A Ilha dos Monstros

Successful adventurer Matt Farrell (John Ashley) is kidnapped whilst on a dive by sadistic hunter Steinman (Jan Merlin), who takes him to a mysterious island dominated by the insane Dr. Gordon (Charles Macaulay). Gordon has been doing experiments on the native locals and cross-bred them with certain animals in an attempt to create a great army, and sees Farrell as a suitable addition to his grisly bunch. After escaping with Gordon's daughter Neva (Pat Woodell) and all the human-animal hybrids, Steinman pursues them in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse.

As far as re-makes/re-imaginings of the hugely influential Island of Lost Souls (1932) go, The Twilight People certainly isn't the worst. Choked with massive budget limitations that naturally leads to terrible acting and worse make-up, this Grindhouse effort certainly has it's charms. It is, of course, f*****g awful, but there is a bit of spirit amongst the cast, and plenty of laugh-at-the-s**t-make-up moments. The creatures, which include an Antelope Man, an Ape Man, a Wolf Woman, and most hilariously, a Bat Man, are so ridiculous looking that I could scarcely believe that the actors behind them managed to keep a straight face throughout the film. It does, however, have Pam Grier as the Panther Woman (made famous by Kathleen Burke from the 1932 original), and seeing her rip her way through a number of Gordon's henchman is certainly worth your time.

But the on-the-run second half of the film repeatedly stalls and ultimately bores, as the film seems to be wind down the proceedings in order to sustain an acceptable running time. It is also quite tame as far as low-budget monster movies go, but I have to admit that it added to it's almost innocent charm. The ending, which doesn't really wrap anything up, ends abruptly when I was expecting and almost hoping for five minutes more. To summarise then, certainly worth a watch if you like your movies trashy, cheap, and easy to watch, but a meandering and ridiculous film overall. Though I would recommend a watch simply for the Bat Man, paper wings and all.

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In case you haven't gotten your fill of bad "Island Of Lost Soul" remakes, there is this beauty. Producer writer John Ashley, a long way from Frankie, Annette, and the rest of the gang, is the hero who is kidnapped and taken to an Island where a mad doctor does mutation experiments; with a little "most dangerous game" rip off thrown in.

This must have been enough to make him miss Eric Von Zipper. Pat Codell, from Pennycoat Junction, shows some real charm in rolling with the punches, the poor thing quit the biz soon afterwards. And you get an early appearance of Pam Grier, and a flying batman livens things up a bit. Mostly however, this is for hard core bad movie fans only.

B movie perennial John Ashley stars as Matt Farrell, a diver / "renaissance man" who is kidnapped by thugs and taken to an isolated tropical island. Said thugs represent a mad scientist named Dr. Gordon (Charles Macaulay), whose experiments have involved turning people into half-human / half-animal aberrations. Matt falls in lust with the doctors' sexy daughter Neva (Pat Woodell), who sympathizes with him and the doctors' other "subjects". So she helps them to escape.

This escape takes up quite a bit of the rather brief running time of 81 minutes, but instead of ramping up the tension and sense of urgency, things start to meander too much. Obviously nobody is in a big hurry here, including the filmmakers.

This was the second unofficial Filipino adaptation of "Island of Dr. Moreau", after the 1959 feature "Terror is a Man" (a.k.a. "The Blood Creature"). That fact becomes easy to understand very quickly, and the material still has a compelling nature, but the film is rather underwhelming, with a script (co-written by director Eddie Romero) that isn't all that hot. The creature makeup is adequate at best; we've seen better work in other, official versions of the H.G. Wells tale. The location shooting is fine, and the film does possess that great atmosphere common to other Filipino genre & exploitation features. While it is mostly played straight, there is some comedy relief from a "bat man" (Tony Gosalvez) who tries in vain to fly. There's even some "romance" between the "antelope man" (Ken Metcalfe) and "wolf woman" (Mona Morena). The score is a mixture of stock music and new compositions by Tito Arevalo & Ariston Avelino.

The performances, much like the makeup, are very much adequate - no more - across the board. The main attraction for a number of people will undoubtedly be the prospect of Pam Grier playing one of the creatures, the feral "panther woman". One undeniable standout is the very amusing Jan Merlin as Steinman, Dr. Gordons' main henchman. Often seen smiling, he cheerfully encourages Farrell to escape, while having his own motivation for this attitude towards the prisoner.

Watchable, but only really worth recommending to die hard devotees of Filipino B cinema.

Six out of 10.

Now for any Brits watching this absurd drivel the most memorable thing - and that really is saying something - will be the frequent repetition of the "Mastermind" theme tune. Otherwise, this is a completely forgettable piece of nonsense that sees a diver (John Ashley) kidnapped and taken to an island populated by creatures that would not look out of place in Madame Tussauds so that he can be experimented on by the evil "Dr. Gordon" (No, not the one from "Black Beauty"!). The results of his failed efforts are all over the place - indeed, the island actually has a real life "Mr. Tumness" and a sort of bat-man creature - oh, and don't forget "panther girl". It is preposterous at every level; the make up has been way too close to the big lights; the dialogue written in haste on the back of a stamp and the performances - especially from a very, very wooden Jan Merlin leave me wondering if Eddie Romero ever actually watched the scenes as he directed them...

Plan 9 From Outer Space is generally considered to be the worst film of all time. I contend that the people voting have not seen Twilight People. It's basically The Island of Dr Moreau without a budget. In this version of the story, I believe the Doctor is doing his genetic engineering for the Third Reich, as he and his assistant/security guy are Nazis. The half man/half animal creatures are bizarre. There is a bat man, an antelope man, and even a mole woman. I had nightmares about this flick for years (not because it was scary) until I found it on video and re-lived the horror of one of the most awful films of all time. The acting is bad. The writing is bad. The costumes are bad. This is a bad movie.