Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon.
***
I can't help feeling the dead ones got the better end of that deal.
But why am I talking about this?
And why?
It's because as I sit here, typing this deathless prose, The Lost World is on my television. Not one of the fancy modern films of that name but the real one. The 1960s one. The one that was made by Irwin (Lost in Space) Allen.
And what a nightmare experience it is, as Professor Challenger and his team encounter harmless lizard after harmless lizard and try to pretend they're scared of them while unseen stage-hands push them off cliffs.
But not every dinosaur movie's been as convincing as that.
And all this terror's demanded of me one thing.
Which is that I ask you what are your favourite dinosaur movies?
Perhaps you love 1914's cartoon Gertie the Dinosaur which I believe to feature the first-ever dinosaur depicted on celluloid. Perhaps you love the original King Kong which does, after all, feature prehistoric beasties. Perhaps it's The Land that Time Forgot that floats your boat. Or even Journey to the Centre of the Earth.
For me, I wish I could claim it's a close contest but, despite my love for The Valley of Gwangi and One Million Years BC, I have to go for Jurassic Park, that tale of what happens when you let the wrong Attenborough brother get involved with wildlife.
You, however, may have other opinions. And they're opinions you're free to express in the comments section below.
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19 comments:
I have a soft spot for The Land The Time Forgot. I saw it - on a Moviola! - when I was a very little kid, and I had the original poster on my wall (my Dad worked for EMI films).
I remember having a dream before I’d ever been to see a film where I walked into a ‘cinema’ (which was a local cafe) and all the events of the film were happening at once on the wall like they are on the poster, and my dream-self said ‘that’s what a film is!’.
I haven’t seen it in decades though, but I saw a bit of ‘At The Earth’s Core’ recently and that was terrible, so I’m scared to go back to LTTF. Love the big, bulky-headed T-Rexes though.
I can’t go with Jurassic Park - I love the T-Rex attack, it’s one of the best action scenes of all time. But the rest of the film is so weak and lifeless that I find it hard to watch.
The sequel gets dissed as a matter of course, but on a dinosaur-by-dinosaur, action scene-by-action scene, likeable cast member-by-cast member basis I actually prefer it.
At least it doesn’t trade almost wholly on a phony sense of wonder.
Can I pretend Cloverfield is about a rampaging dinosaur and go with that?
Don't do it Matthew - nothing good can come from going back to 'The Land That Time Forgot'. I did that with the second Peter Cushing Dalek flick that made an impression on me in the cinema as a little scrote. Big mistake.
Got to agree with you on 'Jurassic Park'. And if we're going to rave about a film just for the level of achievement, then I'd opt for Gertie the Dinosaur. Winsor McCay was a bit of a genius... but even so, it doesn't really hold up 108 years later, I don't think (unlike his comic strips).
Steve, the best is 'One Million Years BC' for me - you can't go wrong with dinosaurs AND Raquel Welch in a loin cloth bikini.
And the runner up is 'Tammy & the T-Rex' -
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dY-kACvfgc
-sean
*To be clear, I meant "level of technical achievement" above.
-sean
It has to be Journey to the Centre of the Earth with James Mason. Fantastic film.
I think my favourite is 'The Valley Of Gwangi' but I have a soft spot for 'When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth' because that was the first film I ever saw at the cinema when I was 7.
Sean, oh my brother, while we seldom agree on topics, our mutual appreciation of Rachael Welch in a furry bikini just may be the sign of the coming apocalypse. That poster of her's adorned my walls before Farrah's ended up on my bedroom closet door.
Doug McClure rules. I can watch any movie that guy's in. In my video library I have every film you folks have mentioned
Wacky as it maybe, Steve, VALLEY OF GWANGI is in my "western section". Love that flick. Genre crossing like that was ahead if it's time.
No one did stop-motion animation like Harryhausen. I prefer that to most of the CGI
today.
Didn't see DINOSAURUS mentioned, though. Mining company explodes offshore from an island, and surfaces a T-Rex, brontosaurus, and a caveman. Alot of the scenes with the caveman are a comedic howl.
-Killdumpster
Yeah, but Pat Boone almost cancels out the coolness of Mason. At least on DVD you c
Meant to say: on DVD you can fast-foward threw his stupid song.
Think I remember reading that after the Hammer dinosaur films the actors in those had a large dose of a divorce pandemic going on, due to quite a bit of promiscuity going on. Maybe beset by the skimpy costumes? Lol.
-Killdumpster
I agree, K.D., Doug Maclure performed his leading man duties with grace and aplomb.
It's hard to share a scene with a pterodactyl, but he pulled it off.
Anybody remember a made-for-T.V. movie called The Last Dinosaur?
Cheesy as heck, but it featured the great Richard Boone as some old grizzled big game hunter looking to take down a Tyrannosaur in Antartica (The warm area, where the dinosaurs are).
Helluva way for a great actor to finish his career, but he clearly upstaged that guy in a big rubber T-Rex suit he was chasing around.
On another note, I didn't much like Jurassic Park. Have you ever noticed, in that movie, all the ordinary-looking or, let's face it, ugly people get eaten, while the good-looking people survive? Including the two adorable kids?
There's something is vaguely fascist about that, I believe.
Does that mean if I get stuck on Dinosaur Island, my ass is gonna automatically get ate?
And why do they still keep going back there, after the first film?
I won't even go back to New Jersey.
M.P.
Steve, as you know I'm not normally one for going off topic in the comments, but I just came across a piece in today's 'paper' that I thought might interest some round these parts, about the Sheffield geezer who had a studio in his front room back in the 70s and recorded artists like the early ABC, The Future (Human League/Heaven 17) and er, the Doncaster Wheatsheaf Girls' Choir.
The Joe Meek of South Yorkshire if you will...
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/27/studio-electrophonique-the-sheffield-council-house-that-became-a-pioneer-of-rock-recording
-sean
Thanks for that link, Sean. I must confess to having previously been unaware of Ken and his studio.
And thanks for the Tammy and the T-Rex trailer. That looks to be Denise Richards' best-ever film.
MP, I'm afraid I've never seen that Richard Boone movie.
KD, I was tempted to use a still from Dinosaurus as the main image for this post but decided, instead, to go with one from Doctor Who.
Colin, The Valley of Gwangi is indeed great.
FFf, I too love Journey to the Centre of the Earth. I would say the dimetrodons are my favourite part of it.
Matthew, I still love At the Earth's Core. The passing decades have failed to dull its magnificence.
MP-
Yeah, poor Doug had to share a scene with a pterodactyl THAT DIDN'T FLAP IT'S WINGS ONCE FLYING CLOSE TO GROUND & CARRYING A CAVE MAN AWAY!!!
While the film is alot of fun, that scene is so bogus. A few years ago it was televised, and my pal had never seen it. We laughed our asses off when that came on.
-Killdumpster
Steve, there's no reason on God's Green Earth for you to ever spend a second of your life watching that movie.
Too late for me, though.
M.P.
...on another note, my vote for a truly great dinosaur movie was Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong. Classic T-Rex scene.
Now, was Naomi Watt's character worth a bunch of guys going into the jungle to rescue her, and most of them getting horribly eaten? Like twenty of 'em? For one person?
Well, in my mind the math don't add up, but otherwise you wouldn't have a movie.
...Now if Kate Bush had been grabbed and carried off by Kong, maybe it would have been worth it.
M.P.
First saw "Journey to the Center of the Earth " as a kid, and totally loved it! Especially the giant reptiles. I also was enthralled by the then- current Saturday morning cartoon version.
But for my favorite, I must swim against the tide today. "Jurassic Park" tops my list. When the Michael Crichton book came out I read it voraciously, getting a similar rush to the one I got from Peter Benchley's "Jaws". So when the film version followed, I was greatly anticipating it. I wasn't disappointed. I particularly was pleased with the more energetic portrayal of the dinosaurs, in line with the newer thinking from paleontologists. Much as I loved the older film dinosaur appearances, there was something a bit disappointing about seeing them sluggishly plodding along , dragging their tails on the ground. JP showed those ancient creatures REALLY LIVING! Now that was a T-Rex who inspired awe...
Red, I didn't know there was a cartoon version of Journey to the Centre of the Earth. I shall have to see if I can find an episode on YouTube.
I do remember a mid-1970s cartoon called Valley of the Dinosaurs. I can't remember if it was any good but I enjoyed it at the time.
Steve- the "Journey " cartoon aired on the ABC network in 1967-68. It was from Filmation studios, and featured voice overs by Ted Knight. At the time, it ranked among my favorites, alongside Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four (which both also aired on that same network).
And I too enjoyed "Valley of the Dinosaurs ". Much more than the concurrent "Land of the Lost", which was live action. Give me animation every time!
Thanks, Red. :)
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