DINOSAUR ISLAND (1994)
Directed by low budget schlockmeisters Fred Olen Ray and Jim Wynorski.
Produced by Roger Corman.
Stars Michelle Bauer (and lots of other people who aren't as mammarable).
*Some Jurassic spoilers below - like you care about the plot anyway!*
They are absolutely right - triceratops is a very jerky and fairly rubbish prop. T-Rex though, the lifesize version, actually looks like a fun kind of prop to play with - especially when its teeth sink fairly convincingly (for a latex lifesize dinosaur that's even better than the one in the British Museum) into an actress's arm as she pretends, also fairly convincingly, to scream. Actually - really convincingly scream (possibly because the stunt prop does seem to bite down on her arm a little too hard - ouch!). Well, props that size are hard to control - "sorry love, no time for lawyers, it's a wrap!"
All this talk of 'stop motion' versions of monsters as opposed to the 'life-sized prop' versions of the same sort is getting a bit confusing. But then - you should see the movie. It's a whole bit more than a bit confusing all the way through.There was a bit of romance between one wisecracking soldier (on his way to a court-martial but being spared from that due to the shipwreck and dinosaurs problem along the way) and a cavegirl without a bikini. But the larger proportioned soldier geek gets the hottest cavegirl - a quite show-stopping Michelle Bauer, veteran of movies such as this. The wisecracking one gets to have the longest sex scene while the geeky one gets to fondle Michelle Bauer's boobs. Citizen Kane this ain't!
Shipwrecked soldiers on a tropical island find big-bosomed bikini-clad cavegirls who give ugly fat men (and I mean that in a 'spirit the movie was made in' kind of way) a chance to find love and be 'real men' by defeating stop motion dinosaurs until the final few reels when they fight the much more fun fibreglass-moulded 'saurs - and a small baby T-Rex puppet that giggles non-stop at them.
This is a film that starts off "SERIOUSLY?", goes a little bit more "SERIOUSLY? - WOAH!!" and ends up finishing on "OMG - I FRICKIN' LOVE THIS (NEW FAVOURITE CULT MOVIE THAT I'VE FOUND)!" - perhaps by sucking the viewer up into the film's same weird wavelength. Or because - if a film starts off dire, there's probably no way to go but up.
The 'actual-sized' T-Rex (actually more like T-Rex's mini-me) is rather good (actually - really good!) I want one in my bedroom. It's the same Mr T. Rex that appears in Corman's Jurassic Park rip-off; Carnosaur (1993). It also appeared in the Tom Hanks movie The Da Vinci code. OK, lied about the last one!
The movie does come stacked with lots of funny, self-aware lines, such as (upon standing beside a giant dino egg), one soldier commenting: "My God! Think of the cholesterol". Other lines have the potential to dangle in mid-air like a pterodactyl on a broken wire, or scratch your head, depending on how many beers you've cracked. As the film goes on, the actors seem to realise that the film should be played for outright laughs (either real or non-existent) and not pretend to be taking any of this too seriously. The film relaxes - and is all the better for it! "Let's have some fun in the sun with rubbery Rex (little hands - but you should see that boy's 'feet'!) and sunbathe between takes - hey: it's a living!" the male actors playing the soldiers all scream (equality not reaching the stone age just yet). Probably. Or perhaps they just get happier when the nubile cavegirls walk on set. Who can blame them? They probably thought they were going to have to spend the rest of the movie acting opposite wobbly dinosaurs (and I don't just mean the boom guy!). Yes sir-ee, I bet there were some fun after-filming parties on this one: the cast definitely look a lot less sober by the end!
There's a standout fun bit: a monster in the cave that gets pushed ferociously (and I use the term loosely) at the cast - on shaky supermarket trolley wheels, or so it seems. It's also shaped like one of those jelly wobbly monsters you could place on your fingers as a kid and waggle them around to make the wibbly arms wave. The cave monster - dammit - is brilliant! It only has a few minutes of screen time, and personally I thought its role could have been extended. Perhaps to become an ally. Perhaps to write, star and direct the whole thing (or replace the boom guy poking everyone with his fluffer)! It was cute, and not 'stop motion' which is good - more likely made up of something that the props department probably found behind the bike sheds or in the cave, left there by the previous film crew working on the 1953 classic, Robot Monster (in which a robot monster is actually a man in a gorilla suit wearing a diver's helmet and being followed around by a bubble blowing machine - fact!).
Robot Monster has a triceratops in it too, just like Dinosaur Island has one. (Hey - what do you mean that's a plot spoiler? Go check the title of this baby!). I think the triceratops in Dinosaur Island is called 'The Great One' for most of the movie, until halfway through (turn away now if you don't want a really big spoiler!) when the film-makers decide that 'T-Rex' is a better 'Great One' than triceratops (and knows how to party without throwing up over the film reel) so they kill him off (I say him . . ). Triceratops shall now forever be known as: 'Not Actually The Great One', or something.
They are absolutely right - triceratops is a very jerky and fairly rubbish prop. T-Rex though, the lifesize version, actually looks like a fun kind of prop to play with - especially when its teeth sink fairly convincingly (for a latex lifesize dinosaur that's even better than the one in the British Museum) into an actress's arm as she pretends, also fairly convincingly, to scream. Actually - really convincingly scream (possibly because the stunt prop does seem to bite down on her arm a little too hard - ouch!). Well, props that size are hard to control - "sorry love, no time for lawyers, it's a wrap!"
All this talk of 'stop motion' versions of monsters as opposed to the 'life-sized prop' versions of the same sort is getting a bit confusing. But then - you should see the movie. It's a whole bit more than a bit confusing all the way through.There was a bit of romance between one wisecracking soldier (on his way to a court-martial but being spared from that due to the shipwreck and dinosaurs problem along the way) and a cavegirl without a bikini. But the larger proportioned soldier geek gets the hottest cavegirl - a quite show-stopping Michelle Bauer, veteran of movies such as this. The wisecracking one gets to have the longest sex scene while the geeky one gets to fondle Michelle Bauer's boobs. Citizen Kane this ain't!
If you take the film as something you might dream about after picking mushrooms in a field wearing a blindfold, cooking them up, and eating them, only to find yourself in wibble wobble land with stop motion, slightly camp, dinosaurs or real life sized dinosaurs straight out of a nearby dinosaur theme park in some state of decline - then you will love this movie even more as a result, I'd venture. There's also a giant (wait for it!) pterodactyl (oh yeah!) that the soldiers try to capture to take back to bikini cavegirl camp, only to miss when throwing the net (which doesn't seem to work on stop motion puppets as much as it would on a real pterodactyl). It just sort of vanishes into the back projection. Instead they capture a couple of local turtles to dish up to the girls. "Do you like the pterodactyl meat?" asks smartass soldier guy, as he joins the ladies at dinner. "It tastes a bit odd" replies cavegirl, "and tastes like turtle." Brilliant!
Near the end of the movie a baby T-Rex (or possibly just big T-Rex shot out of scale) leans over rocks and giggles at the copulating soldiers, before running off into the bushes, still giggling. It's not clear why this creature is in the movie, except it could just be Roger Corman himself making a cameo and admiring his executive produced work. Or a critic sneaking around the set. But if nothing else about this movie is worth your time, this bit is!
At the end of the movie, the closing shot is of baby dino giggling. Yep, instead of getting another angry dino out for last minute revenge . . we get Mr Giggles. That pretty much puts the stoppers on a sequel. But, you can laugh all you like at the 'sillidity' of all this, but I promise you that, by the end credits, maybe the end of the night, maybe a few weeks or a few years later - this film is the kind of 'potentially bad, but officially great' movie you will (if not outright fall in love with) always remember. And even if you do forget this movie one day, you will still never - ever! - be able to wipe from your memory the sight of Mr Giggles laughing from behind a tree at all the crazy shit that's happening on his beach. Maybe, just maybe, he's behind a tree in your garden now, or hiding behind the counter at your local corner shop, or sleeping under your bed - waiting to pop out for no real reason and laugh in your face!
To sum up: Any movie that has a soldier facing a scantily clad cavegirl, her jaw dropping, as the soldier gets ready to 'make out' with the aforementioned cavegirl commenting "It's the great one . ." as she spots the big dinosaur behind the man's back, only for the soldier to reply: "I haven't even got it out yet" - kind of deserves a bit of love in return. It's not politically correct, that's for sure. And you half expect a Barbara Windsor giggle and a quick "Cheeky!" to come out after that last line. But no - you get the giggling baby T-Rex we know all know and love now as Mr Giggles. And that is why this film does not need to be politically correct; it transcends all such concerns and motivations. It's about dinosaurs, that giggle, and actually bite the cast in the leg, for real. If you want to get offended, go and whip up a storm about films like Salon Kitty (the one about giant cats . . on an island) or Gaspar Noe's Love (soppier than a wet Kleenex and sweeter than Richard Gere). But don't pick on Dinosaur Island people!
The end credits get to actually credit . . well: just about everyone (including veteran actor David Carradine, who it seems allowed the cavegirl ranch to be built on a bit of his actual ranch - sounds a fair deal to me!). Jim Wynorski, co-director of Dinosaur Island also gave us The Hills Have Thighs, The Da Vinci Coed, and Ghoulies IV. That last sentence tells you just about all you need to know and perhaps should have been the one-line review needed for Dinosaur Island, instead of all the rest I just came out with.
My first Wynorski purchase was also his first: 1985's The Lost Empire. I think it was a lot like Dinosaur Island, just made a decade earlier. Some of his more recent films, including the 'Doggone' series ('Christmas' and 'Hollywood') have been family friendly and wildly popular - take that doubters! He also made a film version of Forrest J. Ackerman's Vampirella (1996) which even Hammer Films didn't get to make happen and gave Traci Lords one of her finest and first, err . . , err . . , mainstream roles (outside of the cinema top shelf) in the classic sci-fi-ploitation Not Of This Earth (1988). Mr Wynorski was also the man behind the Wes Craven Swamp Thing (1982) follow-up: The Return Of Swamp Thing (1989).
It's good to know that the film world has directors like Wynsorski in it; this man is officially a living legend of cult exploitation movies and always seems a great guy to boot (not literally boot - !) if only to put a rubber spanner in the works and annoy 98% of film audiences and critics alike. Because he who laughs silliest, laughs last (just ask Mr Giggles).
My first Wynorski purchase was also his first: 1985's The Lost Empire. I think it was a lot like Dinosaur Island, just made a decade earlier. Some of his more recent films, including the 'Doggone' series ('Christmas' and 'Hollywood') have been family friendly and wildly popular - take that doubters! He also made a film version of Forrest J. Ackerman's Vampirella (1996) which even Hammer Films didn't get to make happen and gave Traci Lords one of her finest and first, err . . , err . . , mainstream roles (outside of the cinema top shelf) in the classic sci-fi-ploitation Not Of This Earth (1988). Mr Wynorski was also the man behind the Wes Craven Swamp Thing (1982) follow-up: The Return Of Swamp Thing (1989).
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| TRACI LORDS IS 'NOT OF THIS EARTH'! |
It's good to know that the film world has directors like Wynsorski in it; this man is officially a living legend of cult exploitation movies and always seems a great guy to boot (not literally boot - !) if only to put a rubber spanner in the works and annoy 98% of film audiences and critics alike. Because he who laughs silliest, laughs last (just ask Mr Giggles).
words: mark gordon palmer
markgordonpalmer@aol.com
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