There is literally nothing you haven't seen before in this cheap Mexican dinosaur picture. The old "plane crashes in unknown area inhabited by prehistoric animals" plot is used to frame a prehistoric romance between a female scientist and a hunk in a bearskin. Their story is built around extensive footage from One Million B.C. Leads Armando Silvestre and Alma Delia Fuentes are even costumed to more or less match Victor Mature and Carol Landis in the stock footage. The producer also throws in some Hollywood gorilla suit shots. The monkey suit used for the gorilla attack in the new material looks like someone's Halloween costume. The only original dinosaur on the island is a papier-mâché creature glimpsed behind a log in the river. The story revolves around a scientific expedition to discover the remains of lost Atlantis. The scientists' plane makes a crash landing on an island during a storm. While they repair it, they study the island. It is inhabited by a tribe of cave dwellers led by burly Silvestre. Fuentes is frightened by a dinosaur while swimming and is kidnapped by the caveman, who has been ousted from his position. Despite their cultural differences, they fall in love. This is handled in "me Tarzan, you Jane" fashion. La Isla de los dinosaurios a pretty dull affair despite reasonable production values. The cinematography by award-winner Agustin Jimenez is outstanding. That said, there are better ways to spend 87 minutes.
3 Reviews
Dinos
BandSAboutMovies22 January 2021
Warning: Spoilers
Rafael Portillo, come back on down, you're back for another blast of strangeness, this time taking us to an island of dinosaurs! Much like Colombus searching for a trade route to the West Indies and finding Florida, these scientists are seeking Atlantis and end up somewhere else entirely, a place teeming with all manner of giant lizards.
Yes, the Professor (Manolo Fábregas, Two Mules for Sister Sara) has convinced Pablo (Genaro Moreno, Las Mujeres Panteras), Esther (Elsa Cárdenas, Giant) and Laura (Alma Delia Fuentes, Panic) to jump in a prop plane and seek out this secret spot. Of course, the plane crashes but everyone is having so much fun on the island - no one gets upset at all - that this seems like a breezy travelogue.
That is until Laura is taken by a caveman named Molo (Armando Silvestre, Santo contra Los Zombis) and together, they battle dinosaurs - amazingly, stolen from much bigger productions like One Million B.C.* - and fall in love, at which point she teaches him the value of money, shows his people how to make new weapons and gives the women tips on combing their hair. She's like one of those angels from the Book of Enoch that comes down to Earth after the Great Fall only to teach us things like dying garments and how to use makeup**.
Everything works out . Well, a volcano does wipe out most of the island and that too was taken from that 1940 Hal Roach movie. So maybe not so well for everyone.
*To be fair, these lizards with fins glued on them show up in more than just this movie. You can also spot them in everything from Tarzan's Desert Mystery, Two Lost Worlds and Untamed Women to Robot Monster, King Dinosaur and Teenage Caveman. Thanks to Mark David Welsh for pointing this out.
**The angel Azazel is the one who did all that, plus showed humans how to make swords, daggers, shields, breastplates, bracelets, ornaments and how to create jewelry. Other angels like Amezarack, Amaros, Baraqiel, Kokabel, Tamiel and Asradel had to content themselves with just showing humanity how to cast spells and astrology.
Yes, the Professor (Manolo Fábregas, Two Mules for Sister Sara) has convinced Pablo (Genaro Moreno, Las Mujeres Panteras), Esther (Elsa Cárdenas, Giant) and Laura (Alma Delia Fuentes, Panic) to jump in a prop plane and seek out this secret spot. Of course, the plane crashes but everyone is having so much fun on the island - no one gets upset at all - that this seems like a breezy travelogue.
That is until Laura is taken by a caveman named Molo (Armando Silvestre, Santo contra Los Zombis) and together, they battle dinosaurs - amazingly, stolen from much bigger productions like One Million B.C.* - and fall in love, at which point she teaches him the value of money, shows his people how to make new weapons and gives the women tips on combing their hair. She's like one of those angels from the Book of Enoch that comes down to Earth after the Great Fall only to teach us things like dying garments and how to use makeup**.
Everything works out . Well, a volcano does wipe out most of the island and that too was taken from that 1940 Hal Roach movie. So maybe not so well for everyone.
*To be fair, these lizards with fins glued on them show up in more than just this movie. You can also spot them in everything from Tarzan's Desert Mystery, Two Lost Worlds and Untamed Women to Robot Monster, King Dinosaur and Teenage Caveman. Thanks to Mark David Welsh for pointing this out.
**The angel Azazel is the one who did all that, plus showed humans how to make swords, daggers, shields, breastplates, bracelets, ornaments and how to create jewelry. Other angels like Amezarack, Amaros, Baraqiel, Kokabel, Tamiel and Asradel had to content themselves with just showing humanity how to cast spells and astrology.
No Aztec Mummy Around...
EdgarST23 April 2024
This cult movie is pretty bad, I could not even find it funny. This time director Rafael Portillo did not have a terrifying creature like the Aztec Mummy (whose trilogy he directed), but rather magnified lizards from sequences created for "One Million B. C." (1940) and Mexican hunk star Armando Silvestre, who was no longer 25 years old nor in top shape as in "La red", to lead the cast as Caveman Número 1.
The story is simple and silly: scientist Manolo Fábregas recruits his ex-students Alma Delia Fuentes, Elsa Cárdenas and Genaro Moreno to help him prove that he is not crazy, exploring an island in the Atlantic Ocean, which he believes was part of Atlantis, where prehistoric creatures still exist. Alma Delia meets Armando, who kidnaps her and takes her to his cave, while a volcano is about to erupt and giant lizards fight among themselves everywhere. The servviceable integration of live action with the pre-existing footage in some scenes is probably the best achievement of this production... which has to be seen to believe it has a happy and sexy ending in loincloths.
Good copies are available in the net.
The story is simple and silly: scientist Manolo Fábregas recruits his ex-students Alma Delia Fuentes, Elsa Cárdenas and Genaro Moreno to help him prove that he is not crazy, exploring an island in the Atlantic Ocean, which he believes was part of Atlantis, where prehistoric creatures still exist. Alma Delia meets Armando, who kidnaps her and takes her to his cave, while a volcano is about to erupt and giant lizards fight among themselves everywhere. The servviceable integration of live action with the pre-existing footage in some scenes is probably the best achievement of this production... which has to be seen to believe it has a happy and sexy ending in loincloths.
Good copies are available in the net.
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