Movie Review - The Land Of The Lost

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As a voracious consumer of pop culture, it is with more than a little trepidation that I admit to never having seen the television show Land Of The Lost.  I remember it being on when I was a kid.  It looked stupid, so I skipped over it.  Besides, who watched Saturday morning TV for live-action shows?  Saturday mornings were for cartoons in the Qbert household.  So, for me, the arrival of the film Land Of The Lost brings with it absolutely no nostalgia.  I will not be aware of any clever cameos nor will I pick up on any sly references to the original’s catchphrases (assuming, of course, that it had any).  Nope, it’s just a Will Ferrell movie for me.  And man, is it a bad one.

Ferrell plays quantum paleontologist Rick Marshall.  Marshall believes that he has devised a way to travel sideways in time and travel to place where past, present and future meet.  Of course, that makes no sense whatsoever.  But who cares?  We just want to see Will Ferrell and Danny McBride (as Will Stanton) get chased by dinosaurs and sleestacks.  That you will see…and see and see and see.   For all of its manic energy, it’s a fairly meandering story.  Something about helping one lizard-like alien stop another lizard-like alien from taking over earth.  In between thye encounter sleestacks, dinosaurs and giant bugs. 

The movie is an exercise in tedium.  None of the jokes work.  It’s dumbfounding that a movie can consist almost entirely of Will Ferrell and Danny McBride and yet not be remotely funny.  And it’s a surprisingly raunchy film.  Don’t let the fact that this movie is based on children’s television show fool you; this is not for kids.  Even if you’re a parent that’s not too uptight about things (which I am), you’ll be in for some very awkward moments.  The film is full of jokes referencing masturbation, “wetness”, sleestacks having sex and an extended scene in which Marshall, Will and Cha-Ka (a sort of man-ape) are tripping on some kind of Land Of The Lost narcotic while contemplating an interspecies homosexual relationship.  It’s hard to figure just who exactly this movie is for.  While kids are unaware of the property, their parents aren’t.  Surely there are going to be unwitting parents who have a warm sense of nostalgia for the original series that bring their kids.  They are going to be in for quite a shock.

Of course, all that would be forgivable if any of it were funny.

It’s not.

On a scale of 1 to 10, with Jurassic Park being a 10 and Theodore Rex being a 1, Land Of The Lost gets a 3.

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