‘A Deeper Look:  Hollywood’s First 3-D Wave, 1953-1954’
Film Forum
August 6-November 16

Thrill-seekers who have lost sleep wondering what it might feel like to be poked in the eyes by Moe Howard of Three Stooges fame can now have that privilege or, rather, something like it. As part of the series “A Deeper Look: Hollywood’s First 3-D Wave, 1953-1954,” Film Forum will be showing “Spooks,” a short subject starring the Stooges in which Moe, at about the three-and-a-half-minute mark, faces the camera and lets loose with his patented two-finger provocation. Shemp is the ostensible target of Moe’s ire, but given the addition of 3-D, it’s the audience in the theater that recoils.

Just in time for the doldrums of August, Film Forum has seen fit to honor the 70th anniversary of stereoscopic movies, or, rather, Hollywood’s embrace of them. 

In one form or another, 3-D had existed since the early 19th century. Various brainy types, among them Joseph Plateau and William Friese-Green, created not only the illusion of movement using illustrations and photographs, but dimensionality of form. The means of doing so for mass consumption proved unwieldy and impractical until the early 1950s. At that point, innovations in technology — including the rickety cardboard glasses with the red and blue lenses — became more accessible, resulting in the so-called golden age.

The film that ushered it in was “Bwana Devil,” a jungle adventure that promised “The Miracle of the Age!!! A LION in your lap! A LOVER in your arms!” Critical opprobrium didn’t stem the film’s popularity. Studios took notice of how the novelty of 3-D went some way in redeeming so-so material. Or was it that the new technology hampered cinematic vision? 

It’s worth mentioning that while significant directors worked with the new process — among them, William Cameron Menzies, Douglas Sirk, and Alfred Hitchcock — the results can hardly be classified as their best efforts. The irony is that two of the better films, “House of Wax” and “Gun Fury,” were directed by filmmakers with one eye. Neither André de Toth or Raoul Walsh could fully experience their efforts in 3-D.

Among those who have helped put “A Deeper Look” into shape are the founder and CEO of the 3-D Film Archive, Robert Furmanek, and author Mike Ballew, whose book “Close Enough To Touch: 3-D Comes to Hollywood” is the go-to resource for the subject. 

The series at Film Forum is a distinct pot pourri. From “Kiss Me Kate” to “Creature From the Black Lagoon” and “Dial ‘M’ for Murder” to Casper the Friendly Ghost, there’s hardly a genre that isn’t represented. Close to 50 3-D films were produced between 1953 to 1954, a fad that came to an end with the arrival of Cinemascope. Dimensionality was sacrificed for scale. It seems an equitable trade-off.

The primary focus of “A Deeper Look” is a restored version of “Robot Monster” (1953), a 61-minute opus that has long vied for the distinction of the worst film ever made. Donning the telltale glasses can only improve this jerry-rigged tale of post-apocalyptic woe. The story is that the last six people on earth, huddled away in the hills of California, have to contend with Ro-Man, an alien famously consisting of a gorilla suit topped off with a diving helmet. His secret weapon is a gizmo that looks to be a reel-to-reel tape deck cross-pollinated with a bubble machine. 

The dialogue is stilted; the action nonexistent. Ro-Man spends a majority of his time waddling back-and-forth from his command center in a shallow cave in Bronson Park to a dilapidated piece of real estate a stone’s throw from Dodger Stadium. Kitsch like this can best be appreciated while seated among a sympatico audience — where, I am informed, it plays like gangbusters.

Otherwise, the pleasures of “Robot Monster” are bleak, though I have to admit laughing out loud at the scene in which Ro-Man is just too darned harried by his boss to kill off the adorable Claudia Barrett. The restoration of this dubious cinematic artifact is a fan’s endeavor and so, too, is “A Deeper Look.” It should be fun.