Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women

Director Peter Bogdanovich had to start somewhere; following second unit work on Roger Corman's "The Wild Angels," Corman allowed the hardworking novice an opportunity to do a feature film utilizing the exact same Russian stock footage used by Curtis Harrington for his 1965 "Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet," a 1962 entry titled "Planeta bur" (Planet of Storms). It's no stretch to assume that the first-time director just didn't have his heart in his work, as all of his newly shot footage features a dozen bikini-clad models not required to speak, everything narrated by Bogdanovich himself. There is no integration between the alien mermaids and the Russian characters, so the whole thing just sits there, aimlessly meandering from one crisis to another. Granted, I had just viewed Curtis Harrington's work on his "Voyage," so all the Soviet footage was already familiar to me, but at least Harrington had Basil Rathbone and Faith Domergue actually communicating with the Russian astronauts, their scenes already dubbed into English. The blame here simply lies with Roger Corman, who felt the need for another retread rather than something truly original. "Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women" carries a 1967 copyright, and at least Corman was satisfied enough to grant Bogdanovich the freedom to do a feature starring Boris Karloff, who supposedly owed Roger two days work on a previous contract; we can all be grateful that the result was the superlative "Targets," shot in Dec 1967, an achievement that even "The Last Picture Show" couldn't top (some may feel free to disagree). Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater aired "Prehistoric Planet" only 3 times, "Prehistoric Women" 4 times (maybe it was the bikinis), all from July 1969 to July 1972.

In 1965 Roger Corman produced Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet, and in 1967 he produced (uncredited) Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women (VPPW). But the similarities do not end there. Both films are essentially recycles of Planeta Burg, a great Soviet sci fi adventure from the 1950s. Most of the footage from both films - and ALL of the coherent and interesting footage - comes from the original Soviet film.

VPPW is Peter Bogdanovich's first directorial effort, and unlike some of his later films, it's entirely disposable.

It is not the first, nor the last, time that an American director essentially plagiarized a good foreign film, but it is among one of the worst examples of Ameicanization I have ever seen. Even compared to what was done to Gojira, La Femme Nikita, Wings of Desire and Open Your Eyes, this is close to an all-time low.

Like the previous Voyage to a Prehistoric planet, but less seamlessly, Bogdanovich simply took a little new footage and added it to the original film. The story is essentially an adventure set on the planet Venus, where two cosmonauts and a robot await rescue, and follows the cosmonauts and their rescue team through a series of harrowing adventures involving giant carnivorous plants, lizard men, and geological hazards. Planeta Burg also introduced a little mystery by showing some evidence that Venus may once have been inhabited by an intelligent species capable of producing works of art.

The most interesting aspect of Bogdanovich's retelling of this story is his exploration of this mystery. It seems that the last remnants of Venusian civilization are scantily clad telepathic women who worship, among other things, a Pteradactyl which their earthling visitors have murdered. These women have apparently figured out how to reproduce without men, and to produce cotton pants and hats for themselves out of Venus' barren wastelands, but are otherwise quite primitive. Remarkably, despite the fact that there do not appear to be any Venusian men, the gods the women worship are referred to as "him". You get the picture, yes?

The basic idea of examining the Venusian perspective on the events depicted in Planeta Burg was a good one. But this was, apparently, the only good idea involved in the design of this film.

This film is worth seeing if you ever felt compelled to see Mamie van Doren chewing on a freshly caught raw fish, or if you are a fan of Planeta Burg and just have to see how it has been butchered in this final act of cinematic violence. Otherwise, I can't recommend it.

The special effects are way below the quality of those which appear in the 1950s film, the added content is poorly acted, badly edited, and adds very little to the film.

This film is so awful it's brilliant.

The film is actually a re-edit of a Soviet science fiction film with extra footage of young American girls. Very low budget. The two sets of actors never actually meet.

All the voices are dubbed on afterwards. This covers up the fact that the astronauts are speaking Russian. The "Prehistoric women" communicate through thought waves, so none of them have to talk and act at the same time! I watched this on Sumo TV in the UK. The version I saw still had all the cinema adds spliced in. The adverts for ice cream, popcorn and hot chocolate were still there. There was also an advert for CocaCola.

The whole thing looks like someone had filmed the thing from the stalls on an old Cine camera. Picture blurred and fuzzy, colour almost bleached away.

Unfortunately none of the US actors ever went on to do anything of any significance. The leading lady, Mamie Van Doren, seems to have built her reputation around being a former Hollywood starlet who was supposed to be the next Marylin Monroe and spent five years dating Howard Hughes, from the age of 15! Directed by Peter Bogdanovich (Famous director and also Dr. Elliot Kupferberg in The Sopranos TV series)

Any prospective actor/producer/director should see some of this.

I saw this movie as a kid, around 1972 or so, and spent years trying to see it again. Yes, I know, I need a life. I finally found it on DVD in one of those 50 sci-fi movies for $20. The movie itself is pretty bad, but if one enjoys 'bad' sci-fi, then this one is perfect. I still can't figure out how they got their 'space-car' to float around like it did. It looked pretty real, as did a Brontosaurus, but the Pterydactyl looked very cheesy, like it was made by a bunch of 7th graders. Anyway, I watched "Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet", then I watched "Voyage to the Planet of the Prehistoric Women" back to back. There must have been a gun to my head, I know. The movies use the exact same dubbed Russian "Planet of Storms" footage, but each movie spliced in their own additional footage, and the results produce 2 similar, but different story lines. "Prehistoric Planet" has Basil Rathbone in separate footage, as well as Faith Domergue in her own footage-they are in different space stations.....making for a clumsy (but enjoyable) plot involving rescuing the men on Venus. The robot seems to have a bigger role in this movie, although it is used to some effect in the other. "Prehistoric Women" has Peter Bogdanovich's voice-over narration, and the spliced-in women in clam shell bathing suits (Mamie Van Doren is the leader), who communicate telepathically. I found this one to be much more interesting of the two. The Earth men and Venus women seemed destined to meet each other, they look for each other most of the movie, but alas because it is separate footage, they never do! A somewhat surprise ending makes the movie that more interesting. I do have to comment on the eerie female singing/crying throughout the movies, made it pretty haunting. Also, some of the noises coming from the console of the space-ships sounds exactly like those heard on the original Star Trek TV show. Well, I probably spent more time talking about this movie than the production crew who actually shot the movie!

Although Planet Of Prehistoric Women's mother film Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet had some interesting aspects to it, this one is a total dud. Unless of course all you want to see is Mamie Van Doren and those scantily clad Venusian babes. All of them Playboy playmates or could qualify for same.

Honestly if the earth people knew what was on Venus, they'd be rushing pell mell to get to the shrouded second planet.

This film is a re-edited version of the first film with some added footage of Mamie and her clan. It seems as though the earth astronauts have killed the flying reptile the Venusians worship as a god. Causing a theological revolution on the place.

Unless you like Mamie and those twin weapons of mass destruction she sports, I'd pass this one up.