Reviews & Ratings for
Lost City Raiders (TV) More at IMDbPro »

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10 out of 13 people found the following review useful:

Bad story, bad acting, bad music, bad everything

Author: lustigson from The Netherlands
10 October 2009

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This movie comes close to being the worst I've ever seen.

First of all: the story is very thin. The writers probably weren't sure they wanted to write an action film, a science fiction movie, a real-life ecological drama, a love story, an Indiana Jones variant, or a Dan Brown-like story.

Second: the dialog and the acting is horrible, with Ian Somerhalder and Elodie Frenck as low points.

Then third: the music: most of it was probably written especially for the film, but many songs and themes sounded like they were supposed be be something else, something well-know, for instance. The bit where the Filiminov crew hauls up Richard Lionheart's tomb was the worst.

Lastly, the only silver lining with this dark cloud was that I watched the film in Blu-ray, so at least this bad movie looked OK. The opening scenes were fine, for example, although I think they were from The Day After Tomorrow.

8 out of 10 people found the following review useful:

not bad at all

Author: nose_smasher from Romania
14 January 2011

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Saw this little movie two days ago, on cable and in Full HD. Call me crazy, but I liked it. The plot is so common for B-movies: some guys are searching and competing for an ancient artifact. Half of them are the "good guys", the other half are led by a ruthless super-rich man who wants the artifact only for him, ...to rule the whole world, of course. The action is set in the near future, when the level of the planetary ocean raised dramatically. The coast zones ,and not only, are now submerged. The New-Vatican wants the artifact (a scepter from Middle-Ages)hoping, based on old Biblical legends, to lower the level of waters. The bad guy, who lost millions per day with his submerged real estate wants exactly the opposite: to raise the level even more, because he now develops floating communities. He want the whole world to become dependent of his projects, then to lower the level to regain land and sell more, once again, to those who wants to live on solid ground.

As you see, it's a simple plot, used oh so many times before, from Indiana Jones to super-cheap and easy-to-forget other B-movies. Well, in my opinion, this one is able to stay in the upper first half. You won't find Oscar-winning acting here, just enough action to keep you entertained.

The CGI is surprisingly good for a TV movie.The scenes with the half submerged Dresden and Rome are done great. An underwater explosion and, later, CGI flowing water are rendered very realistic. However, the submerged structures are more poorly done.

"Lost City Raiders" is a family-friendly movie, so you can watch it with your kids. Not a lot of talk, talk, talk, the plot is simple to follow, some lines are funny, the acting can be found sometimes a little bit silly, but nothing unbearable. It's 20% comedy, 40% action, 40% adventure. Recommended.

8 out of 10 people found the following review useful:

We all live in a bathtub

Author: unbrokenmetal from Hamburg, Germany
6 January 2010

I think everybody should watch this movie, not as a serious action movie, but simply for being incredible and hilariously funny. Basically constructed as a cheaper TV imitation of familiar mega productions (Tomb Raider, Indiana Jones, Waterworld etc.), "Lost City Raiders" presents the ultimate explanation for the climate catastrophe: we all live in a gigantic bathtub, and every few thousand years, someone needs to pull the plug to lower the water level. Moses did it once, and our heroes just need to find his scepter to repeat the trick. Mind you, this is not a parody, it's intended to be convincing and scientific. When I read the summary on the back of the DVD cover, I desperately wanted to see the movie because I found it hard to believe until I saw it with my own eyes. How does one sell a story like this to a producer? It sounds like a lunatic Troma project, but actually is an international co-production, quite big by TV standards. Apart from the crazy outline, the script is pretty well constructed though: Bettina Zimmermann's character signing a deal with the wrong team, a lot about James Brolin's character only being revealed afterwards etc. - and finally, I liked the design of the cave, archaic and futuristic at the same time.

12 out of 20 people found the following review useful:

Inconsistent, unbelievable, and just bad.

Author: Thomas Hillebrandt from Denmark
28 February 2010

I'll make this pretty short, as other reviewers have already pointed out most of this..

This movie (which is titled "The End of the World" in my country, for reasons no one knows) is among the worst I have seen.. And I've watched through all of "Pterodactyl" as well as "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians"..

The acting is dubious at its very best. Brolin takes the prize with his slow, unconvincing reads, but the others aren't doing a lot better.

The setting - a future where the world is partially submerged due to global warming - is believable, but the environment and geography is far from it (going from L.A. to Rome in a trawler, anyone?). The premise seems to shift during the film, and one key element of the story changes its method radically, to the point where it is ridiculous.

All in all, I'm glad I borrowed this movie from a friend, so I didn't spend any money on it. I'd like my hour-and-a-half back, please.. At least the other two movies, mentioned above, - though bad - are so bad they're funny.. This is just excruciating!

7 out of 11 people found the following review useful:

Not bad...Not Great....Just Meh.

Author: Celticnationalist from Wales
20 December 2009

40 years in the future Global Warming has submerged most of the Earth underwater and a Father (James Brolin) and his two Sons (Ian Solmerhalder & Jamie Thomas King) salvage treasures from sunken buildings for a living when they are given an important assignment from the Vatican to uncover an historical artifact which can lower the seas moses-style - or some such nonsense. The budget as this is a Syfy Channel Production is Low (looks a lot lower than the $6.4M quoted here) and it shows rather badly at times, especially as buildings in the far distance look like paintings, but the acting isn't too bad and there is enough action to keep you interested if not glued to the screen.

A German made production Filmed entirely in South Africa and Directed by Jean De Segonzac, who has been in the Director's chair on many a TV Series and several forgettable DTV Movies.

23 out of 44 people found the following review useful:

Good Plot, Bad Brolin Acting

Author: lottacamel from United States
22 November 2008

I don't know if James Brolin has just become too old to act or if he's always been a bad actor and I just never noticed because he is so damn good looking. His acting in this movie brought the movie down. Old age is no excuse - just look at Sean Connery, Clint Eastwood, Anthony Hopkins, etc. Brolin "reads" his lines slowly, as if slightly drunk. He moves like he is suffering from either arthritis or severe constipation. The movie itself was very good, surprising for a TV movie. The premise is a rather new one and could actually happen. A catalytic event that threatens civilization is nothing new in movies, but Lost City Raiders makes the premise very believable. Overall, I really enjoyed the movie, but not Brolin's acting.

6 out of 11 people found the following review useful:

What were they thinking?

Author: dommiz-1 from Indonesia
25 September 2009

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Surely, about 2 hours into pre-production they must have suddenly realised that this was an absurd concept. Perhaps that is why they could only get such bad actors? But can we blame the actors when the script and direction were so dire?

It seems that they took the most risible bits of 'Da Vinci Code', stirred in some Tomb Raider, stole a few set pieces from 'Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade', and then set the whole thing to, stay with me: Waterworld.

Best bit: when the Cardinal portentously reveals the Triptych, and we see that when Moses parted the Red Sea he was wielding the Sceptre of Osiris or some such baloney. So it follows that whomsoever finds the scepter can reverse the rising waters! But not if the real estate magnate who is going to corner the market in floating houses gets there first! Because, of course, when only 10% of the earth's landmass is left, society will be completely unchanged, and curiously, New Rome will be populated entirely by Americans and stereotypical drunken Irishmen.

My idea of Dystopia is a world in which these sorts of films get made. In the words of the mighty Kermode: all those involved should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

Less than inspiring

Author: Neil Welch from United Kingdom
23 July 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

In the near future, after much of civilisation has flooded (!), rival gangs of aquatic archaeologists scavenge for a mystic artefact which will point the way to Moses' plughole in order to drain off the excess.

Preposterous and enormously derivative piffle, without an original thought in its copycat little head. It is bright and colourful and in focus, but there is little to recommend it beyond that. One wonders what Ben Cross and, to a lesser extent, James Brolin, were doing in it. One doesn't wonder that about anyone else in the cast - after all, a bloke has to eat.

A duff script joins the ridiculous plot (it is so uniquely ridiculous - Moses' plughole, indeed - that it is amazing how much of the movie is ripped off from other movies), but both are trumped by the special effects - half sunk (photos of) buildings in the background which are there as long as there is nothing else in shot: as soon as real-life dock buildings and cranes appear from another angle, nothing half-sunk is added. One is left to wonder who built not-sunk docks to serve a sunken city.

If you have nothing better to do, this might just pass a couple of hours. But you do have something better to do, take my word for it.

Awesomely Bad....

Author: jamase83 from United States
5 April 2011

This movie was awesomely bad. Bad by normal standards, but better than most sci-fi crap. It had horrible effects, the actors would often over act and the plot was kind of ridiculous but I LOVED it. Surprisingly the worst acting for me came from James Brolin. The movie is compared to Water World and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Water World I can see, Raiders of the Lost ark a little bit, with a splash of Angels and Demons. I didn't really feel like I wasted my time. It's bad, but a good bad. Great for people who enjoy cheesy movies. Ian Somerhalder is nice to look at, and at the end I found myself hoping for a sequel. I own the DVD and I would watch it again.

1 out of 2 people found the following review useful:

This movie is ridiculous

Author: adam drowley from New Zealand
16 July 2011

What a waste of time. Bad acting bad everything. The slow motion rubbish is insulting. If the rating could go negative it certainly would have.

I feel I have a duty to take the movie back to the video rental store and pay the people behind the counter to burn all their copies of it.

I just wasted 90 minutes of my life.

Not to mention the $8.

It seems unbelievable that so many people can be involved in the making of a movie and not say anything like along the lines of " Hey this is really embarrassing someone should sack the writer, director and producer before the public get to see it"

Adam

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