Joe

 

 (imdb)

MIGHTY JOE YOUNG-1949-Entrepreneur Max O'Hara (Robert Armstrong) goes to Africa to get wild animals for his new night club. What he finds is Joe, a giant gorilla raised by Jill (Terry Moore). Despite the protestations of big lug cowboy Gregg Johnson (Ben Johnson), O'Hara convinces Jill to bring Joe to America to be exhibited at his club. They're a big hit until 3 drunks (Douglas Fowley & Nestor Paiva are two of them) make him mad and he escapes and destroys the club. The poor ape is sentenced to be shot. A plot is hatched to save Joe leading to a climatic scene at a burning orphanage (tinted red) where Joe saves the lives of two children. 

This is a wonderful little fantasy with meticulous and brilliant stop motion SFX by (among others) Willis O'Brien, Marcel Delgado and Ray Harryhausen. It was directed by Ernest Schoedsack from a story by Merian C. Cooper (the screenplay is by Ruth Rose who also wrote the screenplay for KING KONG which was co-directed by Cooper and Schoedsack without credit!). Many familiar character actors have brief scenes in MIGHTY JOE YOUNG: Regis Toomey, James Flavin (also in KING KONG), Iris Adrian, Bobby Barber, Joe Devlin, Richard Farnsworth (also a stuntman on the film), Dwayne Hickman, Charles Lane, Franks J. Scannell, William Schallert and more. Wrestlers Henry Kulky, Sam Menacker, The Swedish Angel, Man Mountain Dean and Primo Canera also appear,

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Scorpions

 

 (YouTube)

THE BLACK SCORPION-1957-Hank (Richard Denning) and Doc Ramos (Carlos Rivas) investigate a volcano eruption in Mexico. They find a wrecked home, a smashed up police car, a dead police Sgt and a baby. After delivering the baby to a church, the priest tells them of some mysterious deaths and the legend of "the demon bull" that ranchers say kill their cattle. They meet rancher Theresa Alvarez (Mara Corday) after she falls off her horse. They become her guests and try to help out after a giant scorpion attacks. Juanito (Mario Navvaro), a little kid, hangs around acting cute. Dr. Valesco (Carlos Muzquiz) comes to evacuate the city and identifies the creature as a prehistoric scorpion. He says "I beg of you all not to lose your heads...in any sense of the word". Ramos & Hank go down into a huge underground cavern and besides scorpions encounter a giant worm and spider. PITA Juanito hides out with them and almost gets them killed. Dynamite seems to kill prehistoric scorpions but….

Despite it's low budget this movie is saved by the great stop motion SFX by Willis O'Brien and Pete Peterson. Some of it finished, they say, in Peterson's garage due to budget constrictions. The scorpion puppet was created by Wah Chang. Nice climax though I never liked that they killed a character needlessly to make Hank the hero.

 If Warner Brothers had spend some more money on this they would have had a real classic! Director Edward Ludwig began his career making silent short films, went into feature films when sound arrived (WAKE OF THE RED WITCH) and by the time of THE BLACK SCORPION was doing a lot TV. 

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Song of Kong

  (TCM.com)

SON OF KONG-1933-In the aftermath of King Kong's rampage, Carl Denham (Rboert Armstrong) is hiding out in a boarding house trying to avoid process servers. After he meets up again with Capt. Engelhorn (Frank Reicher), they leave NYC and wind up in the Dutch Indies. There they see a show of performing monkeys run by a young woman Hila (Helen Mack) and her father. At night the old man is drinking with a former ship captain Hellstrom (John Marston). The two have a fight and the old man is killed and their place burns down. 

Hellstrom it turns out sold the original map of Skull Island to Denham. He tells the two about another map that leads to a treasure on the island. They set sail and unknown to them Hilda has stowed aboard. Later due to Hellstrom's meddling the crew mutinies. Denham, Engelhorn, Hida and Charlie the cook (Victor Wong) are cast adrift. Hellstrom is thrown over too. They make it to the island but the chief of the natives (returning Noble Johnson) forces them to flee. On another part of the island they find a white haired mini-Kong who's much cuter, friendlier and more helpful than dad. Baby Kong (as he's referred to) fights a dinosaur and a giant bear. The group find a treasure but an earthquake strikes. Hellstrom is eaten by a sea serpent. The island sinks. Poor Kong Jr. drowns saving Denham's life. A ship picks up the survivors and they split the treasure Denham managed to save. 

Released just 9 months after KING KONG this sequel was produced by Ernest Schoedsack (who also directed) and Merian C. Cooper who presented the original. It features more amazing stop motion effects by Willis O'Brien and Harry Redmond Jr (both not credited). The story is more lighthearted than KK but the ending in some ways is much sadder.

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