From the article:
The problem is and always has been that Ray Harryhausen’s movies are invariably made for the wrong reason. They are made to exploit one man’s unique—almost freakish—talent for creating unusual visual effects. Every other consideration in production comes second to that, including such overwhelmingly more important things as story and direction. True, a Harryhausen-Schneer production is always polished and tastefully presented But the flashy exterior and the razzle dazzle of the special effects cannot possibly support the weight of a two-hour motion picture, and the results are almost always unbalanced and dismal. The viewer quickly finds her/himself impatiently waiting for the next animated sequence, since the uncanny manipulation of Harryhausen’s lifelike puppets is more lively than regular action in his pictures. In fact, the animated special effects are always the highlights—the only highlights—of any Harryhausen film. One cannot help but sense that the remaining footage in his movies is as flaccid as it always is because producer Schneer intentionally hires directors who are uninventive enough not to interfere with the often extreme directorial control which Harryhausen must wield in order to pull off some of his carefully synchronized effects.
The writer noted that the movies were aimed at the young, so the audience replaced itself in the few years it took them to make another movie. In the days before home video, they always seemed fresh and original to their target audience.
In The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, I felt bad that they killed a giant newly hatched baby bird and that Sinbad stuck a burning torch in a giant cyclops' eye so they could steal his treasure. At one point, they threw a lamp into molten lava and I think they thought the poor genie was still in there.
The REAL monster in these movies was Sinbad.
The kid above is the genie pictured here with a tiny princess.
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