Slip on your 3-D glasses, boils and ghouls, because we're going to take a quick but "in-depth" look at...
(To view this page in the
proper "three-dimensional" format, you'll need a pair
of 
red-and-blue lensed anaglyphic
glasses. If you don't have a pair, you can order them here
and here and here.)
...is the process by which images, both still and moving, are filmed with red and blue filters to fool the eyes into convincing the brain that they are viewing a flat object as one that has depth--in other words, three-dimensional, or "3-D" for short. Here's an example of anaglyphic 3-D with a "spacey" theme:
In an attempt to combat the
encroachment of television in the early Fifties, the film
industry briefly embraced 3-D as a device to lure patrons from
the little "idiot box" and back into theaters. The
first of these 3-D movies was Arch Obler's Bwana
Devil, an otherwise routine and lackluster
jungle thriller starring a (still) journeyman actor named 
Robert Stack. However, Bwana
Devil did have something extra, something
that would make it a smash hit and usher in a new cinema
craze--3-D. "A Lion In Your Lap! A Lover In Your Arms"
the movie's poster promised. And it certainly delivered on its
promises. Audiences ducked and winced as lances and wild animals
seemed to leap from the movie screen at them.
It wasn't long, of course, before Hollywood latched on to the idea of applying 3-D to movies of all genres--romantic comedies, suspense flicks (Alfred Hitchcock for once jumping in someone else's bandwagon), sex-titillation features (Jane Russell's two enormous talents were just made for 3-D), westerns (John "The Duke" Wayne really filling, even overfilling that big screen) and then, eventually, sci-fi/horror films.
In fact, what many 3-D
aficionados consider the best-rendered 3-D movie was from the
horror genre--House Of Wax,
the Vincent Price vehicle that was a remake of the Fay
Wray-Lionel Atwill early color chiller, Mystery
Of The Wax Museum (1933). The 3-D aspect of
the film is a bit ironic, since the director, Warner Brothers
veteran André
De Toth, was blind
in one eye and couldn't possible "see" the 3-D effect!
But audiences "saw" the new dimension--paddle balls in
the popcorn, chorus girls kicking at viewer's noses, the
terrified heroine chased outside the movie 
screen by the hooded murderer--and they
flocked to see it. House of Wax
(1953) was a big success and led to more horror/sci-fi features
rendered in 3-D...such as It Came From Outer
Space (1953) which featured an alien
spacecraft crashing into the audience's laps!
That loosed an avalanche of 3-D horror/sci-fi movies onto Fifties audiences who happily donned either anaglyphic or stereoscopic (a superior 3-D process that eliminated the use of color "shadows," making it perfect for color films) to view the latest "out-of-screen" experience. The notables among these were the classic gill-man feature Creature From the Black Lagoon (1954); The Mad Magician (1954), also featuring Vincent Price, as a maker of magical illusions who practiced "slay-of-hand"; the cult classic The Mask (1961) which featured some of the weirdest and wildest images ever put on screen during an amazing nightmare sequence (as viewed through the aforementioned mask); ne'er-do-well director Phil Tucker's amusingly awful Robot Monster (1953), the ape-in-a-diving-helmet schlocker whose best special effect was a bubble machine; Cat Women Of The Moon (1954), which had manly earthmen (and an earthwoman) meeting gorgeous gals in a fest of lunar lunacy; and Phantom Of The Rue Morgue (1954), which cast Karl Malden as the namesake Phantom and featured a very young Mike Douglas (yes, that Mike Douglas) in a small supporting role. As can be seen, few of these films were cinematic scream gems, but all had that something-extra--the third dimension.
Unfortunately for lovers of double-lensed flickers, the 3-D craze died quicker than the hula-hoop craze; within a few years, 3-D was seen no more on movie marquees. The fact was, after the initial sensation, audiences became blasé about the process and it no longer lured audiences from their sofas and boob tubes. Unlike "wide-sceen" (Panavision, Cinerama, et al.) another device to entice Fifties couch potatoes, 3-D had no "legs." Despite a quickly concluded "revival" of 3-D movies in the early Eighties (including a rendition of House Of Wax in all of its 3-D glory) climaxed by 1982's Friday The 13th Part 3 in 3-D ("A Knife In Your Guts! A Poker In Your Eye!"), 3-D is basically cinematic history. The formerly 3-D films live on, of course, but only as pale, "flat" versions.
And so it remains today. Aside from the occasional TV revivals and some examples on video (Rhino Video offers The Mask, Cat Women Of The Moon, and Robot Monster in the 3-D format in home video), audiences today don't generally have access today to 3-D films. That's a shame, because 3-D is fun and enhances the viewing pleasure of even schlocky horror films. It's high time someone opened the 3-D crypt and let loose these in-your-face features on the public once again.
(For more 3-D movie history and graphics, artist Phil Gray has updated his fantastic Website collection of Hollywood poster and glamour art with a slew of posters from the 3-D films of the Fifties (and one or two from the Eighties), some of them animated! He has now added a historical prespective (with archive photographs) on 3-D movies here. Renfield borrowed two of his 3-D posters for this article. Many more await your visit to his gallery, Matinee Today. As always, tell him Renfield sent you!)
Contents (c) Joe "Renfield Meadows. "Anaglyphic" Gif and 3-D divider from 3-D Page. 3-D movie posters from Matinee Today.
