Tuck Kirby (James Franciscus, a sort of poor man’s Charlton Heston) arrives in turn of the century Mexico to visit the wild west show he was once a stuntman for. Now a horse trader, Tuck presents his jilted ex-girlfriend, the fiery redhead T.J. (Gila Golan) with an offer for her horse. She throws a vase at him. On his way back to town, Tuck comes across a British paleontologist searching the desert brush for traces of the eohippus, an extinct miniature horse.

T.J. suddenly changes her mind about her ex’s offer. In the film’s best sequence, she plays a music box and out of a miniature barn appears a living breathing eohippus, which she calls “El Diablo.” Once word of the creature gets out, a clan of gypsies steal El Diablo, fearing a curse for removing the creature from its natural habitat. Tuck, T.J. and the cowboys track the eohippus to a forbidden valley, which they discover is filled with dinosaurs, including a pterodactyl, T-Rex and triceratops.

The cowboys realize that they’re packing blanks from the show, and throwing lassos around the T-Rex proves useless as well. When the T-Rex is knocked unconscious in a rock slide, the cowboys decide to take it back to civilization so it can be incorporated into their act. Known by the gypsies as Gwangi, the T-Rex doesn’t enjoy show business and goes on a rampage, first killing an elephant, then chasing the townspeople into a cathedral.

The Valley of Gwangi was based on a story by Willis O’Brien, the pioneering stop motion effects animator who created the effects for King Kong. The original concept was for cowboys to find a T-Rex in the Grand Canyon, but plans to shoot in 1942 were scrapped when financing fell through. O’Brien’s protege Ray Harryhausen found the script in his garage twenty five years later and resurrected the project, with William Bast and Julian More reworking the script.

Director Jim O’Connolly shot the picture in Spain, and Harryhausen spent two years on over 300 effects shots, including the wonderful bit where cowboys corral Gwangi, one of the great visual effects sequences in film up to that point, combining live actors and a snapping, growling stop motion dinosaur seamlessly.

I first saw this flick on the “Million Dollar Movie” showcase that used to play on Houston’s ABC affiliate after school when I was a kid. Typically, the offerings were more like “Ninety Nine Cent” showcase, but occasionally, they’d do a monster week and Gwangi was one of my favorites.

Yes, the movie has numerable flaws. There’s the B-cast (Gila Golan was a former Miss Israel hired here as a favor, and a lot of her dialogue is awkwardly overdubbed). There’s also a lack of variety when it comes to the forbidden valley, which ultimately only has four dinosaurs in it.

But if anyone knows of a concept cooler than “cowboys and dinosaurs,” let me know. I haven’t heard it. Given how terrific the effects were for the day, it tempts the imagination to think of what an entire valley of extinct creatures would look like if this movie were remade. Probably a lot like Peter Jackson’s King Kong, come to think of it, which probably is not a good thing.

What I love about Harryhausen’s stop motion effects is how surreal they look, particularly when blended effectively with live actors. Harryhausen also employed great ingenuity by giving his creatures personality. The eohippus is curious, while the T-rex is also sort of innocent, until shot at by shit kicking cowboys. Given the lack of personality exhibited by the cast, I was rooting for the dinosaurs, and the film does not disappoint here, with several locals being turned into Gwangi snacks.

In terms of story, casting and effects, I’d have to rank this below Jason and the Argonauts and Clash of the Titans. Nothing beats Harryhausen’s brilliant adaptation of Greek myth. But if you have kids, they’ll go bananas over this.