Pagan Island

I rented the DVD to get "Fiend of Dope Island", but "Pagan Island" turned out to be more fun.

The best part of the "action" is the plethora of lovely island girls running around topless but covered by numerous huge leis. I can hear Barry Mahon directing them "okay, girls, we don't wanna go too far here, so whenever you move, I want you to hold on to them leis, okay?".

And, darned if they don't.

And what a surprise -- Nani Maka is played by -- Nani Maka!!! What are the odds?

Too cute even if the acting is God awful.

"White man no good" replies one of the thirty (curiously enough, anglo saxon) island sea girls, upon the arrival of a ship wrecked boat boy. And, wouldn't you know it, he falls in love with beautiful Princess Nani Maka only days before she is to be sacraficed to the Angry Sea God. What will Queen Kealoha say? Not much, as most of her horribly read dialouge is from a cue card.

One man alone with thirty native island girls does sound inviting, but this schlock-ridden island safari is for cheesey movie fans only. "White man say I built like small brick house" is one of the many hilarious lines delivered by the island beauties, (handpicked by Betty Page photographer, Bunny Yeager!) which despite a low budget, managed to be scored with gorgeous Les Baxter inspired music.

Pagan Island (1961)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

William Stanton (Edward Dew) is rescued from a lifeboat with a dead body. Once on the ship he talks about how he was on board another ship that went down in the ocean but he managed to wash up on a mysterious island ran by women.

PAGAN ISLAND comes from director Barry Mahon and if you've seen any of his movies then you already know that he messed around in various genres but the one thing they all had in common was the fact that they didn't have much of a budget. I really, really wanted to like this film more than I actually did and it's really too bad that a little more excitement wasn't thrown into this because it should have been much better.

The main reason this movie was made was to show off the island of beautiful women. Yes, that's right, there aren't any uglies on this island but instead they're all beautiful women and once in a while we even get a quick flash of nudity. There were several films that dealt with men landing on a planet/island/any location that was ran by women so story-wise there's nothing new or original here.

At just 58 minutes the film has some entertaining moments but for the most part way too much time is devoted to nothing. I say that because there are countless scenes here that just drag along for no reason other than to build up the running time. Check out the sequence where Stanton slowly loads his gun and we have to slowly watch ever bullet go in. I really wish some of these scenes had been cut down and replaced with a little more action or even a little more nudity.

Edward Dew is shipwrecked on an island populated by topless beauties that pray and sacrifice to a big fish-like sea god. They first want to kill Dew because the "white man is bad." Soon; however, Dew changes their minds by an act of heroism and promises to not make advances toward the one girl promised to the sea god for sacrifice. Naturally, Dew, with a bevy of bra-less beauties abounding, chooses the one girl he can't have and that plot strand begins a quick resolution to his and her problem. Sounds fishy, but true! Pagan Island is one of those so-bad-it's-good movies that really surprised me. The acting is God awful, the action almost non-existent, and the dialog does not get any more inane then in this one. The girls are primarily "white" so it is somewhat odd that such a fuss is made at Dew as he could easily be most of the girls' brother. The top non-acting award must go to Trine Hovelsrud(she is just brimming with Polynesian flair right? Yeah you bet!)as the queen of the island with the worst dialog. She made me wince a time or two, but have no fear as most male viewers will never give their full attention as they are probably trying to see what hangs and sways under all the leis that the girls wear. Maybe that is why I am a little lenient on this film, but it was funny and therefore entertaining, and as an added bonus very short. As for the sea god, the statue looks ridiculous - I wouldn't want to blow the big surprise at the end. I really was surprised with the sea god at the end. The director, producers, and all accountable really went all out with it.

PAGAN ISLAND is another of those castaway stories that tells the classic male fantasy of a shipwreck survivor who finds himself the sole male inhabitants of a desert island populated entirely by women. In this one they're members of a female tribe who were very little apart from loinclothes and garlands of flowers around their necks, leading to near-constant flashes of nudity as the story progresses. The acting is wooden, the narrative meandering in the extreme, content to regurgigate the usual tropes of sacrifice, slavery and racism in an entirely unremarkable tale. FIEND OF DOPE ISLAND, with which this has been paired on DVD, is much stronger narratorially.