Slurpasaur
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Slurpasaur (or Slurposaur) is a nickname given to optically enlarged lizards that are presented as dinosaurs in motion pictures.
In spite of the pioneering work of Willis O'Brien and others in making stop-motion animated dinosaurs since the early days of cinema, producers have used optically enlarged lizards (often with horns and fins glued on) to represent dinosaurs to cut costs as, it was felt, the public saw dinosaurs as being simply giant lizards. The first major use of the 'slurpasaur' was in One Million B.C. (1940) and, indeed, the special effects in this film were re-used often (in, for example, the 1955 movie King Dinosaur).
Other notable films with 'slurpasaurs' include Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Lost World (1960). The latter is notable for a 'dinosaur battle' wherein a monitor lizard and a young crocodile fight each other for real. The former is a rare example of lizards actually being convincing in their role- the lizards are supposed to be Dimetrodons and actually look superficially similar to those creatures.
The public eventually became too sophisticated to accept 'slurpasaurs' as convincing dinosaurs a factor which (together with the obvious animal cruelty aspect) led to their disappearance from the special effects arsenal.
