King of the Lost World |
  • USA • 2005 • 80m •   • Directed by: Leigh Scott. • Starring: Bruce Boxleitner, Jeff Denton, Rhett Giles, Sarah Lieving, Christina Rosenberg, Steve Railsback, Chriss Anglin, Amanda Ward, Boni Yanagisawa, Andrew Lauer, Thomas Downey, Amanda Barton, James Ferris. • Music by: Ralph Rieckermann.      A commercial airliner has crashed deep in the heart of the Amazon, and as the survivors attempt to make their way to safety they make a most terrifying discovery. This is a land out of time, a place where towering scorpions, winged reptiles, and a ten-story tall simian engage in a constant battle for supremacy. Mankind is but a savory snack in this violent world of giants, and if the survivors don't find their way out of the jungle fast they will no doubt meet a fate worse than death.
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Review:
I was quite surprised that this movie was released in 2005; I would have assumed that it had been produced in the early 1990s and shown on the SCI-FI channel after midnight for the last 15 years. "King of the Lost World" is distributed by a company called "The Asylum".
A plane crashes in a remote jungle, presumably in South America, although I'm not sure it was stated as such. There are several survivors despite a large explosion complete with a near mushroom cloud sized fireball. Sadly, the front end of the plane is missing.
Almost immediately we see a woman still strapped in her seat on a piece of wreckage who has just awakened following the crash. Suddenly a giant ape rips her into the air and carries her off. This is sort of where I see the whole "King Kong" aspect of the movie but the part about the girl falling in love with the savage beast never materialized. In fact, I lost track of this woman all together.
Over time, many planes have crashed in the area and the survivors have become some kind of primitive tribe who feed some of the crash victims to flying dragon like monsters as a ritual sacrifice, trying to placate the flying beats? The tribe may be fearful of the flying dragons but they have a much greater fear of the giant gorilla who "brings death" to them. Of course, they can't speak his name. How do they know his name? Who named him? I didn't see any native folks running around in this Amazon jungle, only freaky crash survivors who sit around painting themselves up in war paint and smoking cigars.
After hiking all day these poor LOST survivors (their numbers thinned somewhat) sit down to rest in a cave or something. A girl asks a guy "Want a peanut?" He replies "Peanuts? No. No peanuts. If I never see another bag of god damned gyp joint airline peanuts in my life. My miserable f-king life I'll be just fine. Keep your f-king peanuts." Did I mention the part about how this woman gets a small scratch on her leg at the beginning of the movie? This guy who is horn-dogging on the arguably good looking photographer notices it (he later gets killed by a giant scorpion in a cave when the scorpion puts it's stinger through his chest cavity). The woman blows it off as 'just a scratch'. The next morning it is a wide open, six inch long gash on the front of her lower leg. One of the other women in the group takes a look at it and says "She's infected!" which came out sounding like she had been bitten by a zombie from Dawn of the Dead and would soon be eating the meager brains out of the remaining survivors.
For a stranded person with zero medical resources the easiest fix for a massively infected leg wound is simple -- you simply pack fly larva into the wound in what we call a "Maggot Bandage." The maggots will eat the dead flesh and apparently cure infections. So this enterprising fellow lifts a couple nearby rocks and finds a bunch of squirmy bugs (definitely not maggots) which is proceeds to drop into the wound, complete with a handful of dirt. This is all wrapped tight with a strip of cloth from one of the other survivor's skirts.
For the next half a day in the movie the girl is deathly ill. They make a great show about how they are carrying her all around the jungle. Then, suddenly, they stop because someone spots a plane crashed in the jungle (there are a surprisingly large number of nearly intact planes laying around) and they set the woman down on a rock where she sits for a moment. The next thing you know she's up and running as if nothing ever happened and no further discussion or observation of her wound is necessary.
The very cute, but amazingly stupid, woman in the torn stewardess uniform is the first one to break through the trees and spot the nearby plane. She shouts for everyone to come because she found their plane! At any rate, the plane this woman spotted looked like a fully intact fighter jet not just a cockpit section of a large airliner. The stewardess was very disappointed when it was pointed out that it wasn't their plane, after all. How the hell could she be that stupid? She can't tell the difference between a 727 and a fighter jet? Let's forget that they left their half of a broken plane two days back on the other side of a mountain and that they were searching for the broken off cockpit section OF A HUGE AIRLINER.
In another scene a woman gets her shirt ripped open and another woman is caressing her breasts and licking her face. While this scene was interesting it didn't contribute to the story line. I suppose it was inserted at a strategic point in the film to grab the viewer's attention just when they were planning to hit the eject button.
This movie was full of exceptionally bad script writing, wooden acting, and cheesy not-so-special effects. There really isn't anything I can tell you about this movie that would make you want to see it. In fact, I would urge you NOT to rent this film.
Review by Andrew (andyofne) from the Internet Movie Database.
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