Thanks for the memories!

Sorry, this movie sucks

SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Copyright 15 August 1951 by Tom Productions, Inc. U.S. release through Lippert Pictures. No recorded New York opening. San Francisco world premiere at the Paramount: 19 July 1951. U.S. release: 17 August 1951. 7,533 feet. 82 minutes. SYNOPSIS: Hunting for a lost rocket, a small party of scientists crash-lands on an unknown Pacific island. NOTES: Shooting from 13 April to 24 April 1951 COMMENT: By the humble standards of both Mr Lippert and the Neufeld Brothers, this is not too trying a little offering. On the debit side (in no particular order) are Mr Sid Melton who labors painfully to garner a few laughs from trite material; animated monsters that look like drawing-board rejects from The Lost World (1925); and a mountain peak that is obviously rooted on a film studio floor. We could also add Hillary Brooke to this side of the ledger. One of our favorite stars, Miss Brooke is treated shamefully here. True, she looks lovely, but she has only one scene. Count it! One! I'll assign Cesar Romero to neither debit nor credit. He's competent enough, but I can take him or leave him. However, I like Chick Chandler and John Hoyt, and it's always good to see Whit Bissell making out as a scientist type. Although the monsters are pretty crummy, at least three or four of the excitements are grippingly presented by director Newfield and I very much the idea of presenting all the top-of-the-mountain footage on green-tinted stock.

I am surprised this has a rating as high as 3.0, as I have found this as one of the most boring movies of the entire 1950's. This was a time where every bad movie had a giant monster or something and this technically no exception. We get to see dinosaurs! Except that the dinosaurs are horribly animated in stop motion. The herbivores try to eat humans for no reason. Well, maybe they were just trying to maul them? I mean, hippos are really aggressive. It doesn't make sense either way.The movie features a group of guys who find, well, a lost continent. They meet some people there, and climb up a mountain for what seems like half of the movie. That's the main flaw with this reason is that it's so TEDIOUS. I had no idea that rock climbing could be so boring. Even when the finally get to the land of the dinosaurs or whatever, very little happens. In the end, the entire journey is mostly pointless. Whereas most monster movies at least has stuff going on, this is just too boring to care about. *

"Lost Continent" turned out to be a reasonably solid film, which was a surprise for me since I knew A) it was directed by mega-hack Sam Neufeld and B)it was an early target for Mystery Science Theater 3000 (in their 2nd season, when they really hit their stride).So let's get the bad stuff out of the way first - rock climbing, Sid Melton, and unconvincing dinosaur animation. Anyone who has seen "LC" all the way through knows that the movie stops dead in the second act and subjects the viewer to endless scenes of the characters scrambling up a mountainside on their way to the crashed "atomic rocket" at the top. I am sure that the point was to help the viewer experience the struggle and fatigue of an 'epic' journey...but the climbing scenes are staged in a plodding, pedestrian manner that kills any interest the first 20 minutes managed to generate. It's worse than watching paint dry. Things actually get moving a little once the crew makes it to the top, but man...rock climbing was sloooooow going.2nd, Sid Melton. I know that Melton got a lot of work in various TV shows and movies calling for comedy relief. And I remember he was pretty good at times (on "Danny Thomas", etc). But he's just not funny to my "modern" sensibilities...in fact, he's really irritating. His performance pulls the movie down a couple of rating points all by itself. His role is pure cardboard, his dialog is completely lame, and he basically does sad-sack military enlisted man "schtick" here, purely on auto-pilot. I kept praying for his immediate and painful death in "LC". Then again, I'm not sure Elvis channeling Jim Carey could have saved this part, so I don't want to trash poor Sid too hard. I hope he's happily retired and living on his residuals somewhere.3rd, the dinosaur animation. I am sure this was the biggest expense in the film, but once you've seen Ray Harryhausen, you can't tolerate stuff like this anymore. There are no credits for the animation sequences in the credits, so it's possible that the producers (and the animators) felt the same way. It was also kind of irritating to have a brontosaurus/apatosaur attack the party and try to eat Hugh Beaumont when any six year old could tell you that the bronto was a gentle, timid vegetarian. Apparently, Neufeld didn't have any six year olds around to act as consultants.As for the "good": everyone else here does a workmanlike job of getting their dialog over and filling out their stereotyped roles. I'd never seen Romero in a "straight" dramatic role before, and I have to admit, he's pretty dashing. He has great hair, and he knows how to rock the mustache. If you were looking for someone to "do" the Errol Flynn role in your movie, Romero would be an obvious choice. Whit Bissell and Beaumont are their usual dignified, genial selves, and the guy who plays the Russian rocket scientist brings a certain humanity and nobility to his lines that a lot of other actors might not.And c'mon...it's rockets and dinosaurs and manly men on a manly adventure, how could this movie's intended audience (sleepy male adolescents) NOT love it? As I said, MST3000 covered this one early on...if fact, I remember that the episode where they tackled "Lost Continent" was the first MST I ever saw. And yes, the movie deserved all the barbs, japes, and witticisms they tossed at it, but it still has a certain quality that elevates it far above most of their other fare...even if it hasn't aged too well. But let's be fair...how well do you thing Cameron's "Titanic" will hold up to viewers in 2056??

A synopsis of this film and a list of the cast members is bound to raise false hopes. Sad to say, it sounds much better than it looks.An atomic rocket crashes atop a lofty plateau on a South Sea island, a plateau where dinosaurs still survive. Three military men and three scientists climb to the top of the plateau and struggle through the savage environment to recover important data from the rocket. The cast consists of B-movie sci-fi veterans: Cesar Romero ("The Jungle"), John Hoyt ("Attack of the Puppet People"), Hugh Beaumont ("The Mole People"), White Bissell ("The Time Machine" and others), Hillary Brooke ("Invaders from Mars"), Sid Melton ("Captain Midnight"), and a bit part by Acquanetta ("Captive Wild Woman").The jungle sets and tabletop miniatures bear a pleasing resemblance to a poor-man's Skull Island (misty and surrealistic). The special effects during the climactic earthquake are nicely done. The cast does a fair job with Richard Landau's script. Admirable music by Paul Dunlap. Directed by Sam Newfield.In spite of these assets, the film is defeated by a low budget and the poorly done animation (the credits do not name the animator). Only two triceratops, one brontosaurus, and one pterodactyl are shown. The dinosaur models lack detail. "The Lost Continent" came out early in the sci-fi craze of the 1950s, before any of Harryhausen's movies. The producers didn't realize how hungry the public was for rampaging stop-motion monsters.