The Lost Skeleton Returns Again

We saw this at the LA premiere last night, complete with cast and crew (and their families and friends, which made for an enthusiastic and fun audience).

Even with 10X the budget, it still had the no-expense look. All the old characters were back, including the bickering aliens Kro-bar and his wife, dead characters resurrected as their not-so-evil twins, and yes, Animala. Of course the Skeleton is back, although only as a skull (which gives him certain dependency issues). He gets the best lines (while waiting for his minions to carry out some task - "It's the waiting that's difficult").

All the performances were excellent, particularly Larry Blamire as the bitter scientist (another scientist took credit for his rock) and wife Fay Masterston.

The plot, such as it is, involves a race to South America to obtain the valuable Geranium-90, worshiped by the Cantalope people. It's basically 60 minutes of plot stuffed into a 90-minute movie. Although the individual jokes are often very funny, the framework is too bare-bones and linear. Even cheeseball 50s SF movies often had, you know, subplots. There's a lengthy middle section where everyone passes the same banana plant about 10 times (which was probably part of the joke). Failing a bit of a rewrite and reshoot, editing down to 70 or 75 minutes would help.

To his credit, Larry Blamire said he would not do another sequel, as he fears the jokes would start repeating themselves. True enough.

In short, hilarious! Definitely ranks on my top 10 list of favourite movies. It manages to just be generally amazing and the satire is done to the fullest, and oh so well.

The characters are great and funny, it has more story than most movies that *aren't* making fun of "no story", and after having watched the original "Lost Skeleton of Cadavra" I'd say this one outdid the previous. Oh, and of course the special effects are very realistic and I'm still not sure how they did it. (Sarcasm.)

I can understand how some people wouldn't like this. Those people have no sense of humour :)

The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra redefined how I viewed independent film. It was fresh, fun, and smart.

The sequel is fun and smart.

To be honest, the trailers didn't give me much hope. I went into the theater nervous.

First, I want to say the first 20 minutes of the film are a blast! The rest of the movie is a pleasant but not powerful ride.

I will say that the characters are still funny, and making Paul and Betty a little smarter this time around adds just enough to keep them interesting. The new characters are a mixed bag...the queen is pretty damn funny, the others come and go.

The plot does drag a bit, as did the original, but this movie really feels too long. At some point, everything seems to lose steam, but it never comes to a halt.

Still, if you're a fan of Blamire's smart dialogue humor and somewhat theatrical directing style, you'll find lots to laugh at here.

Oh wait, he was cranky to start with.

I shouldn't have to even mention basic rule of thumb for sequels; they stink, with the occasional exception. I'm happy to report that this is one of those exceptions. Counting myself as a fan of THE LOST SKELETON OF CADAVRA, I give this follow-up my seal of approval - a huge relief as I was braced for the worst, knowing the Sequel Rule and all.

The prior film covered a raft of 50's-to-early 60's SF B-movie sub-genres: crashed meteor/Ed-Woodish aliens/rampaging mutant/cat-woman/haunted skull. THE LOST SKELETON RETURNS AGAIN picks up most all of that and rolls it in a cheesy (of course deliberately so) jungle adventure, harking to movies like LOST CONTINENT (1951) or THE LOST WORLD (1960) or THE LOST _(insert noun here)_. A host of time honored jungle movie clichés are subjected to a Blamiring they shall not soon forget.

All of the cast and nearly all of the characters from TLSOC characters show up in TLSRA, which is a bit of a trick as a couple of them were killed off in the last picture. This seeming non sequitur is explained away in the finest tradition of cheesy film making, and it's on with the show.

Like TLSOC, there is a broad range of humor going on with appeal to all ages; from visual gags to genre in-jokes. Thus providing grown-ups with stuff to quote and kids with hijinks to giggle at.

The standard question when it comes to sequels goes something like "does it work if you haven't seen the previous film?" I'm disqualified to answer in this case, but my money is on 'yes'. There's enough continuity and in-jokes to make persnickety fans happy, but not so much that it would put off first timers - as far as I can tell. But as usual, seeing the previous film first is a plus.

Larry Blamire movies tend to result in either a love-or-hate state. Like most cult movies, it seems you're either a fan of TLSOC who never tires of watching it and quote it in your sleep, or you're one of those who doesn't like it. Bottom line, if you didn't care for the first movie, this one isn't going to make you any happier. But the many fans of THE LOST SKELETON OF CADAVRA will get along just fine with THE LOST SKELETON RETURNS AGAIN.

If I may borrow the immortal words of Tom Servo, Larry Blamire is "a national friggin' treasure." Many writers and directors have trafficked in parody and pastiche, but Larry has three things going for him that I've rarely seen demonstrated by other filmmakers: An encyclopedic knowledge of movies, from the most obscure Poverty Row programmer on up; an infectious enthusiasm for the output of auteurs whose ambitions are bigger than their brains; and a unique style which combines brilliant wordplay and antic comedy in a way that makes one suspect he's actually the secret love child of Preston Sturges and Dr. Seuss. In other words -- he's a triple threat. And all of these qualities combined to make THE LOST SKELETON OF CADAVRA one of the funniest films of the last few years.

So how does the sequel fare? Surprisingly, it doesn't really feel like a sequel. I went in prepared for more of the same, but THE LOST SKELETON RETURNS AGAIN takes on a whole new series of clichés, primarily drawn from those low budget adventure epics -- rich in potted ferns and stock footage -- that thrived on cheap back lots from the early 30s to the late 50s. But LSRA wanders beyond the narrow confines of jungle pictures, parodying everything from gangster movies (there's a hilarious scene which pretty much guarantees you'll burst out laughing the next time you see a movie character order another to "take your gun out -- slowly") to those Mondo films of the 1960s, with their salacious native dances (believe me, you'll never look at cantaloupes the same way again).

All the actors from the original film make a return appearance, alongside a few new additions to the Blamire stock company. But it's not necessary to have seen the original LOST SKELETON (although I'd recommend checking out the DVD), or even many of the films the sequel lovingly mocks, because the jokes come so thick and fast there's something there for everybody. If you can appreciate a comedy that's smart and silly at the same time, you'll enjoy THE LOST SKELETON RETURNS AGAIN.