The bad news is this the seventh incarnation of this title. It was produced in 1925, 1960, 1992, 1998, 1999, 2001 and as a TV series from 1999-2002. Whew!!! The good news is that of all the versions I have seen this one is easily the best. Looks like they finally got it right! This 2 DVD A&E Miniseries of 200 minutes manages to both tell a good human story and a great adventure. Certainly this is a balance not easy to achieve as too many action films either become boring talk fests or FX extravaganzas with little story to carry them forward. This is not the case here I believe.
The cast of Bob Hoskins, James Fox, Tom Ward, Matthew Rhys, Elaine Cassidy, and Peter Falk are all excellent and fit their roles well.
The first half builds the tension and creates the characters in fine detail as we meet the irascible and exuberant Professor Challenger (Hoskins), the skeptical and stodgy Professor Summerlee (Fox), bold adventurer / hunter Lord Roxton (Ward), fledgling ambitious newspaper reporter Edward Malone (Rhys), naive beautiful jungle orphan Agnes Cluny, and her adoptive religious zealot uncle Rev. Theo Kerr (Falk).
The pacing is just right as we finally arrive at the mysterious plateau and the Rev. Kerr proves not as friendly as he first appeared. At this point the adventure side really gains momentum.
As we meet our first dinosaur in the second half, the special effects are second to none, melding both CGI and animatronics seamlessly. They were done by the same team as the well known "Walking With Dinosaurs" series so that should not be a surprise.
Filmed in New Zealand, the scenery is simply gorgeous. There are some genuinely suspenseful moments and a few surprises too. There is even a love triangle that is eventually resolved.
All the loose ends are nicely tied up at the end of film.
If the film has any serious flaws it is that the resident Indians are just too finely dressed for being on an isolated plateau and the ape-men we encounter just seem hokey. It's hard to shake the feeling that you are seeing actors in monkey suits.
The DVD extras are top notch and an entire 2nd DVD disk is devoted to "The Making Of The Lost World" and a superb documentary "Dinosaur Secrets Revealed" that traces both the history of paleontology and its interesting interaction with Hollywood. In retrospect, Hollywood was often more correct in its dinosaur portrayals than the academics thought at the time.
The film never loses the human story but the adventure is well maintained in addition. If you like dinosaurs and/or adventure films don't pass this up. I believe you will be pleasantly surprised and entertained.
The cast of Bob Hoskins, James Fox, Tom Ward, Matthew Rhys, Elaine Cassidy, and Peter Falk are all excellent and fit their roles well.
The first half builds the tension and creates the characters in fine detail as we meet the irascible and exuberant Professor Challenger (Hoskins), the skeptical and stodgy Professor Summerlee (Fox), bold adventurer / hunter Lord Roxton (Ward), fledgling ambitious newspaper reporter Edward Malone (Rhys), naive beautiful jungle orphan Agnes Cluny, and her adoptive religious zealot uncle Rev. Theo Kerr (Falk).
The pacing is just right as we finally arrive at the mysterious plateau and the Rev. Kerr proves not as friendly as he first appeared. At this point the adventure side really gains momentum.
As we meet our first dinosaur in the second half, the special effects are second to none, melding both CGI and animatronics seamlessly. They were done by the same team as the well known "Walking With Dinosaurs" series so that should not be a surprise.
Filmed in New Zealand, the scenery is simply gorgeous. There are some genuinely suspenseful moments and a few surprises too. There is even a love triangle that is eventually resolved.
All the loose ends are nicely tied up at the end of film.
If the film has any serious flaws it is that the resident Indians are just too finely dressed for being on an isolated plateau and the ape-men we encounter just seem hokey. It's hard to shake the feeling that you are seeing actors in monkey suits.
The DVD extras are top notch and an entire 2nd DVD disk is devoted to "The Making Of The Lost World" and a superb documentary "Dinosaur Secrets Revealed" that traces both the history of paleontology and its interesting interaction with Hollywood. In retrospect, Hollywood was often more correct in its dinosaur portrayals than the academics thought at the time.
The film never loses the human story but the adventure is well maintained in addition. If you like dinosaurs and/or adventure films don't pass this up. I believe you will be pleasantly surprised and entertained.
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