seen this happen), there's no way the image can be screwed up nowadays. It also helps that there's much better movies being made nowadays as opposed to the batch from the 60s through the 90s. While there's definitely been some stinkers in the past 17 years, there's been plenty of movies like Hugo, Gravity, Life of Pi, the various Marvel and Star Wars movies, etc. that can stand alongside the classics of the 50s. The circular polarized glasses are better, too. More comfortable and you can tilt your head without losing the effect. Of course, Hollywood did itself no favors with some lousy rushed conversions like Clash of the Titans, but now even the conversions look great. Watching The Force Awakens or The Walk, you'd hardly believe they weren't actually shot in 3-D.

Yes, there's not as many 3-D movies as there were 7 or 8 years ago, but there's still some high profile releases. Yes, TV manufacturers stopped making 3-D TVS, but you can still get 3-D projectors for the home. Frankly, bigger is better with 3-D anyhow. There's a huge difference between seeing The Force Awakens in 3-D on a 50 inch TV screen and seeing it on a 100 inch projection screen. And while it is also true that not as many 3-D Blu Rays are being released in America, you can still get many of the big releases from Europe. I've gotten the last half dozen Marvel movies and the last 3 Star Wars movies all from the UK on 3-D Blu Ray, and all region free. On top of that, the 3-D Film Archive is still releasing several titles a year on 3-D Blu Ray. Taza, Son of Cochise will be out from the 3DFA and Kino later this month. And unless Covid-19 kills movie theaters totally forever, there are some high profile releases coming this fall like Black Widow and Wonder Woman 1984.

So no, 3-D is not totally dead. And it really hasn't been totally dead for nearly 70 years. Even when it goes away, it only goes away for a few years before poking back up in some fashion. The longest gap between movies since the 50s has been five, and that was right after Revenge of the Creature. All the other gaps have been an average of 3-4 years. So I have to say it: 3-D, like the Force, will be with us always.

3-D Thursday: 3-D Rarities Vol II

The 3-D Film Archive has done it again. Five years after the incredible 3-D Rarities from the 3D Film Archive and Flicker Alley, we a second installment that's nearly as great as it's predecessor. There may be a little less this time, but what there is, is wonderful.

Vol. II kicks off with A Day in the Country, a 1953 Lippert short. Originally shot in New Jersey in 1941 as Stereo Laffs and intended to beat the Pete Smith short Third Dimensional Murder to the screen, A Day in the Country basically sat on a shelf until Lippert put it out to cash in the 3D craze that was just getting under way. The short was released in anaglyphic format back then, one of the rare anaglyph releases. Narrated by future Stooge Joe Besser, the short is a pleasant if somewhat goofy affair that, like the Smith short, manages to throw everything it can think of out of the screen at you. Incidentally, this is from the only surviving print, a somewhat faded anaglyph. The image might not be the prettiest, but it's the best we'll see on this one.

If you're a little more highbrow than that, the second short should be more up your alley: The Black Swan, a 1951 ballet short shot for the Festival of Britain. It's incredibly well staged in 3D and makes you wonder why more shorts like it weren't done. A couple of other shorts for the Festival of Britain were included on Volume I, so maybe Volume III could complete the collection!*

Hillary Hess narrates the next part, a 20 minute collection of 3-D stills taken from the mid-40s to the late 50s. It's a fascinating look at a time long gone and Hess's narration brings it even more to life. Most fans praise this segment the most and for good reason.

A very odd short done in 1966, Games in Depth, is up next. Shot by the Polaroid company, Apparently intended for Expo '67 but never released until now. It's a mess of different shots set to goofy music, which is pretty bizarre but worth watching at least once.

The prologue to Frankenstein's Bloody Terror follows. I missed my chance to see the film itself in 3-D a few years ago and this two minute prologue really makes me regret that. Following that and rounding out the shorts section is a trailer for the never released clip documentary, The 3-D Movie. It's sad we'll never see this film as it looked like a ton of fun with clips from The Stranger Wore a Gun and Gorilla at Large among other things.

Then comes the centerpiece of the whole thing, the first Mexican 3-D feature, El Corazon y La Espada. Starring Cesar Romero and Katy Jurado, this is a wonderful little swashbuckler about a Spanish nobleman (Romero) out to take back his castle from the Moors. Jurado is the spitfire looking for the formula to turn lead into gold.  Ponce De Leon is also tagging along, looking for the Rose of Youth. There's a lot of sneaking around secret passages, which looks great in 3-D. The sword play won't make it forget Errol Flynn, but the movie is reasonably fun. I've certainly seen worse 3-D movies over the years. The disc allows you to watch it either in Spanish with subtitles or the English dubbed track from the movies 1956 re-release in America as Sword of Granada. A Kickstarter campaign was done to complete the restoration of the film and as it result, it looks spectacular.

The disc finally ends with a selection of 3D stills taken by Harold Lloyd. I've seen at least some of these before since I have a book of Lloyd's stills, but they're even more spectacular here. Harold's granddaughter Suzanne narrates this wonderful look back at a bygone era.

3-D Rarities II is, as I said earlier, nearly as great as the first one. There's less here but it's still great stuff. The only real knock on the disc is that you can't access each short separately like you could the original disc. Nonetheless, this is another must have from the 3-D Film Archive.

3-D Classics on Blu Ray

If you're a fan of vintage 3-D 2016 has been a pretty awesome year so far. MVD kicked things off in January with 1981's Comin' At Ya!. Admittedly, that's a terrible movie--all of the 80s 3-D films fail at being good movies--but it has a lot of goofy 3-D gimmick shots so it's kind of fun in that manner.

Kino Lorber in March released Gog courtesy of the 3-D Film Archive. I've mentioned before what a fantastic restoration it is and it bears repeating. Gog hasn't looked this good since its initial release in 1954. This is a restoration to rival restorations from the major studios, that's how well done it is. If you're a fan of 50s science fiction or classic 3-D movies, you really need to get this one.

Going back to 80s 3-D for a moment, last month Universal finally released all 3 Jaws sequels on Blu Ray. Included in this, of course, is Jaws 3-D. While they didn't make as big a deal about it as it can be argued they should have, that Blu includes the 3-D version listed as a special feature. But it's the 3-D Blu Ray edition, unlike Paramount's anaglyphic release of Friday the 13th Part 3. Some of the gimmick shots get way too close to the camera for comfort but the 3-D looks great. I have a warm spot for Jaws 3-D (despite knowing it's a bad movie) since it was my first 3-D movie in the theaters so I'm glad it's finally out the way it was meant to be seen. Besides, why would you want to watch it any other way?

The most recent release is a 1950s title from Twilight Time. Miss Sadie Thompson starring Rita Hayworth and Jose Ferrer shipped just this week. Sony did a beautiful 3-D DCP restoration a few years ago. I saw that DCP at the 2013 World 3-D Film Expo and it looked terrific. That's what Twilight Time is releasing. I'm looking forward to revisiting this soon.

There's more on the way, too. Kino Lorber and the 3-D Film Archive are working on 1976's A*P*E.  A South Korean Kaiju movie made to compete  with the Dino DeLaurentis remake of King Kong, A*P*E has a ridiculous looking 36 foot gorilla rampaging across Korea, kidnapping Joanna Kerns (the mom from Growing Pains), and flipping off the audience! While it wouldn't be my first choice for restoration, I'm confident the 3-D Film Archive will make it look better than it deserves. More exciting is the potential restoration of September Storm from the 3-D Film Archive. There's a Kickstarter campaign to fund the restoration at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/3-dspace/september-storm-1960-3-d-digital-feature-film-rest. If you are a fan of vintage 3-D, you owe it to yourself to contribute to this.

On top of that, Shout Factory has announced 1983's Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared Syn. Charles Band's second of three 3-D movies, Metalstorm stars Kelly Preston in the second worst sci-fi movie she was in (Battlefield Earth remains the champ) and Richard Moll in the part that got him the role of Bull in Night Court. It has just enough goofy 3-D effects to make it worth watching, too. The 3-D Blu Ray will be released on September 13.

Finally, Universal may be working on the 1953 sci-fi classic It Came From Outer Space. Originally, Panamint in the U.K. had announced a release set for this month but cancelled it when Universal said they were planning a release. It the Universal Blu Ray is the same as what Panamint was planning, it will include the short that originally played with the movie, Nat King Cole and Russ Morgan's Orchestra. Universal hasn't confirmed anything yet, however, so vintage 3-D fans wait eagerly for news.

For those of you who wonder why I get so enthusiastic about these old 3-D movies and not so much the newer ones, it's because I generally find the older titles have better 3-D. They take better advantage of the process with greater depth and more gimmick shots. Even the less gimmicky films of the 50s are deeper and, as a rule, have at least some pop outs. There are more recent titles that have     nothing coming out of the screen at all. They also usually don't take as much advantage of the depth as they could. There are exceptions, of course, but they aren't the rule. So until all modern filmmakers bring the fun back to 3-D, I'll continue to jump at any of these older titles.

3-D Classics on Blu Ray: 3-D Rarities

Someone give the 3D Film Archive an Oscar. Seriously. Bob Furmanek, Greg Kintz, and Jack Theakston need to be given an Oscar and the right to restore any vintage 3D movie they want. Their work in the restoration and preservation of our 3D heritage is as important as it is astounding. 3-D Rarities, now out from Flicker Alley, is as good an example as any I can think of.


Covering material from 1922-1962, 3-D Rarities literally has something for everyone. The disc is broken into two parts: Dawn of the Stereoscopic Cinema, covering from 1922-mid-1952, and Hollywood Enters the Third Dimension, covering from November 1952 -1955, with bonus material giving us a peek at some 1960s footage. This Blu Ray is the motherlode, a 3D fan's dream come true. Test footage, trailers, cartoons, industrial shorts--it's all here. Every short and clip perfectly aligned and looking better than ever.


Part One starts with the oldest existing 3D footage from 1922. Some of it is test footage while a bulk of it is a fascinating glimpse at Washington, D.C. from that time frame, shot through the trees. Part one chugs along through the 20s with more test footage, mostly fun gimmick shots. Those shots were used in a variety of 3D shorts back then, all of which are lost. Some 1930s test footage, used for the Pete Smith Metroscopix shorts from 1936-1941 (all three of which do exist) updates a few of the gags from the 20s while adding to their own. You could literally stop the disc right there and have seen more 3D gimmick shots than in almost any ten modern 3D films you can name. But then you would miss the real highlights of Part One: Thrills for You and New Dimensions.

These two shorts were done for the 1940s World's Fair. Thrills for You played in San Francisco while New Dimensions played in New York. The former short is a wonderful snapshot at a time gone by: the era of traveling by locomotive. It was produced by the Pennsylvania Rail Road and not only shots the trains being built, but gives a glimpse into what riding on those trains was like. It was a lost short until 2006 when it popped up at the World 3-D Film Expo II. If you are any sort of train enthusiast, this is a must see short.


New Dimensions will appeal to car lovers. It's a color re-do of the previous year's black & white In Tune With Tomorrow, a stop motion animation short of a full size Plymouth being built, set to music. For years, fans of the short could only see the edited version RKO released in 1953 called Motor Rhythm. This disc restores the complete short as seen by audiences in 1940.


If animation is your thing, there's four Canadian 3D shorts from 1951-1952. Two of them were by Norman McLaren. They're interesting examples of 3D animation. An industrial short for the Bolex 3-D camera rounds out part one.


Part Two kicks off, appropriately enough with the short that opened Arch Oboler's Bwana Devil, M.L. Gunzberg Presents Naturalvision 3-Dimension or as it came to be referred to in later sources, Time For Beany since it features Beany and Cecil the Seasick Serpent. Oh, Lloyd Nolan is in it, too, along with Shirley Tegge, Miss 3-D. It's a humorous explanation of the Naturalvision camera system.


Other highlights for Part Two include four trailers, a Casper Cartoon (Boo Moon),a short about Atom Bomb testing (Doom Town), a Burlesque short (I'll Sell My Shirt), the Rocky Marciano-Joe Walcott fight film, and the short that opened for Robot Monster with comedian Slick Slavin (Stardust in Your Eyes). The bonus material includes two minutes from the 3D footage Francis Ford Coppola directed for the 1962 3D nudie film The Playgirls and the Bellboy. Mr. Furmanek has threatened to unleash the rest of that film on us in the near future.

Personally, I most enjoyed the Time For Beany short and another puppet cartoon on the disc called The Adventures of Sam Space. But the truth is, there isn't a bad piece of footage on this disc. The product of five years work, it's a great celebration of all things 3D and a perfect showcase for the diversity the process once had before settling into cartoons and comic book movies. Not only should any 3D fan get this disc, but anyone who wants to make 3D movies should get it, watch it, and learn from it.


So yeah, get the 3D Film Archive an Oscar for this one. This is hands down the Best 3-D Blu Ray you'll ever own.

3-D Classics on Blu Ray: Kiss Me Kate (1953)

Let me say precisely what I mean to say: Kiss Me Kate is one of the greatest 3D movies ever made. Ever. The list of 3D movies as good or better than it is practically non-existent. Maybe you can make an argument for Hugo or Dial M For Murder or House of Wax but that's about it. This is it, baby--The 3D movie of all time.

What makes KMK so great? How about everything. Start off with a terrific score by Cole Porter, toss in two of the best musical stars of the 50s (Howard Keel and Kathryn Grayson), mix in incredible dance routines by the likes of Ann Miller, Tommy Rall, and Bob Fosse, add some great comedy by Keenan Wynn and James Whitmore and top it all off with one of the best uses of the process you'll ever see.



Hammy actor Fred Graham (Keel) plans to win back ex-wife Lilli Vanessi (Grayson) by starring opposite her in a musical version of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. But she's engaged to be married to a cattle baron. Adding to his troubles are free-spirited and flirtatious actress Lois Lane (Miller) whose boyfriend (Rall) forged Graham's signature on an IOU to a gangster. Two of his thugs (Wynn and Whitmore) show up to collect on the "debt of honor". The onstage battles mirror the backstage chaos, all set to one of the best scores in a musical.

Porter's score is quite possibly the best non-songbook score of the decade in terms of movies. Starting with the wonderful So in Love and ending pretty much with the hilarious Brush Up Your Shakespeare, every song is fantastic. Some say KMK was Porter's crowning achievement and that doesn't seem to be an understatement. In fact, if there is a complaint against the movie, its the fact that 50s sensibilities forced so many of the songs to be cleaned up. That said, there are a few raunchy lines that slipped past the censors. I dare you to not take the line "a Dick, a Dick" in Tom, Dick, and Harry dirty.

Then there's From This Moment On. While Hermes Pan choreographed the rest of the numbers, he gave the dancers free reign to do whatever they wanted. The result is pure movie magic with a 66 second steamy routine from Bob Fosse and Carol Haney. It's that routine that made critics take notice of Fosse.

It helps that the cast is one of the best assembled for a 50s musical. Keel and Grayson have great voices for the numbers, even if they weren't dancers. This was their second movie together, after Show Boat (1951). But it's Wynn, Whitmore, and Miller that own this movie. Miller was one of the top female tap dancers and even if she seems a little old for the part of Lane/Bianca, she sells it. Her tap routine during Too Darn Hot is exactly that. As for Wynn and Whitmore, they knew they weren't song and dance men so they didn't even bother to rehearse their big number. As such, they tend to bumble through it in a way that actually works to the movie's advantage. They steal every scene they're in. Oh, and serial fans will get a kick out of Dave O'Brien as Keel's stage manager.

KMK is a great example on how to do a gimmicky 3D movie, too. There's over 20 gimmick shots in it. But, unlike the 80s films that lost their mind with gimmick shots, it's not as obvious. The majority of the gimmick shots are incorporated into the musical numbers (Those Redheads From Seattle does the same trick). This makes them less blatant than the yo-yos and popcorn in Friday the 13th Part 3. There's only one 40 second segment at the beginning of the play within the movie with a bunch of gimmicks there just for the sake of being there and that's only in the 3D version. But even more than the gimmick shots is the other ways the movie uses 3D. There's lots of shots from various parts of the theater that gives the illusion that one is actually watching these antics live. It is hands down the most brilliant use of the process you'll ever see. Especially look for one shot at the end of Where is the Life That Late I Led that means nothing in 2D but is one of the craziest shots in 3D.

Warner Home Video has released Kiss Me Kate in an amazing 3D Blu Ray that is a must own. This is the first time KMK has been released in its original 3D widescreen format with the added bonus of having the original stereo soundtrack. KMK is one of only two 3D movies from the 50s to still have its stereo soundtrack and its a treat to not only see but hear the movie as it was intended. I may have said this before about other movies, but you really do need this 3D Blu Ray. If you only ever see one 3D movie in your life, make it Kiss Me Kate.

3-D Classics on Blu Ray: Inferno (1953)

There is a very odd thing about the existence of Roy Ward Baker's 3D color noir Inferno, and that is the fact that it was made by 20th Century Fox. When 3D movies went big in 1953, most studios eagerly jumped on the bandwagon. Fox, however, was putting their money on CinemaScope, a widescreen process where the image was roughly 2 1/2 times as wide as it was high. Fox did a ton of press for the new process and even snarkily referred to it as "The Modern Miracle You See Without Glasses". And then they turned around and made a movie that is not only one of the top 10 3D movies of the 1950s, it's a top 10 3D movie for all time.

Robert Ryan is Donald Carson III, an arrogant and not particularly likeable businessman. He goes on a trip to the desert with wife Geraldine (Rhonda Fleming) and speculator Joe Duncan (William Lundigan). What he doesn't know is that Geraldine and Duncan are lovers, so when he breaks his leg at the top of a cliff, they take the opportunity to make it look like he got drunk and ran off, effectively abandoning him to die in the desert. Carson realizes that if he's going to get back to civilization, it's going to be on his own.

The performances in this movie are great. Ryan does a lot with just a voice over and his facial expressions. The look of increasing desperation turns him into a more sympathetic character. While he starts the movie as fairly hateful, by halfway through we're completely on his side. In contrast are Fleming and Lundigan. While Lundigan is straight unapologetically evil, Fleming is far more sinister. She seems to be uncomfortable with what they've done, but is totally willing to abandon her lover in the desert the same as her husband. It's equally interesting since this isn't the type of role I'm used to seeing Fleming in. Those three are the majority of the film, but TV fans will get a kick out of seeing Larry Keating (Mr. Drysdale on The Beverly Hillbillies) as Carson's concerned business manager. Universal monster fans will equally enjoy seeing Henry Hull (Werewolf of London) as the desert old timer who ends up helping save Ryan in the end.

Inferno features one of the most stunning uses of 3D ever. Like several great 3D westerns of the era (Hondo, Gun Fury), the movie makes the most of its desert setting. The screen seems to stretch on forever, letting us know just how isolated Carson really is. There's one absolutely dizzying shot from the top of the cliff looking down that gives us a very good idea of just how precarious Ryan's position is. On top of that, the movie employs a trick that most 3D movies of the era did: concentrating on depth, but having gimmick shots during big movies. In fact, most of the gimmick shots in the movie show up during the climactic fight between Ryan and Lundigan. The only knock on the gimmick shots is when Ryan throws a lantern at the camera towards the end, it comes off a bit as a 3 Stooges style 3D effect.

U.K. company Panamint released Inferno on 3D Blu Ray last year, initially only Region B but later making it Region Free. The Blu Ray comes from a restoration done by the late Dan Symmes in which all the misalignments in the film were corrected. The result is a beautiful looking and practically perfect 3D Blu Ray of one of the all time great 3D movies. Only the credits are in reverse 3D and that's the way they were in the original film. Any true 3D fan needs this movie in their collection.

3D Thursday: Robot Monster (1953)

Back in 1978, Harry and Michael Medved wrote a book called The 50 Worst Movies of All Time. In it, they listed  1953's infamous Robot Monster as the worst movie of all time. They changed their minds two years later when they wrote The Golden Turkey Awards and gave the title of worst movie to Ed Wood's equally infamous Plan Nine From Outer Space. To not put too fine a point to it and yet still try to sound somewhat diplomatic, the Medveds were wrong.

Let me qualify that. The book ultimately is their opinion of what the 50 worst movies are. All movie criticism is ultimately that. However, the movies in the book, while undeniably bad, really don't deserve that title. Truly bad movies are boring and unwatchable. Try watching something like The Phantom of 42nd Street or The Clutching Hand. Both of those were directed by a man named Albert Hermann. Unless you're a serial geek like me, you've probably never heard of Albert Hermann, and for good reason. Albert Hermann was a man who could take a 60 minute B-movie like The Phantom of 42nd Street and make it feel like it ran for 60 hours. Considering the fact that his serial The Clutching Hand runs over 5 hours, you can extrapolate how long that one feels. Albert Hermann made boring, seemingly never-ending dreck and he did it with shocking consistency.

Robot Monster, if nothing else, is not boring. It can probably best be described as crack cocaine for the brain and eyes. It's a dizzying 66 minutes of "wait, what?" that no mere synopsis could ever do justice to. It's a movie you need to see to believe, you won't believe you've seen, and you'll have to see again just to believe that you've seen it. That, my friends, is Robot Monster.

The plot has the earth invaded by an alien named Ro-Man (George Barrows). Ro-Man is basically a guy in a gorilla suit with something vaguely resembling a space helmet on his head. Ro-Man has managed to destroy all but six hu-mans. Actually, there's eight people still left on the planet, but two of them had common sense enough to not actually appear in the movie. The six are a Scientist (John Mylong), his wife (Selena Royale), his oldest daughter Alice (Claudia Barrett), his two young kids Johnny (Gregory Moffett) and Carla (Pamela Paulson), and his assistant Roy (George Nader). Great Guidance Ro-Man (Barrows again) orders his underling to seek out and destroy the pesky hu-mans. Ro-Man does his best, which is usually pretty inept. He does manage to strangle Carla and pummel Roy, but then he falls for "Al-lice" and kidnaps her instead of killing her. This annoys Great Guidance, who kills Ro-Man and unleashes earthquakes and prehistoric reptiles to kill all who remain. In the film's twist ending, ripped right off of the same year's Invaders From Mars, we find out this was all a dream of Johnny's. Then Ro-Man comes out of a cave.

Actually, the only a dream ending is telegraphed five minutes into the movie. You just have to pay even half-attention to know what's happening. Though that does raise a few questions about what type of kid Johnny is. I mean, seeing as to how his dream involved his younger sister being strangled and his older sister being tied up and almost forced to have sex with a gorilla spaceman, well...

Like I said before, Robot Monster is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a good movie. You won't confuse it with the likes of Dial M For Murder. However, it's also not the worst movie ever made (neither is Plan Nine for that matter). It's not even the worst 3D movie ever made, even if you take 3D porn out of the equation. It's not even the worst 3D movie of the 1950s. I can make a pretty strong argument that Flight to Tangier and Jivaro go on far too long and are far more boring for the 50s movies. I can make a better argument that Domo Arigato, Run For Cover, and Camp Blood are all far worse 3D movies.

What it is, however, is excessively entertaining. Once Ro-Man shows up, you just sort of hold on tight and go along for the ride. It's lunacy is an undeniable part of it's charm, too. Lines like "I must--yet I cannot. How do you calculate that? At what point do must and cannot meet on the graph. I cannot--yet I must", "you look like a pooped-out pinwheel!" (!) and "you're so bossy you should be milked before you come home at night" abound. That's bad? No, my friend, that's  brilliant.  Do you know why? Because we know those lines and probably a couple dozen more. Anyone who has ever heard them knows them and is likely to quote them. Truly bad movies like Domo Arigato don't have lines like that. Name me one memorable line from a crapper like Hillbilly Monster. You can't, probably because you've mercifully never heard of Hillbilly Monster and even if you had, you'd be hard pressed to come up with a quotable line from it!

Contrary to popular belief, Robot Monster was shot in 12 days (not four like the Medveds claim) for a budget under $20,000. It was shot with a new, never before (or since) used 3D camera rig called Tru Stereo Three Dimension, mostly in Bronson Canyon. Funny enough, a far worse 3D movie in the 80s was also shot in Bronson Canyon (Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared Syn). Despite these conditions, the cast tries there best, even if they do get defeated by the dialogue sometimes. And stunningly enough, the 3D is actually really, really good. In other words, this isn't the incompetent piece of garbled mess you may have heard it is.

Robot Monster has been a fixture on home video for nearly 30 years. The late, lamented Rhino Video even had a (horrible) anaglyphic videotape release in 1991 that had a couple of looped in joke lines. Mystery Science Theater 3000 did the film. This is a film that won't die. Unfortunately, the greatest crime against the film--besides the Medveds' ill-informed books--comes from the so-called rights holder, one Wade Williams. Whether or not he actually owns the rights to Robot Monster, like almost every film he claims to own the rights to, he doesn't care about any sort of restoration of the movie. He's content to let this and it's spiritual sister movie Cat Women of the Moon rot away instead of preserving them and getting them on 3D Blu Ray. That's a shame, since the 3D is so good, the movie deserves to be released on 3D Blu Ray. It's mind-boggling to me that something like The Flesh and Blood Show will get a 3D Blu Ray release, but not this.

If you truly want to appreciate this movie, see it in a theater in 3D with a packed audience. I've done that three times and outside of a couple of cranky old people, the majority of the audience loved it. They laughed with it.They were entertained by it. And isn't that the ultimate purpose of any movie? To entertain it's audience?