Wednesday, July 6, 2011

T-Rex: A Dinosaur in Hollywood (TV 2005)

picked this fun little doc up at Target for $5, and it's about worth that price. 

it's definitely not a serious documentary, but there's some good stuff on it, and they talk to both Donald F. Glut and Ray Harryhausen which means they had an idea about getting good information out there.


it's a look at the discovery of tyrannosaurus rex at Hell Creek MT in 1905 to his "stardom" in the movies.  he's sort of treated like a real actor, which is an interesting take.  however, there are some serious stretches of the imagination to make some of the cinematic theropods into t rex, the most egregious of them in calling Gwangi (of The Valley of Gwangi (1969) a t rex. 
Don and Ray both speak of the movie, and I know that they know better than to call an allosaurus a completely different animal.  I've never heard of Gwangi being a t rex, but it seems to be what some people think these days.  of course, some people think the t rex in King Kong (1933) was an allosaurus as well. so go figure.

and Bob Bakker misnames the movie (common mistake, "The Valley of THE Gwangi") and he should also know better.

anyway, it's a fun for what it is, and there is some stop-motion shown.  that alone almost makes up for leaving out Godzilla...

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