THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT (1974)

THE FILM

FILM DIRECTOR: Kevin Connor

SCREENWRITER: Michael Moorcock, James Cawthorn

FILM STARS: Doug McClure, John McEnery, Susan Penhaligon, Keith Barron, Anthony Ainley, Godfrey James, Declan Mulholland, Roy Holder, Andrew McCulloch, Ron Pember, Brian Hall, Peter Sproule, Steve James

COUNTRY: GB / USA

THIS BOOK

AUTHOR: Edgar Rice Burroughs

TYPE: Novel

PUBLISHER: Tandem

THIS EDITION PUBLISHED: 1975

COUNTRY: Great Britain

COVER: Paperback

THE ORIGINAL BOOK

ORIGINAL AUTHOR: As Above

YEAR FIRST PUBLISHED: 1918

ORIGINAL BOOK TITLE: The film title

NOTES

GENRE: Sci Fi

WORDS: While the term “science fiction” had not yet been coined in the days before the First World War there were authors beginning to write works that would clearly fit into that genre: Frenchman Jules Verne (1828-1905), Englishman H. G. Wells (1866-1946), and American Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875-1950). All three would set the boundaries of science fiction.

All three would write adventures with various degrees of fantasy and science fiction in them.

Though I have read mostly the last two, the charm in their storytelling comes from the application of the then known science to an adventure narrative.

So why can’t you have dinosaurs on an island in the 20th century who don’t know they are supposed to be extinct?

And, lets face it what a great title … The Land That Time Forgot.

The title is a synopsis of the book and it has a bum bum bum dramatical musical quality to it.

The “lost world” story was popular at the turn of the last century when science was banging on the door of tall tales and superstition for ordinary folk – with novels such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World (1912) and Jules Verne’s The Mysterious Island (1874) and Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864), H. Rider Haggard She: A History of Adventure (1887), A. Meritt’s The Face in the Abyss (1931), Dwellers in the Mirage (1932), The Moon Pool (1918), and H. P. Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness (1931).

It’s fun and plausible and it’s only a short hop from here to Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park (1990)

I’m more of a Tarzan man and I love author Burroughs. He is less scientific than H.G. Wells but he nevertheless wrote adventures (like Tarzan – a baby is raised by apes in Africa) and sci fi (like the John Carter novels – a Civil War veteran who gets transported to Mars or another planet called Barsoom) with a basis on the real, or the plausible.

He was quite happy to mix the known with the knowable with the plausible and potential.

They read well and are a lot of fun even though the “science” is no longer accurate or even “science’ anymore … and Burroughs likes the setting (or can make easy use of it) because he returned to the “lost world” idea with dinosaurs on Tarzan the Terrible (1921) and then again without dinosaurs in Tarzan at the Earth’s Core (1929).

Here the story starts out as a wartime sea adventure, before hitting the lost world where dinosaurs and people exist side by side. It’s fun.

And so is the film from 1974. I first saw it as a kid in the 70s (I have a recollection they showed it to us in school on a projector – but I could be wrong) but as a kid in the 70s it was cheer out loud fun. As an adult I watched it with my young kids and it is still fun though the rubber monsters, fake backdrops, puppets and other assorted pre CGI effects are noticeable (to me, kids don’t notice) but I don’t care because there was effort put in.

What I like best is by the time I had become an adult I had become a Doug McClure fan. Interestingly, another favourite of mine, Stuart Whitman, was to have starred: “Amicus originally wanted to cast Doug McClure in the lead, but he refused, so they signed Stuart Whitman. Then Samuel Z. Arkoff of American International Pictures came on board as co-financers, providing the bulk of the budget, but would only make the film if McClure was cast. He changed his mind and agreed to do the film”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Land_That_Time_Forgot_(1974_film)

McClure is great because in most of his roles he is committed but never seems to take anything too seriously. He is professional but with  a knowing wink to the audience as he does here which is the perfect position to take when your character is on an island with British and German sailors, primitive man and dinosaurs all competing with each other.

The film’s director Kevin Connor said: “Doug was a great asset. In fight scenes he was especially good due to his hours of American TV action films. He knew exactly where the camera was at all times and threw punches precisely where the effect would work for the screen. He was always co-operative and came up with many ideas”. No amount of stage work will give you that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Land_That_Time_Forgot_(1974_film)

The rest of the cast are British (a UK-US co-production) with pretty Susan Penhaligon standing out, though everyone looks 1974 groomed for a film set around 1918.

The screenplay was co-written by English sci-fi author Michael Moorcock (The Fireclown, aka The Winds of Limbo (1965), The Ice Schooner (1966), The Black Corridor (1969), The Final Programme (1969) A Cure for Cancer (1971)The Alchemist’s Question (1984)).

He was perhaps a good fit for the material giving it a little more science meat for the 70s but maintaining the fantasy elements. Moorcock who writes in heroic fantasy fiction a lot has mentioned that “The Mastermind of Mars” by Edgar Rice Burroughs is one of the first non-juvenile books that he read before beginning primary school.

He said this about the film: “I was very lucky in being given the authority by Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc to write a movie as close to the first part of the book as possible, but even then the producer managed to stick a volcano in, which I had insisted not be in the movie (making it difficult to continue the series according to the books!). Jim Cawthorn broke the book down into scenes and I wrote the script. We used the German submarine commander as the biologist on board who could explain the theme, rather than have a stereotypical U-boat German of the period (WW1) when the books were written. Even then his dialogue had to be overdubbed by Anton Dolin (I think) who had a rather more convincing voice than the actor who played the commander. Given the budget, I thought they did pretty well, using glove-puppet dinosaurs mostly. They got the atmosphere of the sub finding the secret way into the island very well, I thought. My main trouble with the dinosaurs was the fixed wing pterodactyl and there was also a certain amount of dimensional problems here and there. All things considered, however, I thought it came out pretty well. Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc for some reason didn’t exercise the same control over the sequel. After learning what the producers intended, Jim and I left the project, whereupon one of the producers took it over”. https://www.michaelmoorcock.net/forum/q-a/q-a-%E2%97%A6-questions-for-mike-news/1793-the-land-that-time-forgot

Co author James Cawthorn (1929–2008) who was also a fantasy illustrator and comics artist often collaborated with Moorcock.

The film was a big enough hit for the production company Amicus (distributed in the United States by American International Pictures) was to make two more Burroughs adaptations, The People That Time Forgot (1977), a direct sequel to this film starring Patrick Wayne, Sarah Douglas and McClure in a cameo, and At the Earth’s Core (1976), also with McClure (in a different role), Peter Cushing, and Caroline Munro.

Will I watch it again? yes, with a bottle of red at my side.

TRIVIA

• The film (or book) was remade in 2009 under the same title though sometimes called Dinosaur Island and it is no fun. Still low budget but all CGI.

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