When Hollywood does a remake of a classic television show, that shows fans tend to be eager to see how Hollywood handles their love. When Brad Silberling tackled "Land Of The Lost" he took what many looked at as an amazing show and turned it into a joke. true fans will be disappointed at just what he gives us. We do get the monkey people, Chaka (Jorma Taccone) the lizard people (Sleestaks) and of course dinosaurs. On his latest expedition, Dr. Rick Marshall (Will Ferrell) along with his newest willing research assistant Holly Cantrell (Anna Friel) and a gas station clerk, Will Stanton (Danny McBride) who is played more as a redneck then anything else.
After years of abuse from the scientific community and from Matt Lauer Dr. Marshall is ready to give up, he has been reduced to teaching science classes to a bunch of teenagers who can care less about the subject of science. When Holly finds him on the floor passed out, she tells him that she followed his career while she was at Cambridge and that since he has finished his new machine they should of course try it out, Holly has found a fossil that proves Dr. Marshall was right all along. He isn't so willing at first but agrees to go to a location that Holly says has a lot of activity around it. When they get to the location it is an abandoned carnival attraction, the devils mouth is run by Will who is also a business man, so he tells them if they buy thirty dollars worth of junk he will give them a tour of the devils mouth cave. When they get into the cave Dr. Marshall turns his invention on and it opens a portal to another dimension, one that is an alternate realty to ours.
In this land of the lost Dr. Marshall becomes the brunt of the meanest dinosaur ever, the T-Rex, who Marshall ticks off by remarking that they have brains the size of a walnut, the dinosaur takes offense to this and sets out to prove who is the better man? He gift wraps a huge walnut and tosses it to the mouth of the cave where the group is now hiding, he tracks them down every time they leave the cave. So when Marshall has a vision of a captive sleestak and they set out to find him they are of course pursued by the T-Rex. When the group finds the captured sleestak, Enik (John Boylan) he tells them that a rogue sleestak Zarn (Leonard Nimoy) plans to use Marshall's invention to take over Earth, that they must find the lost invention and prevent Zarn from using it. What transpires is one form of antic after the other. Marshall is stung by a huge mosquito that drains most of his blood, and they are forced to defend themselves against not one but two dinosaurs that want to eat them. It doesn't help that Chaka gives them a fruit off a tree whose juice causes drug induced illusions.
The comedy in this movie is just one liners, there isn't much of that either, there are no plot twists that will surprise you, of course it isn't Zarn that Marshall will have to protect the invention from, but Enik, who of course gets the invention and tries to use it to rule Earth, his plan fails when Marshall takes control of the crystals Enik needs to get to Earth, of course there is the showdown between Marshal land the T-Rex, who will of course help Marshall defeat the sleestaks later. The special effects at times look like cheap imitations that the movie makers try to pass off, the T-Rex looks awesome though, so although of course we get the happy Hollywood ending where Marshall and Holly get together and make it back to their own reality, we feel let down, this could have been so much better, I for one, who wasn't that big a fan of this show felt disappointed. Unlike the Star trek movie where I was completely amazed.
I give Land Of The Lost a very reluctant 2 and on my avoidance scale it gets a 1, this is a DVD special that should be taken advantage of. If you feel that you must go and see this movie, don't have such high expectations and maybe you won't mind the silliness.
Land Of The Lost is rated PG-13 for Crude and Sexual Content and Language Including a Drug Reference
Running time is 1 hr. 41 mins.
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