Anonymous Rex

Anonymous Rex is about smart dinosaurs living among humans in holographic costumes. They've been living with us for millions of years and are the dragons of legend. The story is about two PIs that track down a rogue dino organization called the voice of progress who is trying to change the world so dinos rule again. The dinos got high on various herbs, even the carnivorous ones. Some of the rogue cult vaporizes tarragon in a club to try and get the dinos to go on a rampage killing humans and exposing themselves so the dinos will need to come out and fight to protect themselves from the scared and angry humans. The directing was good along with the camera work and dialog. Acting was passable and helped keep the story moving. Subplot, one of the dinos daughters was a real human that wanted to be a dino.

Dinosaurs didn't die out. They live among us, in disguise. And some of them are private detectives. That's the premise of Anonymous Rex, written by Joe Menosky and based on the book by Eric Garcia. The show successfully blends fantasy with hard boiled detective drama, moving at a brisk pace from start to finish. I think it works best because of the matter-of-fact tone of it all. The show takes itself seriously enough without becoming a spoof of the PI genre. This a detective show that just happens to include dinosaurs in holographic costumes. With such a fantastic premise, suspension of disbelief takes a little work. But the show pulls it off thanks to some very crisp writing, nifty direction, and excellent performances from the cast. Every actor is spot-on for their character, with some nice performances turned in by Faye Dunaway and Isaac Hayes as members of a dinosaur council. While the two hour movie stands alone, it also sets up what would be a terrific weekly series. Dino For Hire? Sounds like a stretch. But it works, and works surprisingly well.

While watching this film, I kept having flashbacks to a vampire series which played a few years ago, Forever Knight. The similarities were many:

(1) Protagonist PI versus Police Detective (2) Nightclub as meeting place for Dinosaurs / Vampires (3) Protagpmost lives in loft (4) Hiding secret identities (Dinosaur / Vampire) (5) Human let in on secret ("Daughter" / Girlfriend) (6) Secret Society of Violent Elders (Council / Enforcers)

etc.

They both also looked like they were filmed in Toronto, though for Anonymous Rex I have no validation.

I've read the comments prior to mine (7 or 8 as of this writing). I think some folks put a little too much expectation into these things. This is a SciFi channel effort. They don't get many viewers, so they can't charge much for commercials, so they can't pay much to film an original movie. Question: If any of you dissenters think you can do better, then why don't you have a basic cable channel of your own? Answer: You can't do better.

OK, they used cheap, older generation CG effects. Just 20 years ago you'd have been blown away by them. 60 years ago people would've been peeing in their theater seats. Kids that grew up knowing nothing before Terminator 2 are jaded.

Also, remember that the story is a fantasy. If you can buy into a silly story like The Wizard Of Oz, Harry Potter, or Lord Of The Rings, you're loopy enough to buy this too. The difference between great and lesser fantasy movies depends on budget. If Spiderman was made on half a million bucks, it would've been on SciFi too, with all the complaints I've read here tonight.

Anonymous Rex wasn't that bad, as long as you understand where it came from. Hey, if you were ever entertained by an ignorant show like HEE HAW (which had almost 600 episodes!), this movie is an EPIC!

The Sci Fi channel puts out a lot of TV movies... many of them are dreaded crap. After seeing this, however, I was rather surprised. This movie wasn't bad at all.

Summary: Dinosaurs didn't all die out after a huge meteor hit the earth. Humans did take over the world (as we all know) and dinosaurs had to adapt. It's now modern day and dinos use sophisticated disguises to look like people and live secretly among us. A sub-society of these dinos wants to start a conflict with humanity because they think that they shouldn't be living like people and that in the long run they can take over the world for the better. A dino detective guy (the main hero and narrator) who has mixed feeling about this issue investigates stuff, and ultimately makes some pretty grand decisions. (an interesting story, I hear there's a book like this)

Good Things: The story is quite intriguing. The special effects look pretty good, and they are not used often (this is important or it ruins a film). The acting is decent, too. The film is edited incredibly well: The way visuals and sounds are shuffled and put together at times gives the film a real erie/awesome feel (a 'Fight Club' kinda weird I'd say).

Not So Good: There's some loose ends, some implausible stuff (but hey, its a science fiction movie..), and a rather strange ending. Nothing that bad though.

Of course someone is sure to badmouth this movie and call it complete garbage. That's their right... but I invite them to see Sci Fi's 'Raptor Island'. THAT movie, my friends, is the utter crap. It deserves something like a 2 out of 100. Bad story, bad acting, horrid special effects, all around awful. You might not be able to watch it to the end. THEN compare it to this... you'll be amazed. So please don't compare this to The Matrix or Saving Private Ryan: don't forget that it's a TV movie.

So... if you're sitting around at home and you want to see an interesting and entertaining little TV movie, give this a shot. It's one of the few rare Sci Fi movies worth watching.