Third official version of the H.G. Wells novel was such a troubled production that it's fortunate it would be watchable to any degree. In any event, the story of its making is infinitely more interesting than the final result.
For those not familiar with the story, it deals with a plane crash survivor, Edward Douglas (David Thewlis), adrift at sea and picked up by a passing ship, and ending up trapped on a remote island where the local mad scientist, Dr. Moreau (a hilarious Marlon Brando) has been busy turning animals into human like abominations. He's just in time to witness as the beasts start tiring of their treatment and stage a horrific uprising, while Moreaus' second in command, Montgomery (an amusing Val Kilmer) goes bat *beep* crazy, and Edward becomes taken with a cat woman named Aissa (sexy Fairuza Balk).
This film is never terribly involving, but at least it manages to be a somewhat *intriguing* mess. The ideas at work here still make some impact, although it would have helped had there been a stronger protagonist. Thewlis, who has gone on record as saying this was a very negative experience for him, looks largely disinterested, unlike Kilmer and screen legend Brando (Brando looking very pasty faced and rotund here); they both ham it up something fierce. Balk is quite appealing, and there's also the always welcome presence of Ron Perlman, playing the Sayer of the Law.
One good thing that can be said is that the creature designs by the Stan Winston Studio *are* indeed impressive, and the actors buried under the makeup all do a creditable job, especially Daniel Rigney and Mark Dacascos as the scary characters Hyena-Swine and Lo-Mai. This movie is beautiful in a visual sense, so it does have the look of quality, with production design by Graham "Grace" Walker and cinematography by William A. Fraker; it was filmed on location in Queensland, Australia.
One can't help but wonder what could have been had original director Richard Stanley (the man behind the cult items "Hardware" and "Dust Devil") not been fired. As it is, legendary political thriller master John Frankenheimer ("The Manchurian Candidate", "Seven Days in May"), who was brought in to try to create something releasable, does a slick job, even if his heart wasn't really in it.
Fans of the book would be advised to stick with the '32 and '77 adaptations; overall, this film does have good horror movie moments, and ends fairly well, but isn't too memorable when all is said and done.
Six out of 10.
