Danger Island

I first watched this movie back in 1998, in a late night slot on the UK's Channel 5. I had never heard of the movie or read about it and just happened to start watching it. In the first few minutes, I assumed it would be a romantic drama on a tropical island. Swiss Family Robinson meets Blue Lagoon, maybe? Oh, how I was wrong.

After they arrive safely upon the island we get the view from under the water and the eerie music comes on. So its not a modern day Swiss Family Robinson after all. More like Demon Seed. I become even more intrigued in to what mysteries the island possesses, with references to the mutated fruit, 'fish like people' and hallucinations that Vic (Graham) has. I had to keep watching this movie, even though some of the acting was cringe worthy.

In to the latter part of the movie when they move in to the ''Habitat'', the group start to discover what truths there are behind the islands military past. A lot of the action takes place around this part of the movie, some it quite entertaining and exiting. When it came to an end I was shocked, I wanted more. Looking back though, there are painful reminders that Danger Island was not meant to end like this, but made to pave the way for a TV series, which never took off unfortunately (unless you can count Lost).

A good and entertaining film, with a relatively unknown cast and poor scripting, but good acting from Gary Graham and June Lockhart. In all though very intriguing characters and all work well together as a group. Would have been great to found out the answers that were never given especially if they were ever rescued. Oh well, a worthy 7/10

When this TV movie made its debut, the trailer (and the montage behind the end credits) made a lot of Kathy Ireland's appearance in a swimsuit. Enough said. (That, and the fact that early on she can't believe someone tells her and other models to "Make those bikinis sing!" If even the characters in the film can't believe their dialogue...)

When I watched the NBC airing of DANGER ISLAND, I was fascinated by what a well-stocked premise the show had. First, a well-hidden lush jungle island. Add a local mysterious (but not evil, no matter what the earlier poster thought) tribe. And finally, the mysterious government black op, "Project Naomi", a well-stocked laboratory apparently handling a disturbingly wide variety of experiments. Which caused any number of mutants and mutagens to be released to roam the island.

Heck, as a former role playing game designer, I was envious I had not come up with such a setting. It would make a heck of an RPG!

The characters covered a wide variety of types, including apparently an ex-CIA type who knew about Project Naomi.... And a hero who, upon being exposed to a mysterious mutagen, is starting to become something other than human....

Man, I would love to see the writers' guidelines for this series!

The basic format of DANGER ISLAND has been revisited by two other TV series.

The mid-90s syndicated series PETER BENCHLEY'S AMAZON had an airliner crash in the remote jungle, stranding a few dozen passengers in an unexplored valley filled with mysterious threats..... And in fall 2004, ABC brings us LOST. An airline crash on a mysterious uncharted island filled with mysterious threats......

Postscript, January 2005-- It's funny watching LOST and DANGER ISLAND and seeing some of the same photogenic areas being used by the two similar shows a decade apart. LOST is definitely the better written show but still, it would have been nice for DANGER ISLAND to have had a better chance!

POST-postscript, January 2006-- A year later and it looks even more like DANGER ISLAND was a parallel world counterpart to LOST. Especially now that we know DI's "Project Naomi" has a counterpart in LOST's "Dharma Institute."

Its a fairly decent film,the script isn't that bad,and for being a TV film had some very atmospheric moments,given the way it ends obviously they were aiming for a TV series but i really had to laugh when i read the trivia page "a pilot for a series never made" because whoever made this should be suing the makers of "Lost" big time.. There are so many comparisons between them that to list them all should take pages JJ Abrams Damon Lindelof and co should be shamed of themselves for so blatantly ripping off "Danger Island" without giving either the director Tommy Lee Wallace or the writer William Bleich any credit ...not even a little nod in their direction in any interviews.. Lost is the better show its written better and the cast is better but i just wish they had been a bit more honest about how they came up with the idea for Lost

I agree with the comments made by other users, but have to disagree with the trivia section..

This film did become a very successful TV series, however they changed the name from "Danger Island" to "Lost" and just spent a bit more money on the special effects (and threw in the odd polar bear..) :-)

Here in the UK this film is either shown at 3pm or 3am (which should tell you a lot!) Very much like the ATeam in its production values and storyline, so if you used to enjoy the Ateam in the 80's, you will find this film a very easy watch for a couple of hours on a rainy afternoon.

Having just seen the film again (seen it a few times now over the years) I think it would make the basis of a very good computer game. (everything seems to be level based - probably due to the limited budget)

It also has the Human from the "Alien Nation" TV series in it (Gary Graham - most recently seen as Vulcan Ambassador Soval in "Enterprise"), and also one of the very first uses of computer generated "morphing".