Two Lost Worlds

This movie is available on video, and I recommend buying it. A problem with the bad movie genre (subgenre? metagenre?) is that it is dominated by science fiction and horror. Well, this movie has elements of both, but it is mainly an adventure film gone horribly wrong. So, it is often overlooked as a source of unintentional laughs. Here's 10 good reasons to see it:

1. Look at the tattoos in the opening and closing title sequence.

2. Is it a historical drama? A pirate adventure? A monster movie? Who knows?

3. Bad narration -- lots of it! Could be missing pieces of soundtrack.

4. James Aurness (sic) -- He was more expressive as the carrot in "The Thing"

5. Bill Kennedy -- the grouchy costar was later a popular TV movie host in the Detroit area -- a special Michigan connection

6. Fight montage sequence -- there must be stuff from 10 movies in here!

7. You know, you can MOVE that camera! But this cinematographer obviously wasn't aware -- he just turned the camera on, and people walked in and out of the shot. Guess he was in the can a lot.

8. The monsters fight each other, but pose no threat to the humans. They should get guest star billing!

9. If you can tell the two lead women apart, you're doing better than me.

10. Last but not least -- the finale features the world's most powerful handheld telescope as a side-splitting topper.

I've said enough -- and last but not least -- it's SHORT! The best quality a bad movie can have. This one's a winner, folks.

Soon after America gained its independence, a new-fangled clipper sets sail from Boston to the East Indies. Attacked by pirates off the Hebrides, the ship's builder, James Arness, is wounded, and landed to recover at the ship's next port of call, in Australia. There he falls in love with Elaine Jeffries, and she with him. She is due to be engaged to Bill Kennedy, who scowls at the thought. However, other things are going on, particularly pirates. Arness is commissioned to build a ship to clear the sea of pirates. On its maiden voyage, with Miss Jeffries, her kid sister Gloria Petroff, and Kennedy, they run into a pirate ship and give battle. Both ships are sunk, but our main players escape by raft to a small island with dinosaurs from One Million B. C.

If, like me, you gave up hope of any of this making sense at the second sentence, be reassured! Dan Riss narrates about a third of the movie, and whoever wrote his lines never saw a noun that didn't need at least two adjectives and a dependent clause. The battle scenes with the second pirate ship are nicely shot by DP Harry Neumann. Arness and Miss Jeffries changed their names after appearing in this. With Pierre Watkins, Fred Kohler Jr. And Hank Mann.

Two Lost Worlds and I only counted one of them is a cheap knockoff of a film with stock footage from One Million BC and Captain Caution thrown together fill out a film where a Yankee sailor finds love and romance and dinosaurs and volcanoes and kangaroos in one sixty minute film. If you like all those things you got your money's worth.

This low budget independent casts James Arness in the lead as the Yankee sailor who after a firefight with some pirates in the New Hebrides island is dropped off in Queensland in Australia to recover from wounds. Where he falls in love with Laura Elliot who is engaged to rancher Bill Kennedy. That's your romance.

But the pirates aren't done yet, they capture Elliot and her little sister as hostages after a raid and Arness and Kennedy lead a rescue attempt. After another pirate firefight they get stranded on a volcanic island with some dinosaurs. I think you can figure the rest out.

I saw this when I was about 8 years old on Million Dollar Movie in New York. I thought it was hot stuff then, but my ardor for this film has considerably cooled. It's half romance novel, half science fiction and not done well in either department. And absolutely no one talks like they're from Australia.

Two Lost Worlds is one of those movies that I remember seeing as a very young child...well, at least I remembered one part of the movie, not knowing which one it was from. The scene where the cavegirl is caught in the lava flow was one of those pivotal images with me for some unknown reason. The scene was also repeated (I'm not sure if it was the exact same shot, but it could have been) in Valley of the Dragons.

While this movie has special effects and "dinosaurs" (lizards in make-up), it is very hard to classify this as a real science fiction movie, even under the very un-demanding criteria of the time. For the most part, this movie is a pirate-style adventure. James Arness is as stoic as ever in it, and there isn't much else to really recommend the film.

My research indicates that TWO LOST WORLDS is made up of two episodes of an un-aired T.V. series. Perhaps the producers of this T.V. series thought these pilot episodes were so spiffy that they decided to edit them into a feature film and release it to theaters. Perhaps not. It is more likely the series just did not sell. This explains the films bifurcated structure. The dinosaur sequences come from that often mined film ONE MILLION B.C.

Other films made from unsold T.V. shows include PROJECT MOON BASE; JUNGLE HELL; TARZAN AND THE TRAPPERS; and INVISIBLE AVENGER. I'm sure there are a least a dozen more examples of films made from unsold pilots that could be found.