A Saturday morning tradition — the coffee is unforgivable, but the conversation makes up for it. Somewhat.

German postcard by Kunst und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn. Photo: Stiftung Deutsche Kinemathek Berlin. Carole Bouquet and Fernando Rey in Cet obscur objet du désir / That Obscure Object of Desire (Luis Buñuel, 1977).

Carole Bouquet (1957) is a French actress and fashion model. She is best known for her role as Bond Girl Melina Havelock in the 12th James Bond film, For Your Eyes Only (1981). In the following years, she became the face of the French fashion house Chanel. She also starred in Cet obscur objet du désir/That Obscure Object of Desire (1977), and Trop belle pour toi/Too Beautiful for You (1990), for which she won a César Award.

Carole Bouquet was born in 1957 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Seine (now Hauts-de-Seine]) France. Carole and her older sister Laurence were brought up by their father, Robert Bouquet, a civil engineer, who was separated from their mother when Carole was 3. She was educated at a convent school. She studied briefly at the Sorbonne University but decided to try acting. In 1976, she joined the CNSAD (the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art of Paris) for a three-year course, but during the first year, she met director Luis Buñuel through a casting session. She left school for a starring role opposite Fernando Rey in Buñuel's French-Spanish drama Cet obscur objet du désir/That Obscure Object of Desire (Luis Buñuel, 1977). She shared the lead role of Conchita with Ángela Molina. Bouquet won rave reviews for her film debut on both sides of the Atlantic, and her image as an “icon of icy beauty” was born. She left for New York to perfect her English and was chaperoned by Andy Warhol. On her return to France, she took part in a series of films, including the black comedy Buffet froid/Cold Buffet (Bertrand Blier, 1979), starring Gérard Depardieu. She was interviewed for the lead role in the James Bond film Moonraker (John Glen, 1979) but lost the role to Lois Chiles. Nevertheless, she impressed director John Glen who cast her in the lead for the next Bond film For Your Eyes Only (John Glen, 1981). She received good notices from critics and filmgoers for her performance as a revenge-seeking heroine. The producers excluded her from the film's publicity tour because of an earlier interview she gave where she said Roger Moore was old enough to be her father rather than a romantic lead, due to the thirty-year age difference.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Carole Bouquet became the face of Chanel, taking over from Catherine Deneuve. She embodied the image of No 5 perfume in two commercials directed by Ridley Scott and then Bettina Rheims. Bouquet was the girlfriend of late producer Jean-Pierre Rassam between 1978 and 1985. They have a son, Dimitri Rassam (1982), who is also a producer. She had a second son, Louis Giacobetti (1988) with photographer Francis Giacobetti. From 1991 to 1996, she was married to immunologist Jacques Leibowitch. In 1984, she appeared alongside Coluche, Ugo Tognazzi and Michel Serrault in the French-Italian comedy Le Bon Roi Dagobert/Dagobert (Dino Risi, 1984). That year, she was nominated for a César for Best Supporting Actress in Rive droite, rive gauche/Right Bank, Left Bank (Philippe Labro, 1984), alongside Gérard Depardieu. In 1990, she won the César for Best Actress for her role in Trop belle pour toi/Too Beautiful for You (Bertrand Blier, 1990) opposite Gérard Depardieu and Josiane Balasko. She starred with Francesco Nuti in the Italian romantic comedy Donne con le gonne/Women in Skirts (Francesco Nuti, 1991), the highest-grossing Italian film in Italy in 1992. In 1997, she played a passionate Lucie Aubrac in Claude Berri's biographical film Lucie Aubrac, alongside Daniel Auteuil. She was engaged to Depardieu from 2003 to 2005. She had been with him since 1997 except for a break up of a few weeks in the summer of 2002. In 2004, she had a small role in the US television series Sex and the City. In 2011, she became a grandmother, when her son Dimitri Rassam and his wife, Russian model Masha Novoselova had their first child. Carole Bouquet starred on TV in the Mini-Series Rosemary's Baby (Agnieszka Holland, 2014) with Zoe Saldana, played a serial killer in La Mante/The Mantis (Alexandre Laurent, 2017) and a therapist in the series En thérapie/In Therapy (Éric Toledano, Olivier Nakache, 2021-2022). In the cinema, she appeared in such well-received films as the drama Impardonnables/Unforgivable (André Téchiné, 2011) starring André Dussollier, and the comedy Une heure de tranquillité/Do Not Disturb (Patrice Leconte, 2014), starring Christian Clavier. On 21 May 2014, Bouquet formalised her relationship with Philippe Sereys de Rothschild on the red carpet of the 37th Festival de Cannes, of which she was one of the jury members. She has been running a winery, Maison Carole Bouquet, on the island of Pantelleria in the Strait of Sicily since 2005.

Sources: Pedro Borges (IMDb), Wikipedia (Dutch, French and English) and IMDb.

And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

This is not my photo; this is a photoshop creation from a source photograph and a source illustration, both released under Creative Commons.

I was inspired to create this monstrosity after one of those online AI/ML image generator tools took the prompt "Bottle of HP Lovecraft Sauce" and returned an image derived from *tabasco* sauce. Unforgivable.

Original photo is "Breakfast Room" by thirtyfootscrew: www.flickr.com/photos/thirtyfootscrew/3378694699/

Shoggoth illustration provided by CaptainSpunky, although they say the author is unknown so it might be an unfortunate case of attribution-washing. www.flickr.com/photos/captainspunky/5102979235/

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

Hello Friend,

(Greeting's to you and your entire family)

Let me start by introducing my self my names are Ms Blake Bianca from

(Ottawa Canada) but i based in Burkina Faso West Africa as a business

woman dealing on gold exportation. I have been suffering from ovarian

cancer disease for some years now and the doctor says that i have just few

days to live, Now that am about ending the race without any family

members.

I have $3 Million US DOLLARS in Africa Development Bank (ADB) Burkina Faso

wish i instructed the bank to transfer the money to St Andrews Missionary

Home in Burkina Faso yet my mind is not at rest because i also have $4.5

Million US Dollars at ECOBANK here in Burkina Faso wish i have also

instructed the bank to transfer the money to you as soon as you apply for

the fund when i have gone.

Here in my sick bed the illness is increasing seriously day by day and my

eyes are filled with tears, since the doctor stated that

i will give up anytime from now so i don't know if i will be there

tomorrow then i wrote this letter with the help of a nurse here at the

hospital.

I want you to take 50% of the $4.5 million Dollars in ECOBANK and give

50% to Orphanages in your country in order for my soul to rest in peace.

You are to contact the bank through this email address

(ecobankbf@pisem.net) immediately you receive this message. I wish you

good luck and God protection.

Remain Bless,

Ms Blake Bianca

msbianca@gmail.com

thank you kind

generous mrs blake

i know your impending

death is at stake

my heart breaks

$4.5 million Dollars

in goodwill kindness

i take ..good use

of it i shall make

though i feel guilty

whipping my conscience

my thirst for humanity

i slake .. with your

money i will open

orphanages for

the children of

prostitutes

for whom my

heart aches

orphaned because

of deeds of lustful

snakes ..children

why did they make

result of orgasms

fake ,,illegitimate

children of rogue

politicians middle

eastern sheiks

darkness at daybreak

their cries for justice

for years kept me awake

sex is nothing but

forcibly unforgivable

give and take

After party i could take a picture to this unforgivable moment . ;)

On January 11, 2019, for the ninth year running, I was in Washington, D.C. for the annual vigil outside the White House calling for the closure of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, on the anniversary of its opening. On January 11 this year, the prison had been open for 17 unforgivably long years — unforgivable because it is completely unacceptable for a country like the US, which claims to respect the rule of law, to hold prisoners indefinitely without charge or trial, as is the case at Guantanamo. And, of course, the situation has been particularly intolerable since Donald Trump became president, because he has no intention of releasing anyone under any circumstances, and, fundamentally, exercises complete power over the prisoners, who, this year, I described as his personal prisoners.

This photo shows members of Witness Against Torture, whose campaigners fast in the run-up to the anniversary and hold actions across the capital dressed in orange jumpsuits, during the vigil.

The vigil was organized by over a dozen rights groups including Amnesty International USA, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Close Guantanamo (which I co-founded in 2012 with the US attorney Tom Wilner), the Justice For Muslims Collective, the World Can’t Wait and Witness Against Torture.

For a video of the vigil outside the White House, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/01/16/video-and-radio-feat...

For a video of the New America panel discussion, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/01/13/on-my-annual-us-visi...

For Amnesty International USA, see: www.amnestyusa.org

For the Center for Constitutional Rights, see: ccrjustice.org

For Close Guantanamo, see: www.closeguantanamo.org

For the Justice For Muslims Collective, see: justiceformuslims.org

For Witness Against Torture, see: www.witnessagainsttorture.com

For the World Can’t Wait, see: www.worldcantwait.net

For my most interesting photos, see: www.flickriver.com/photos/andyworthington/popular-interes...

Unforgivable to have not gotten this guy's name; he's probably a famous banjo player--- the Old Town School of Folk Music is right there. I was suffering from Sudden Hunger Derangement Syndrome and had to find food.

unforgivable!!! a proof that Hinata actually likes Sasuke

One of the main attractions I have appreciated in Landmannalaugar was the geothermal hot spring located near the camp site at the feet of the petrified lava field Laugahraun. In particular chilling out with a cold beer in those soothing crystal-clear waters after a quite challenging 8-hours hiking has been priceless! Both hot and cold waters coming from beneath the lava field converge into a natural pool through two small streams. You can spend hours lazily swimming from a spot to another enjoying all the most subtle changes in temperature. Furthermore you can profit of the luminous icelandic summer nights for a midnight bath under a starred sky! It will be an unforgivable experience! In contrast to the well-known Blue Lagoon Geothermal Spa, the water in Landmannalaugar is free from silica minerals, that even if they are supposed to be healthy for your skin, they will unpleasantly dehydrate it (because of the osmotic gradient).

Press "L" to see it large on black.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

This is an interesting picture that brings up as many questions as it does answers.

This is a photograph illustration from the book “Story of the Lopez Family, A page from the history of the war in the Philippines” copyrighted in 1903 and published in 1904 by the J. H. West Company of Boston USA. That dates this picture to 1903-1904 or before.

A 1907 publication date map that I have shows that the Manila Bay Luneta extension reclaimed land was not there when the picture was taken. The filled in reclaimed land from Manila Bay is where the Elks Club, Army & Navy Club, and Manila Hotel were later built and it is not there in this picture.

On the left is the Legazpi-Urdaneta Monument that was found in storage by the American’s after they took control of the Philippines. The Americans erected it where it is today but I can’t find a firm date when it was erected. But it apparently had to be erected by 1904.

Little is shown on Luneta Park except the bandstand that was close to where the Rizal Monument would be placed. There are no taller buildings to the south of Luneta Park in the Ermita district.

Notice how there is little remaining to Luneta Beach.

Something is on my mind about the Legazpi-Urdaneta Monument today. I believe it is the City of Manila that should be caring for it but they are not. It is vulnerable and is basically unprotected. In recent years it has suffered from vandalism with the theft of the some of the bronze work. The last time I was there some of the remaining bronze shows where someone has pried on damaging the monument but was unsuccessful in stealing the bronze. The next time I am back I expect it to be gone. This is an unforgivable shame but the people whose responsibility is to protect this important beautiful historical monument just don’t care about heritage.

Too many people died this day they didn't deserve to die so soon that just proves how evil people can be its unforgivable but we just have to keep going our path might be unclear but we just have to keep trusting God to help us on the way.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

As Kenny and I stepped into the Lucky 7 Canteen on Bath Street, the first thing to strike us was the smell of fish, but neither of us thought much of it at the time. We sat down, admired the shabby-chic decor, and I ordered the coq au vin with Kenny opting for mussels. The food took a while to arrive, but we were in no hurry and, when mine did arrive - a beautifully presented pot on a wooden board - I thought it would be worth the wait. Sadly, I was disappointed. The chicken was decent, but the potatoes were undercooked and the juices were bland: they seemed to hint at beautiful flavours but didn't deliver, as though someone had taken a very nice sauce and watered it down a lot. It was disappointing, but I was hungry and I ate all of it.

Kenny's mussels, however, were worse than disappointing. To undercook potatoes is a minor error, and a bland sauce is, well, disappointing; but to serve mussels that were as past their best as Kenny's were is unforgivable. He ate them without enjoyment but, having tried one, if I had been given them I would have sent them back, something I've never done in a restaurant before. I asked Kenny to move the plate onto which he was putting the empty shells away to the side, because every so often I was catching the smell of it and it was disgusting.

I had eaten in the Lucky 7 once before, and on that occasion I'd had mussels which, while not particularly memorable, were not bad at all. But, on this occasion, even the smell should have been enough to let the chef know that something wasn't right.

All mains at the Lucky 7 are £7, which is very reasonable. The Butterfly and Pig across the road may be more expensive (but not necessarily so: one of my favourite dishes there is only £5.95) but it's worth paying those few extra pounds for a lot of extra quality. Otherwise, just buy a nice steak and cook it at home, as I wish I'd done instead tonight.

There are a few restaurants I won't go back to because they charge exceptional prices for mediocre food, but Lucky 7 Canteen joins The Red Onion among places in Glasgow I won't eat in because a meal was worse than mediocre: it was bad.

(update: on the assurance of a friend, I ate here again in November 2011, and things were much improved.)

Glasgow, 2010

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

29 November, 2015 – Risso’s Dolphins Slaughter – at Taiji, Japan

No mercy has been shown by the killers of Taiji today, as a small pod of six Risso’s dolphins were brutally slaughtered for consumption. Seven of the eleven banger boats that left the harbor this morning, quickly and efficiently drove the pod into the killing cove. The remaining four were not seen during the drive.

The six Risso’s were netted into the cove, although the pod was huddled together, some managed to break away into the outer nets. One of the Risso’s in the inner nets, desperately tried to swim through the nets to get to his loved ones, but as we know the Taiji killers are notorious for their unforgivable cruelty. A diver conspired with two skiffs to trap the dolphin by tying a rope around the tail and dragged the terrified victim under the tarps to certain death. Cove Guardians reported that no trainers were seen in the cove, it is not common for Risso’s to be selected for captivity.

Destruction and devastation can happen quickly in Taiji, as the killers again prove that they are able to completely erase a once happy family of six Risso’s dolphins within 2 hours.

Today's Livetream is archived at livestream.seashepherd.org/

Sites for more information :

Sea Shepherd Cove Guardians Page (official)

www.facebook.com/SeaShepherdCoveGuardiansOfficialPage

Cove Guardians

www.seashepherd.org/cove-guardians

Photo: Sea Shepherd

"Unforgivably wicked, it mocked the very idea of being restrained."

Heavy binding set complete and for sale!

marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LH-Heavy-Binding-Sets/11809453

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Ave%20Maria/38/34/2991

On January 11, 2019, for the ninth year running, I was in Washington, D.C. for the annual vigil outside the White House calling for the closure of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, on the anniversary of its opening. On January 11 this year, the prison had been open for 17 unforgivably long years — unforgivable because it is completely unacceptable for a country like the US, which claims to respect the rule of law, to hold prisoners indefinitely without charge or trial, as is the case at Guantanamo. And, of course, the situation has been particularly intolerable since Donald Trump became president, because he has no intention of releasing anyone under any circumstances, and, fundamentally, exercises complete power over the prisoners, who, this year, I described as his personal prisoners.

This photo shows members of Witness Against Torture, whose campaigners fast in the run-up to the anniversary and hold actions across the capital dressed in orange jumpsuits, walking towards the White House after a procession from the New America think-tank, where I had been part of a panel discussion about Guantanamo, also featuring the attorney Tom Wilner (with whom I co-founded the Close Guantanamo campaign in 2012) and Laura Pitter of Human Rights Watch.

The vigil was organized by over a dozen rights groups including Amnesty International USA, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Close Guantanamo, the Justice For Muslims Collective, the World Can’t Wait and Witness Against Torture.

For a video of the vigil outside the White House, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/01/16/video-and-radio-feat...

For a video of the New America panel discussion, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/01/13/on-my-annual-us-visi...

For Amnesty International USA, see: www.amnestyusa.org

For the Center for Constitutional Rights, see: ccrjustice.org

For Close Guantanamo, see: www.closeguantanamo.org

For the Justice For Muslims Collective, see: justiceformuslims.org

For Witness Against Torture, see: www.witnessagainsttorture.com

For the World Can’t Wait, see: www.worldcantwait.net

For my most interesting photos, see: www.flickriver.com/photos/andyworthington/popular-interes...

French postcard by Editions LMP, no. SH 006. Photo: Studio Harcourt, 1995.

Carole Bouquet (1957) is a French actress and fashion model. She is best known for her role as Bond Girl Melina Havelock in the 12th James Bond film, For Your Eyes Only (1981). In the following years, she became the face of the French fashion house Chanel. She also starred in Cet obscur objet du désir/That Obscure Object of Desire (1977), and Trop belle pour toi/Too Beautiful for You (1990), for which she won a César Award.

Carole Bouquet was born in 1957 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Seine (now Hauts-de-Seine]) France. Carole and her older sister Laurence were brought up by their father, Robert Bouquet, a civil engineer, who was separated from their mother when Carole was 3. She was educated at a convent school. She studied briefly at the Sorbonne University but decided to try acting. In 1976, she joined the CNSAD (the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art of Paris) for a three-year course, but during the first year, she met director Luis Buñuel through a casting session. She left school for a starring role opposite Fernando Rey in Buñuel's French-Spanish drama Cet obscur objet du désir/That Obscure Object of Desire (1977). She shared the lead role of Conchita with Ángela Molina. Bouquet won rave reviews for her film debut on both sides of the Atlantic, and her image as an “icon of icy beauty” was born. She left for New York to perfect her English and was chaperoned by Andy Warhol. On her return to France, she took part in a series of films, including the black comedy Buffet froid/Cold Buffet (Bertrand Blier, 1979), starring Gérard Depardieu. She was interviewed for the lead role in the James Bond film Moonraker (John Glen, 1979) but lost the role to Lois Chiles. Nevertheless, she impressed director John Glen who cast her in the lead for the next Bond film For Your Eyes Only (John Glen, 1981). She received good notices from critics and filmgoers for her performance as a revenge-seeking heroine. The producers excluded her from the film's publicity tour because of an earlier interview she gave where she said Roger Moore was old enough to be her father rather than a romantic lead, due to the thirty-year age difference.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Carole Bouquet became the face of Chane, taking over from Catherine Deneuve. She embodied the image of No 5 perfume in two commercials directed by Ridley Scott and then Bettina Rheims. Bouquet was the girlfriend of late producer Jean-Pierre Rassam between 1978 and 1985. They have a son, Dimitri Rassam (1982), who is also a producer. She had a second son, Louis Giacobetti (1988) with photographer Francis Giacobetti. From 1991 to 1996, she was married to immunologist Jacques Leibowitch. In 1984, she appeared alongside Coluche, Ugo Tognazzi and Michel Serrault in the French-Italian comedy Le Bon Roi Dagobert/Dagobert (Dino Risi, 1984). That year, she was nominated for a César for Best Supporting Actress in Rive droite, rive gauche/Right Bank, Left Bank (Philippe Labro, 1984), alongside Gérard Depardieu. In 1990, she won the César for Best Actress for her role in Trop belle pour toi/Too Beautiful for You (Bertrand Blier, 1990) opposite Gérard Depardieu and Josiane Balasko. She starred with Francesco Nuti in the Italian romantic comedy Donne con le gonne/Women in Skirts (Francesco Nuti, 1991), the highest-grossing Italian film in Italy in 1992. In 1997, she played a passionate Lucie Aubrac in Claude Berri's biographical film Lucie Aubrac, alongside Daniel Auteuil. She was engaged to Depardieu from 2003 to 2005. She had been with him since 1997 except for a break up of a few weeks in the summer of 2002. In 2004, she had a small role in the US television series Sex and the City. In 2011, she became a grandmother, when her son Dimitri Rassam and his wife, Russian model Masha Novoselova had their first child. Carole Bouquet starred on TV in the Mini-Series Rosemary's Baby (Agnieszka Holland, 2014) with Zoe Saldana, played a serial killer in La Mante/The Mantis (Alexandre Laurent, 2017) and a therapist in the series En thérapie/In Therapy (Éric Toledano, Olivier Nakache, 2021-2022). In the cinema, she appeared in such well-received films as the drama Impardonnables/Unforgivable (André Téchiné, 2011) starring André Dussollier, and the comedy Une heure de tranquillité/Do Not Disturb (Patrice Leconte, 2014), starring Christian Clavier. On 21 May 2014, Bouquet formalised her relationship with Philippe Sereys de Rothschild on the red carpet of the 37th Festival de Cannes, of which she was one of the jury members. She has been running a winery, Maison Carole Bouquet, on the island of Pantelleria in the Strait of Sicily since 2005.

Sources: Pedro Borges (IMDb), Wikipedia (Dutch, French and English) and IMDb.

And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.

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Decided to kick off the Friday with a quick self shot and some random facts about me... Tag your it (Challenging you to post 12 random facts about you)

1. When I was very little I had a crazy obsession with stickers. I was constantly getting in trouble over them not coming off of things they shouldn't be on in the first place. I got some really cool ones out of a cereal box and thought they would look great on this expensive wooden chest of my mother's. My mom didn’t share in my belief. In fact she was pissed! But to this day she still has the chest with the stickers intact. That’s my earliest form of art expression that's still around today.

2. I use to be Chuck E. Cheese! In that hot a$$ mascot suit, I felt like I had a secret identity. When I got out of it I would think kids and people would still try to play (or kick me) but they didn't even know who I was.

3. I am a certificate Junky. I will sit through any course, learn any skill as long as I get a certificate for it. Hell I'm even looking forward to dying (one day) because I know I will get a certificate for it!

4. I have died in my dreams. People always tell me you cannot die in your dreams well I'm here to dispute that loud and clear!

5. I never where my favorite cologne. Unforgivable by Sean John is my FAVORITE and I have a ton of it, but the smell repulses my wife so I'm never allowed to wear it.

6. I'm a girl and I have a wife… yep

7. I hate chocolate and seafood. Never met anyone that hates them both as well, except my mother.

8. I'm the first one in my family to receive a college degree. (Go figure it offered a certificate)

9. I love role playing. Like LOVE it! (TMI: especially in the bedroom). Though I don't like "drama" in my life.

10. I have OCSD. (Obsessive Compulsive Shoe Disorder). Timbs and Air Force I's are my weakness. I believe shoes can make or break anything you wear. Even on my "bum" days as long as I have on fresh kicks I feel a sense of confidence.

11. Call me what you will I believe the "Delete" button was the best form of technology ever invented. Do NOT ask me why!

12. I just discovered I was type INFJ personality which is the rarest in the world (making up only 1% of population). That's right I can officially say you won't meet anybody like me. hehe… Want to know your personality type? Find out here

A lot of you know this man as Aiden Lexenstar and he's built quite the reputation for himself in the SL porn world. But for the last year and a half I've known the real man, albeit under another name. About a year ago I found out about Aiden and confronted him, of course he denied it all and as many people do when confronted with information they don't want to believe is true, I chose to put my beliefs aside and move forward with our relationship. Deep in my heart I knew the truth but the avatar disappeared from search a few days later and I told myself the worst was over and my love for him was strong enough to overcome this small obstacle. Then in November thanks to a pic done by one of my contacts, Ehl Genesis, I discovered Aiden's flickr and my world crumbled. Aiden's avatar was like the fraternal twin of the avatar of the man I knew and loved with all my heart and the storyline descriptions in the pics were things he'd said to me often. He used the same AO, wore the same sort of accessories, dressed eerily similar and even hung out with a few avs that he had known when we first got together.. which in and of itself was not much but coupled with everything else I had discovered it was all just brick after brick in the wall of truth that was coming to light. I struggled with all this information and decided to confront him again and yet again he managed to make me feel as if it was all in my head and I cried myself to sleep night after night because in my heart i knew the truth.. the man I loved and had given my heart to had betrayed me and he had betrayed me at a time when I was most vulnerable. The reason he had ample time to 'be' Aiden was because I was late in my pregnancy (when I met him I was in an unhappy marriage and had just gotten pregnant though I didn't find that out until a few wks later) and then had a baby. I was exhausted and trying my hardest to juggle it all and make sure I was still giving him all the attention he deserved but it was hard and I had to sleep sometime. Well while I slept he was out building a name for himself in the sl porn industry. He was the worst kind of selfish at a time where I needed his understanding and loyalty the most and that part is hard to get past. For the longest time I struggled with how to unearth the truth once and for all. At first I decided to bring MY secret alt out of retirement, I mean come on most of us have alts and some that are complete secrets, and use her to get to Aiden. This is where Lyra came into play. The problem was I was too damn exhausted at the end of the day to stay up, log on as Lyra and be sneaky lol. I did get Aiden to friend Lyra and that gave me a modicum of satisfaction but in the end I realized it was gonna take me ages to get the truth this way so I had to change tactics (and knowing now that the av was shared by him AND his brother I'm damn glad I decided against my original plan. I mean how fucked up would it have been if I had pixel banged my bf's brother thinkin it was him in alt form LOL. Sheesh I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone). Finally I decided to use the old cop tactic of pretending to have more evidence than you really do and a few nights ago I got up the nerve to confront him for the last time. It didn't take much, he confessed rather easily and I know why. He knows what he did was wrong and he wanted me to catch him plain and simple. And I did. And now comes the hardest part of all.. healing. You may think I'm a fool or that I have very little self respect for myself but you would be wrong. I just love him. Unconditionally and with everything that I am and no matter what has happened and what anyone else thinks I KNOW that he loves me too. And since the confrontation he has done nothing but prove to me how much. He is my best friend and the bond between us is so strong. There is no excuse for what he did and I hate it but I don't hate him because I feel that real love, true undying love cannot be shattered so easily and all relationships have their ups and downs and require work and you can't just give up and run for the hills anytime things get rocky. Don't get me wrong, it will take years for him to earn back my trust and even then this will always be in the back of my mind. I will forgive but I will NEVER forget. Judge me if you will, you can think I'm a fool for giving him another chance, I really don't care. What he did was wrong but to me it was not unforgivable because I know with every fiber of my being the kind of man he really is and what it comes down to is I don't want a life without him. Period. He's at his heart a good man, a kind man and a loving man. He's young and he screwed up, we all make mistakes but what matters is what you take from it. What you learn and whether you grow as a person. I believe he deserves a second chance.. but I'm gonna make him crawl through fire to get me back and this pic is just step one in his atonement. I want EVERYONE to know what he's done and who Aiden really is.. he's Cameron Batista and I love him with all my heart.

The trouble with eating seafood on the Gulf Coast, is you always end up making a trade-off.

You can pick. Amazing Seafood. Outstanding Atmosphere/Location. Great Service. Reasonable Cost.

These are all available from Gulf Coast restaurants but you can usually only pick one, not all of them.

We knowingly headed to such a trade-off, yesterday as we went to The Hangout in Gulf Shores after a disappointing portrait session. (More on that session, in a later post) We received our pager, a 30 minute wait-time estimate and settled in for some overpriced, mediocre food in a playful atmosphere and great location. That's what we've come to expect from The Hangout and what we were prepared for. An hour later, we received an updated seating estimate of another 30-40 minutes. Annoyed, (and a little confused by the massive crowds on a Monday) we departed The Hangout and set out for something else.

What we found, redeemed the evening for us.

Located near the marina office & outfitter store on the West Side of The Wharf in Orange Beach, on the Intracoastal Canal, sits Bimini Bobs. I'll summarize and say: It is awesome. Go There.

When I kept Stargazer at The Wharf, this location was "Shuckers Restaurant". I spent many hours at Shuckers for lunch on days when I would work from my sailboat. Shuckers was really decent overall, though they had the ironic distinction of having terrible oysters, which -- given their name -- would have been unforgivable had the other food not been pretty decent.

Shuckers was a "very good atmoshphere", "decent food", "okay service", "good price" sort of place on the trade off-scale. They moved.

What we found at Bimini Bobs was a cozy, relaxed atmosphere, whose quietness was a welcome respite from the obnoixous touristy-ness you find down on the Gulf-front. The table/ dining areas are broken up with these really comfortable table / chair sets that really makes the layout of the restaurant feel less restaurant-y and more "just chillin' with my buddies at the docks"-y.

"A Excellent Atmosphere", "Awesome Food", "Epic Service", "Great Price" sort of place now occupies the dockside restaurant area of The Wharf. Bimini Bob's. Seriously, go there.

The service was fantastic. There may have been more employees than customer seats, actually, though I didn't count. We gave them plenty of opportunity to be annoyed with us, showing up only 30 minutes before close and my kids' usual liesure dining pace. (Color some... eat a bite... color some more.. eat a bite.) Hell, they are my kids and *I* get annoyed with how they eat. My phone vibrating every three seconds with some professional emergency here and there didn't help either.

But the good service just kept coming. Genuine smiles, attentive service. We weren't rushed, our food was timed appropriately and the drinks stayed full.

The food was great. The appetizer combo tray of hummice, smoked crab dip & shrimp salad had complimentary flavors and plenty of good pita chips to eat with it. Fish was light and flakey, not overcooked, with a desirable crust. My wife's shrimp, the kid's burgers -- all great.

And the price was less-than-expected. For a trip to The Hangout, 2 adults, 2 kids, we where looking at $90 if I didn't order a beer with the meal, before gratuity. Same party at Bimini Bobs, an appetizer, entrees and two beers we came in right at half-that.

The new layout of the restaurant adds or improves by having fewer tables and more "chill" areas like those pictured here. Not sure if the Marina Company or Restaurant is to thank for this but either way -- it is awesome and works to create a very nice environment right on the Canal, overlooking the fuel docks and Marina.

Look, I don't get paid / this isn't sponsored but when I see somebody do something well, I like to see them get credit. And the folks at Bimini Bobs did a great job of serving us a great meal in a very coastal-chill atmosphere after a frankly otherwise crappy day. :) Did I mention, you should go check it out?

..from the blog post: goo.gl/UxlMr

Since I have not uploaded anything for a while and the weather has been so bad I thought I would raid the archives for a couple of uploads. This was taken with my old Olympus back in 2005 and although I don't really do a lot of plant shots I thought it was worth the time to upload it. This is straight out of the camera with no processing..which I didn't do then anyway.

This old lily finally bit the dust this year after repeated attacks from lily beetles and unforgivable neglect.

Biggs, or ''Bags'', the traveling merchant.

I'm really sorry for my lazyness the last couple of months. It is unforgivable (don't really care what you think, I'm asking my self for forgivness. Fools q:)

ps: I know there is a strap missing but I didn't care. smaller than A5. don't know exactly how small

SOLD

Committed the unforgivable sin of a messed up frame. I waited quite a while for this one, but there was no opportunity popping up. Decided to give up, and started heading back. Few seconds later, I noticed that the opportunity is coming screaming at me. Rushed to the place with the tripod and snapped without realizing the messed up frame.

Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B. I'm sorry, Aaliyah. Wow. I guess I don't know where to begin. I really don't. A part of me wants to completely, through written word, obliterate the Lifetime channel (and I will), and another part of me feels incredibly sad. The film was not even funny! How can you make an unfunny comedy? There is so much to be upset about, it's not even funny. Well...I'm gonna try and make it funny. I mean, Missy Elliot looked like a crackhead in the film at one point, so I am going to at least try and make it funny. I mean, comedies are supposed to...

Oh, wait...

Okay. Nope. Scratch that. Sorry. I was just informed that Aaliyah: The Princess of R&B was not intended to be a comedic film. That makes this so much worse. Yeah. F*** Lifetime.

If you were one of the horribly unlucky souls that watched this Lifetime movie last night, first, may God have mercy on your soul and I sincerely hope you find the strength to carry on, and second, you already know how truly, truly bad Lifetime done did. They done did bad, y'all. Seriously. #LifetimeDoneDidBad. Please make that happen.

For those of you who were fortunate enough to not see it, perhaps you were actually watching a good movie, I will break it down for you. In every possible conceivable component of filmmaking: acting, casting, directing, the script, the dialogue, the singing, the overall storytelling in this film...was simply atrocious. The story in this film is just rushed, no two ways about it. We're quickly bouncing from one event in her life, to the next, with no organic fluidity in-between.

The pacing of this narrative structure folks, is completely off. Hell, there is no structure. It's clear that they are just dancing around the rights issues, so none of Aaliyah's music can be played (in a biographical film about her life as a musical artist). We get no sense of why she fell in love with music, her process for writing songs, or even how she behaved as an actress on movie sets. It's all skipped. So we're literally watching a highlight reel of her life.

You and R. Kelly are dating. Now you're not. You're gonna go meet with Tim and Missy about producing your next album. Now the album is done. Now you're an actress. Now you're dating Dame Dash. Now you're gonna be in the Matrix sequals. It was absurd. This character has no real arch, what the hell happened in this movie? Other than the writers telling us how great she is, rather than showing us.

The fact that Lifetime did not even speak to Aaliyah's family about the production in any capacity whatsoever, especially when the family was protesting against the film, is unforgivable. That is truly disgusting, and I'm not being sarcastic right now. That is wrong. That is egregiously disrespectful. For you to continue production without the blessing of the family, without even talking to them about the production, and then of top of it, make a movie that is nothing but ass? I'm not talking about booty, of any sexual nature, folks. This movie is ass. This is the Kim Kardashian fat-ass of television movie biopics. Better yet, it is the Nicki Minaj booty of television biopic films: it's not truthful, it did not put in nearly enough effort, and it thinks it actually did accomplish all of the above and then some. Then again, Lifetime has never really had a good track record with biopics. So, yeah, let's forgive them, right?

No, sir. No. For shame. Wendy Williams, wipe that ***damn smile off your face. "We're not throwing

anybody under the bus". You might want to check that bus again, ma'am. I think I hear screaming.

Apparently, according to the film, Missy Elliot and Timbaland were just small-timers. Just barely getting by until Aaliyah came into their lives, and we don't get to see what happens with them after. Really? Really, Lifetime? Missy and Tim weren't big before Aaliyah? Nobodies? They only get one scene in the movie? Really, bruh? You just gon' push Missy and Tim up under the tree with all that shade? Forreal? Missy and Timbaland can't get no sunlight? No Vitamin-C, Lifetime? Wendy? You acting like you didn't see a bus pass by just now with two black folks under it? A'ight. You keep thinking that. With your ignorant, inaccurate ass, you go ahead and keep thinking that.

Go ahead and keep thinking that Aaliyah being fifteen years old and illegally marrying old pedophile ass R. Kelly, causing an outrage with her parents, is just her having those old, high-school teenage moments. Yeah, it's just regular teenage problems, you know where she yells "I hate you! I hate both of you!!". Ahh, come on, it's no big deal, right? It's not like her parents were, gee I don't know, trying to keep her the hell away from this grown ass man, knowing he's too damn old to be sniffing around this young girl.

Rather than blatantly telling her what he's doing is illegal and what he is doing is illegal and immoral, this is treated like Kelly was some regular boyfriend who Aaliyah could not see anymore because he was a thug. Not a pedophile, just a thug. Is that really how she reacted? And you're also trying to tell the audience that R. Kelly was such a gentleman that he wanted to wait for Aaliyah to turn 18 before they had sex? Sir. Ma'am. Really? Y'all know good and ***damn well...really?

And I'm not going to even get into the casting with this film. But let me talk about the casting in this film. You know, it still shocks me that Hollywood has not figured this out. It's still even more shocking that so many people do not realize what they just did with this film.

A photo posted by Timbo the King (@timbaland) on Nov 11, 2014 at 7:19pm PST

Melissa "Missy" Elliot fairs more to the dark skin we can say right? She was not light skinned. Nor was she a size two, in the 90s, which is totally fine. So why in the hell would you cast a thin light skinned actress, Chattrisse Dolabaille, to play her? Why cast Izaak Smith to play Tim "Timbaland" Mosely when he bares no resemblance, not even in skin-tone? Oh, I know why. All y'all reading this, you probably know too. And Lifetime is wrong for perpetuating this trend in Hollywood of favoring the lighter skinned black actors, because, well, those dark-skin Negros just look too scary and threatening. Oh, don't flinch. My language could have been a hell of a lot worse. I'm being nice. Izaak, you're not Timbaland, stop bugging your eyes out like that. This is not a horror movie.

Now, in all seriousness, I have to say, that I am truly sorry for the actors, I am sorry for the crazy avalanche of hate you are going to receive. It's really not all your fault, it's not. And to Alexandra Shipp, I am terribly sorry for what you are about to go through and experience, because of this film. You did the best you could with what you were given. I'm happy that you got a somewhat high profile project to be in that gives you much more exposure, that's beautiful. I am terribly sorry it had to be in such an ugly film.

If at first you don't succeed, dust yourself off and don't ever try this nonsense again, Lifetime. The least you people could have done, is make a phenomenal movie that blew everybody away and prove that you were right all along. You did the exact opposite.

To Michael and Diane Haughton, I am sorry for what they did to your daughter's legacy and her fans. And anyone else outside of the Lifetime camp, who's reading this, if I offended you, I do apologize. I am in no way targeting any of you. Only the real culprits.

Unfortunately for me in California where I live, the garbage men don't come until Tuesday. So I gotta let this trash-ass movie sit in front of my house for a couple more days before they can take it away. Is there a special service for this? Trash-Ass-Movie Pick-Up? That'd be awesome.

Peace, and peace to Aaliyah smj12.com/?p=867

The Unforgiveable Sin

The problem of the unforgivable sin must also be addressed as we consider perseverance. If the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven (Mat.12:31), then is this not the one transgression that can make Christians lose salvation? How do we know whether or not we have committed this sin? A look at Matthew 12:22–32 will help us answer these questions. We begin with some quick observations about the sin in question based on verse 31. First, it is not just any sin against the Holy Spirit that is unforgivable, only blasphemy against the Spirit. Recall also that blasphemy is a sin involving words. It consists primarily in speech, though it can be committed in the heart as well. What then does this blasphemy look like and why will God not forgive it? Jesus has just healed a demon-possessed man in today’s passage, which leads the crowd to believe Jesus just might be the Christ (vv. 22–23). Some Pharisees then say the power of Beelzebul or Satan enables Jesus to perform exorcisms. Jesus responds, telling the people it is by the finger of God — the Holy Spirit — that He casts out demons (vv. 25–30). He then uses the occasion to teach that blaspheming the Spirit will not be forgiven (vv. 31–32). Thus, attributing demonic activity to Jesus evidences blasphemy against the Spirit. But how can this be so? Remember that knowing the truth is, by itself, not sufficient for salvation. All truth is from God and the Holy Spirit can show a person who Jesus is even if he never trusts in Christ. If He reveals to us that Christ is from God and then we accuse Jesue of being demonic, we have blasphemed the Spirit because we have called Him a liar, denying His character. The Pharisees had come dangerously close to this sin. Of all people, they should have heard the Spirit speak through the Law and the prophets about Jesus as they were trained in the Scriptures, and they should have known that the Messiah would come to defeat the Devil. They were on the cusp of denying Christ out of a conscious, willful suppression of the Spirit’s work, not mere ignorance. The Pharisees were close to blaspheming the Spirit by calling His testimony about Christ a lie even when they knew it to be true (Luk.22:66–71).

_____

Renewing Your mind - R.C. Sproul

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A dabbawala; also spelled as dabbawalla or dabbawallah; is a person in India, most commonly in Mumbai, who is part of a delivery system that collects hot food in lunch boxes from the residences of workers in the late morning, delivers the lunches to the workplace utilizing various modes of transport, predominantly bicycles and the railway trains, and returns the empty boxes back to the customer's residence that afternoon. They are also made use of by prominent meal suppliers in Mumbai where they ferry ready, cooked meals from central kitchens to the customers and back.

In Mumbai, most office goers prefer to eat home cooked food rather than eat outside, usually for reasons of taste and hygiene, hence the concept. A number of work-from-home women also supply such home cooked meals, delivering through the dabbawala network.[1]

Etymology[edit]

A dabba, or Indian-style tiffin box.

Box coding

The word "dabbawala" when literally translated, means "one who carries a box". "Dabba" means a box (usually a cylindrical tin or aluminium container), while "wala" is a suffix, denoting a doer or holder of the preceding word.[2] The closest meaning of the dabbawala in English would be the "lunch box delivery man".

Origins[edit]

In 1890, Mahadeo Havaji Bachche started a lunch delivery service with about a hundred men.[3] In 1930, he informally attempted to unionize the dabbawallas. Later, a charitable trust was registered in 1956 under the name of Nutan Mumbai Tiffin Box Suppliers Trust. The commercial arm of this trust was registered in 1968 as Mumbai Tiffin Box Supplier's Association. The current president of the association is Raghunath Medge.

Supply chain[edit]

A collecting dabbawala, usually on bicycle, collects dabbas either from a worker's home or from the dabba makers. As many of the carriers are of limited literacy (the average literacy of Dabbawallahs is 8th grade[4]), the dabbas (boxes) have some sort of distinguishing mark on them, such as a colour or group of symbols.

The dabbawala then takes them to a designated sorting place, where he and other collecting dabbawalas sort (and sometimes bundle) the lunch boxes into groups. The grouped boxes are put in the coaches of trains, with markings to identify the destination of the box (usually there is a designated car for the boxes). The markings include the railway station to unload the boxes and the destination building delivery address.

At each station, boxes are handed over to a local dabbawala, who delivers them. The empty boxes are collected after lunch or the next day and sent back to the respective houses.

Dabbawallas tend to belong to the Varkari sect of Maharashtra and consider Tukaram's teachings of helping each other to be central to their efficiency and motivation.[5]

Appearance and coding[edit]

Lunch boxes are usually marked in several ways: (1) abbreviations for collection points, (2) colour code for starting station, (3) number for destination station and (4) markings for handling dabbawala at destination, building and floor.[6]

A typical dabbawala lunch.

It was estimated in 2007 that the dabbawala industry was still growing by 5-10% per annum.[7]

The dabbawalas have started to embrace technology, and now allow for delivery requests through SMS.[8] A colour-coding system identifies the destination and recipient. Each dabbawala is required to contribute a minimum capital in kind, in the form of two bicycles, a wooden crate for the tiffins, white cotton kurta-pyjamas, and the white Gandhi cap (topi). Each month there is a division of the earnings of each unit.

Uninterrupted services[edit]

The service is almost always uninterrupted, even on the days of severe weather such as monsoons. The local dabbawalas and population know each other well, and often form bonds of trust. Dabbawalas are generally well accustomed to the local areas they cater to, and use shortcuts and other low profile routes to deliver their goods on time. Occasionally, people communicate between home and work by putting messages inside the boxes (See: The Lunchbox film); however, with the rise of instant communication such as SMS and instant messaging, this trend is vanishing. Since 1890, when the dabbawalas formally came into existence, none of them had ever gone on strike until 2011 when the members decided to head towards Azad Maidan to support Anna Hazare in his campaign against corruption.[9]

Economic analysis[edit]

Each dabbawala, regardless of role, is paid about eight thousand rupees per month. Between 175,000 and 200,000 lunch boxes are moved by 4,500 to 5,000 dabbawalas, all with an extremely small nominal fee and with utmost punctuality.

It is frequently claimed that dabbawalas make less than one mistake in every six million deliveries.[10] However, this error rate is conservative as it is estimated from Ragunath Medge, the president of the Mumbai Tiffinmen's Association in 1998, and is not from a rigorous study. Medge told Subrata Chakravarty, the lead author of the 'Fast Food' article by Forbes.[11] that dabbawalas make a mistake "almost never, maybe once every two months" and this statement was extrapolated by Subrata Chakravarty to be a rate of "one mistake in 8 million deliveries." [12]

The ABC has produced a documentary on dabbawalas [13] and Prince Charles visited them during his visit to India; he had to fit in with their schedule, since their timing was too precise to permit any flexibility. Charles also invited them to his wedding with Camilla Parker Bowles in London on 9 April 2005. Owing to the tremendous publicity, some of the dabbawalas were invited to give guest lectures in some of the top business schools of India, which is very unusual.

The New York Times reported in 2007 that the 125-year-old dabbawala industry continues to grow at a rate of 5–10% per year.[7]

Awards, Studies and recognition[edit]

Awards / Accreditations[edit]

ISO 9001:2000 certified by the Joint Accreditation System of Australia and New Zealand [14]

Studies and accolades[edit]

In 2001, Pawan G. Agrawal carried out his PhD research in " A Study & Logistics & Supply Chain Management of Dabbawala in Mumbai". He often presents his results on the efficiency of Dabbawallas in various fora.[15]

In 2005, the Indian Institute of Management (Ahmedabad) featured a case study on the Mumbai Dabbawallas from a management perspective of logistics.[16]

In 2010, Harvard Business School added the case study The Dabbawala System: On-Time Delivery, Every Time to their compendium for its high level of service (equivalent of Six Sigma or better) with a low cost and simple operating system.[17]

Six Sigma myth[edit]

It has been frequently asserted that dabbawalas were awarded a Six Sigma certification by Forbes magazine. This is a myth perpetuated by the news media who inferred the accreditation from the 1998 article in Forbes.[18] In 2007, an explanation was provided by the lead author of the article, Subrata Chakravarty in a private email correspondence to Gauri Sanjeev Pathak:

"Forbes never certified the dabbawalas as being a six-sigma organization. In fact, I never used the term at all. As you know, six-sigma is a process, not a statistic. But it is commonly associated with a statistic of 3.4 errors per million operations, and that is what caused the confusion … . I was impressed by the efficiency and complexity of the process by which some 175,000 tiffin boxes were sorted, transported, delivered and returned each day by people who were mostly illiterate and unsophisticated. I asked the head of the organization how often they made a mistake. He said almost never, maybe once every two months. Any more than that would be unforgivable to customers. I did the math, which works out to one mistake in 8 million deliveries—or 16 million, since the tiffin carriers are returned home each day. That is the statistic I used. Apparently, at a conference in 2002, a reporter asked the president … whether the tiffinwallahs were a six-sigma organization. He said he didn't know what that was. When told about the 3.4 error-per-million statistic, I'm told he said: "Then we are. Just ask Forbes". The reporter, obviously without having read my story, wrote that Forbes had certified the tiffinwallahs as a six-sigma organization. That phrase was picked up and repeated by other reporters in other stories and now seems to have become part of the folklore."

—Subrata Chakravarty, [12]

On January 11, 2019, for the ninth year running, I was in Washington, D.C. for the annual vigil outside the White House calling for the closure of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, on the anniversary of its opening. On January 11 this year, the prison had been open for 17 unforgivably long years — unforgivable because it is completely unacceptable for a country like the US, which claims to respect the rule of law, to hold prisoners indefinitely without charge or trial, as is the case at Guantanamo. And, of course, the situation has been particularly intolerable since Donald Trump became president, because he has no intention of releasing anyone under any circumstances, and, fundamentally, exercises complete power over the prisoners, who, this year, I described as his personal prisoners.

This photo shows members of Witness Against Torture, whose campaigners fast in the run-up to the anniversary and hold actions across the capital dressed in orange jumpsuits, walking towards the White House after a procession from the New America think-tank, where I had been part of a panel discussion about Guantanamo, also featuring the attorney Tom Wilner (with whom I co-founded the Close Guantanamo campaign in 2012) and Laura Pitter of Human Rights Watch.

The vigil was organized by over a dozen rights groups including Amnesty International USA, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Close Guantanamo, the Justice For Muslims Collective, the World Can’t Wait and Witness Against Torture.

For a video of the vigil outside the White House, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/01/16/video-and-radio-feat...

For a video of the New America panel discussion, see: www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/01/13/on-my-annual-us-visi...

For Amnesty International USA, see: www.amnestyusa.org

For the Center for Constitutional Rights, see: ccrjustice.org

For Close Guantanamo, see: www.closeguantanamo.org

For the Justice For Muslims Collective, see: justiceformuslims.org

For Witness Against Torture, see: www.witnessagainsttorture.com

For the World Can’t Wait, see: www.worldcantwait.net

For my most interesting photos, see: www.flickriver.com/photos/andyworthington/popular-interes...

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

There'll be times

When my crimes

Will seem almost unforgivable

I give in to sin

Because you have to make this life liveable

But when you think I've had enough

From your sea of love

I'll take more than another riverfull

And I'll make it all worthwhile

I'll make your heart smile

Strangelove

Strange highs and strange lows

Strangelove

That's how my love goes

Strangelove

Will you give it to me

Will you take the pain

I will give it to you

Again and again

And will you return it

There'll be day's

When I'll stray

I may appear to be

Constantly out of reach

I give in to sin

Becouse I like to practise what I preach

I'm not trying to say

I'll have it all my way

I'm almays willing to learn

When you've got something to teach

And I'll make it all worthwhile

I'll make your heart smile

Pain will you return it

I'll say it again - pain

Pain will you return it

I won't say it again

I give in

Again and again

I give in

Will you give it to me

I give in

I'll say it again

I give in

I give in

Again and again

I give in

That's how my love goes

I give in

I'll say it again

I give in

©Martin L. Gore

www.deezer.com/fr/#music/depeche-mode/music-for-the-masse...

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

Salmon and Cheese

- cured salmon, cheese, lemon

This was our favorite of the entire night - www.docsconz.com and I were in complete agreement about this magnificent plate.

House-cured salmon was paired with soft, Camembert-type cheese; citrus articulated all flavors and textures - umami from the shredded nori, delicious crunch form salmon skin chips, unmistakable freshness of shiso. The star of the dish were the noodles - similar in shape to fettuccine ("little ribbons", as they are), but a bit more wavy and what a texture! Ramen used in this bowl had just the right bite - nice chew and a pleasant rebound; these noodles were absolutely impeccably cooked.

I was extremely curious about fish and cheese pairing - an unforgivable, socially awkward faux pas in Italian cooking ( albeit the one successfully used by true pasta masters - Michael White pairs lobster with creamy burrata at his phenomenal Marea, for example), it worked to perfection in this mazemen. This was one dish I don't have the right skills to describe - it is just something one has to try.

Noteworthy: "mazemen" is a relatively new style of ramen, where noodles are served with minimal, if any, broth and are supposed to be mixed with oil, toppings or sauces served in the bowl. In fact, "mazeru" means "to mix" in Japanese, I believe.

Yuji Ramen at the Whole Foods Bowery is operating as a test kitchen for Yuji-san's upcoming restaurant Okonomi in Williamsburg/Brooklyn. Although the brick and mortar place is scheduled to open in the fall of 2013, the food is impressive already.

Please take a look at the same meal as shot by www.docsconz.com :

Yuji Ramen picture set by John Sconzo

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

St Andrew, Westhall, Suffolk

I'm currently preparing a new page for Westhall at suffolkchurches.co.uk - I'm parking the old one here so it doesn't get lost forever.

Listen: come with me. We’ll set off from the Queen’s Head at Blyford, a fine and welcoming pub across the road from that village’s little church. Perhaps we’ll have just had lunch, and we’ll be sitting outside with a couple of pints of Adnams. You’d like to stay there in the sunshine for the rest of the afternoon, but I’m going to take you somewhere special, so stir yourself. You are probably thinking it is Holy Trinity at Blythburgh, Suffolk’s finest church a couple of miles away on the main A12. But it isn’t.

Nor is it St Andrew at Wenhaston, a mile away across the bridge, and home of the Doom, one of Suffolk’s greatest medieval art treasures. You’ve already seen that.

No. Within a few miles of the pub sign (notice that it features St Etheldreda, whose father King Anna was killed in battle on the Blyth marshes) there is a third of Suffolk’s finest churches. It is the least known of the three, partly because it is so carefully hidden, so secreted away, and partly because Simon Jenkins, inconceivably, unforgivably, missed it out of his book England’s Thousand Best Churches.This may yet have serious consequences, as we shall see.

Blyford is on the main road between Halesworth and Dunwich, but we are going to take a narrow lane that you might almost miss if you weren’t with me. It leads northwards, and is quickly enveloped by oak-buttressed hedgerows, beyond which thin fields spread. Pheasants scuttle across the road in front of us; a hare watches warily for a moment before kicking sulkily back into the ditch (we are on foot perhaps, or bicycle). Occasional lanes thread off towards the woods and the sea.

After a couple of miles, we reach the obscenity of a main road, and cross it quickly, leaving it behind us. Now, the lane narrows severely, the banks steepening, trees arching above us. They guard the silence, until our tunnel doglegs suddenly, and an obscure stream appears beyond the hedgerow. Once, on a late winter afternoon, my dream was disturbed here by a startled heron rising up, its bony legs clacking dryly as it took flight over my head. I felt the rush of its wings.

This road was not designed for cars. Instead, it traces the ancient field pattern, cutting across the ends of strips and then along the sides, connecting long-vanished settlements. The lane splits (we take the right fork) and splits again (the left) and suddenly we are descending steeply into a secret glade shrouded in ancient tree canopies. The lane curves, narrows and opens – and here we are. Still, you might not notice it, because the church is still camouflaged by the trees, and the absurdity of the neighbouring bungalow with its kitschy garden may distract you; but to your right, in a silent velvet graveyard sits St Andrew, Westhall. It has been described in one book as Suffolk’s best kept secret.

I hope that I can convey to you something of why this place is so special. Firstly, notice the unusual layout of the building as you walk around it. That fine late 13th century tower, not too high despite its post-Reformation bell-stage, organic and at one with the trees; the breathtaking little Norman church that spreads to the east of it. And then, to the north, a large 13th century nave, thatched and rustic. It was designed for this graveyard, for this glade. Neither has changed much. Beyond it, the grand 14th century chancel, rudely filling almost the entire east end of the graveyard. Perhaps as we step around to the north side the same thing will happen as happened to me one muggy Saturday afternoon in July 2003 – a tawny owl sat watching me on a headstone, and then threw itself furiously into the air and away.

Your first thought may be that here we have two churches joined together – and this is almost exactly right. You can see the same thing on a similar timescale at Ufford, although the development there is rather more subtle than it is here.

Here at Westhall, there was a Norman church – an early one. Several hundred years later a tower was built to the west of it, and then the vast new nave to the north. A hundred years later came the chancel. Perhaps the east end of the Norman church was rebuilt at this time. Mortlock thinks that there was once a Norman chancel, and this may be so. The old church became a south aisle, the particular preserve perhaps of the Bohun family. They married into the famous Coke family, who we have already met at nearby Bramfield.

And so, we step inside. We may do so through the fine north porch; it is a wide, open one, clearly intended for the carrying out of parish business. It was probably the last substantial part of the church to be built, on the eve of the Reformation. The door appears contemporary. Or, I might send you round to step in through the Norman doorway on the south side, into the body of the original church.

You expect dust and decay, perhaps, in such a remote place. But this is a well-kept church, lovingly maintained and well-used. Although there are a couple of old benches scattered about, most of the seating is early 19th century, with that delightful cinema curve to the western row which was fashionable immediately before the Oxford Movement and the Camden Society sent out their great resacramentalising waves, and English churches were never the same again.

If you step in from the south, then you are immediately confronted with something so stunning, so utterly wonderful, that we are going to pretend you cannot believe your eyes, and you pass it by. Instead, draw back the curtain, and step into the space beneath the tower. Walk to the western wall, and turn back.

You are confronted with the main entrance of a grand post-conquest church, probably about 1100. Surviving faces in the unfinished ranges look like something out of Wallace and Grommit. Above, an arcade of windows, the central one open. Almost a thousand years ago, it would have thrown summer evening light on the altar.

As you step back into the aisle, it is now easy to see it as the nave it once was. The northern wall has now gone, replaced by a low arcade, and you step through into the wideness of the modern (it is only 600 years old!) nave.

Here, then, let us at last allow ourselves an exploration of Suffolk’s other great medieval art survival. This is Westhall’s famous font, one of the seven sacrament series, but more haunting than all the others because it still retains almost all its original colour.

The Mass panel is the most familiar, because it is the cover of Eamonn Duffy’s majestic The Stripping of the Altars. The other panels, anti-clockwise from this, are Last Rites, Reconciliation, Matrimony, Confirmation, Baptism, Ordination, and the odd panel out, the Baptism of Christ.

The font asks more questions than it answers. How did it survive? Suffolk has 13 Seven Sacrament fonts in various states of repair. Those nearby at Blythburgh, Wenhaston and Southwold are clearly from the same group as this one, but have been completely effaced. Other good ones survive nearby at Weston and Great Glemham, at Monk Soham, at neighbours Woodbridge and Melton, neighbours Cratfield and Laxfield, at Denston in the south west and at Badingham. We don’t know how many others there might have been; probably not many, for most East Anglian churches have a surviving medieval font of another design. The surviving panels were probably plastered over during the long puritan night (the damage to the figures is probably a result of making the faces flush rather than any attempt at iconoclasm) but they were also all probably once coloured. So why has only this one survived in that state?

The other feature of the font that is quite, quite extraordinary is the application of gessowork for the tabernacled figures between the faces. This is plaster of Paris which is moulded on and allowed to dry – it can then be carved. It is sometimes used on wood to achieve fine details, but rarely on stone. Was it once found widely elsewhere? How has it survived here?

If it was just for the font, then St Andrew would still be an essential destination for anyone interested in medieval churches. But there are several other features that, in any other church, would be considered equally essential.

There is the screen. It is a bit of a curiosity. Firstly, the two painted ranges are clearly the work of different artists. On the south side are female Saints, very similar in style to those on the screen at Ufford. The artists helpfully labelled them, and they are St Etheldreda (the panel bearing her left half has been lost) St Sitha, St Agnes, St Bridget, St Catherine, St Dorothy, St Margaret of Aleppo and finally one of the most essential Saints in the medieval economy of grace, St Apollonia - she it was who could be asked to intercede against toothache. With the possible exception of St Margaret, modern Anglicans would think of all of these as peculiarly Catholic Saints, a reminder that St Andrew was built, after all, as a Catholic church.

The depictions on the northern part of the screen are much simpler (Pevsner thought them crude) and are probably painted by a local artist. Note the dedicatory inscription along the top on this side; it is barely legible, but the names Margarete and Tome Felton and Richard Lore and Margaret Alen are still discernible. I think the figures on this screen are equally fascinating, if not more so. They are all easily recognisable, and are fondly rendered. With one remarkable exception, they are familiar to us from many popular images.

The first is Saint James in his pilgrim's garb, as if about to set out for Santiago de Compostella. The power of such an image to medieval people in a backwater like north-east Suffolk should not be underestimated. Next comes St Leonard, associated with the Christian duty of visiting prisoners - perhaps this had a local resonance. Thirdly, there is a triumphant St Michael, one of the major Saints of the late medieval panoply, and then St Clement, the patron Saint of seafarers. This is interesting, because although Westhall is a good six miles from the sea, it is much closer to the Blyth river, which was probably much wider and faster in medieval times. It seems strange to think of Westhall as having a relationship with the sea, but it probably did.

Next comes the remarkable exception. The next three panels represent between them the Transfiguration; Christ on a mountain top between the two figures of Moses and Elijah. It is the only surviving medieval screen representation of the Transfiguration in England. Eamonn Duffy, in The Stripping of the Altars, argues that here at Westhall is priceless evidence of the emergence of a new cult on the eve of the Reformation, which would snuff it out. Another representation survived in a wall painting at Hawkedon, but has faded away during the last half century.

The last panel is St Anthony of Egypt, recognisable from the dear little pig at his feet. I wonder if it was painted from the life.

There is a fascinating wall painting against the north wall. It shows St Christopher, as you might expect. St Christopher was a special devotion in the hearts of medieval churchgoers, and usually sits opposite the main entrance so that they could look in at the start of the day and receive his blessing. As a surviving inscription at Creeting St Peter reminds us, anyone who looks on the image in the morning would be spared a sudden death that day. It is the other figures in the illustration that are remarkable, though, for one of them is clearly Moses, wearing his ‘horns of light’ (an early medieval mistranslation of ‘halo’).

There are a couple of other wall-paintings, including a beautiful flower-surrounded consecration cross beside the south door, and a painted image niche alcove in the eastern splay of a window in the south wall. This is odd; it should have a figure in it, but none appears to have been painted there. Perhaps it was intended to have a statue placed in front of it, but the window sill is very steep, and it is hard to see how a statue could have been positioned there. DD surmised that there had once been a stand, the base of which was canted in some manner, and that the sill had once been less steep (the base of the painting seems to suggest this). Whatever, it is very odd.

Between the painted niche and consecration cross there are surviving traces of a large painting; it seems to consist of the leafy surrounds of seven large roundels. Mortlock wondered if it might have been a sequence of the Seven Works of Mercy as at Trotton in Sussex, but there is insufficient remaining to tell.

Nicholas Bohun's tomb, in very poor repair, sits in the south-east corner; an associated brass gives you rather more information than you might think you need. A George III royal arms hangs above.

If you haven't lost your appetite for the extraordinary, come back up into the apparently completely Victorianised chancel. Chalice brasses are incredibly rare, because of their Catholic imagery. Westhall had two of them, although unfortunately only the matrices survive. Then, look up; on one of the roof beams is an image of the Holy Trinity, with God the Father holding the Crucified Christ between his knees. There is probably a dove as well, although that is not visible from the ground. Indeed, the whole thing is too small, as if the artist hadn't really thought about the scale needed for it to be seen from the chancel floor.

So there we are, I've let you in on Suffolk's best-kept secret. But I said earlier that I was afraid Simon Jenkins’s omission of this church might have serious consequences. Here is why: there is an ongoing programme of essential repairs, and the church has had to raise tens of thousands of pounds at fairly short notice. The parish has less than a hundred people living in it, and the congregation is barely in double figures. The church is clearly a national treasure, and its continued survival is essential; but it is difficult to convince people of this, because it has been missed out of what is increasingly being treated as a heritage wish-list. It was bad enough that Pevsner’s books were used as arbiters of what should survive when redundancies loomed in the 1970s; it would be appalling if the Jenkins book was used in the same way now.

The Lost World (20th Century Fox, 1960).

youtu.be/h1CLA-gJbmA?t=5s Trailer

Irwin Allen, the producer who would go on to make the disaster film a huge success in the seventies, brought us this Saturday afternoon fodder with giant lizards posing as dinosaurs. Starring Michael Rennie, David Hedison, Claude Rains and Jill St. John.

Intended as a grand sci-fi/fantasy epic remake of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic novel. The first film adaptation, shot in 1925, was a milestone in many ways, but movie making and special effects had come a long way in 35 years. Irwin Allen's Lost World (LW) & 20th Century Fox version was derailed on the way to greatness, but managed to still be a respectable, (if more modest) A-film. Allen's screenplay followed the book fairly well, telling of Professor Challenger's expedition to a remote plateau in the Amazon upon which dinosaurs still lived. Aside from the paleontological presumptions in the premise, there is little "science" in The Lost World. Nonetheless, dinosaur movies have traditionally been lumped into the sci-fi genre.

Synopsis

When his plane lands in London, crusty old professor George Edward Challenger is besieged by reporters questioning him about his latest expedition to the headwaters of the Amazon River. After the irascible Challenger strikes reporter Ed Malone on the head with his umbrella, Jennifer Holmes, the daughter of Ed's employer, Stuart Holmes, offers the injured reporter a ride into town. That evening, Jenny is escorted by Lord John Roxton, an adventurer and big game hunter, to Challenger's lecture at the Zoological Institute, and Ed invites them to sit with him. When Challenger claims to have seen live dinosaurs, his colleague Professor Summerlee scoffs and asks for evidence. Explaining that his photographs of the creatures were lost when his boat overturned, Challenger invites Summerlee to accompany him on a new expedition to the "lost world," and asks for volunteers. When Roxton raises his hand, Jenny insists on going with him, but she is rejected by Challenger because she is a woman. Ed is given a spot after Holmes offers to fund the expedition if the reporter is included. The four then fly to the Amazon, where they are met by Costa, their guide and Manuel Gomez, their helicopter pilot. Arriving unexpectedly, Jenny and her younger brother David insist on joining them. Unable to arrange transportation back to the United States, Challenger reluctantly agrees to take them along. The next day, they take off for the lost world and land on an isolated plateau inhabited by dinosaurs. That evening, a dinosaur stomps out of the jungle, sending them scurrying for cover. After the beast destroys the helicopter and radio, the group ventures inland. When one of the creatures bellows threateningly, they flee, and in their haste, Challenger and Ed slip and tumble down a hillside, where they encounter a native girl. The girl runs into the jungle, but Ed follows and captures her. They then all take refuge in a cave, where Roxton, who has been making disparaging remarks about Jenny's desire to marry him solely for his title, angers Ed. Ed lunges at Roxton, pushing him to the ground, where he finds a diary written by Burton White, an adventurer who hired Roxton three years earlier to lead him to the lost diamonds of Eldorado. Roxton then admits that he never met White and his party because he was delayed by a dalliance with a woman, thus abandoning them to certain death. Gomez angrily snaps that his good friend Santiago perished in the expedition. That night, Costa tries to molest the native girl, and David comes to her rescue and begins to communicate with her through sign language. After Gomez goes to investigate some movement he spotted in the vegetation, he calls for help, and when Roxton runs out of the cave, a gunshot from an unseen assailant is fired, nearly wounding Roxton and sending the girl scurrying into the jungle. Soon after, Ed and Jenny stray from camp and are pursued by a dinosaur, and after taking refuge on some cliffs, watch in horror as their stalker becomes locked in combat with another prehistoric creature and tumbles over the cliffs into the waters below. Upon returning to camp, they discover it deserted, their belongings in disarray. As David stumbles out from some rocks to report they were attacked by a tribe of natives, the cannibals return and imprison them in a cave with the others. As the drums beat relentlessly, signaling their deaths, the native girl reappears and motions for them to follow her through a secret passageway that leads to the cave in which Burton White lives, completely sightless. After confirming that all in his expedition perished, White tells them of a volcanic passageway that will lead them off the plateau, but warns that they must first pass through the cave of fire. Cautioning them that the natives plan to sacrifice them, White declares that their only chance of survival is to slip through the cave and then seal it with a boulder. After giving them directions to the cave, White asks them to take the girl along. As the earth, on the verge of a volcanic eruption, quakes, they set off through the Graveyard of the Damned, a vast cavern littered with dinosaur skeletons, the victims of the deadly sulfurous gases below. Pursued by the ferocious natives, Roxton takes the lead as they inch their way across a narrow ledge above the molten lava. After escaping the natives, they jam the cave shut with a boulder and, passing a dam of molten lava, finally reach the escape passage. At its mouth is a pile of giant diamonds and a dinosaur egg. As Costa heaps the diamonds into his hat, Challenger fondles the egg and Gomez pulls a gun and announces that Roxton must die in exchange for the death of Santiago, Gomez' brother. Acting quickly, Ed hurls the diamonds at Gomez, throwing him off balance and discharging his gun. The gunshot awakens a creature slumbering in the roiling waters below. After the beast snatches Costa and eats him alive, Ed tries to dislodge the dam, sending a few scorching rocks tumbling down onto the monster. Feeling responsible for the peril of the group, Gomez sacrifices his life by using his body as a lever to dislodge the dam, covering the creature with oozing lava. As the cave begins to crumble from the impending eruption, the group hurries to safety. Just then, the volcano explodes, destroying the lost world. After Roxton hands Ed a handful of diamonds he has saved as a wedding gift for him and Jenny, Challenger proudly displays his egg, which then hatches, revealing a baby dinosaur. The End.

The 50s had seen several examples of the dinosaur sub-genre. LW is one of the more lavish ones, owing to color by DeLuxe and CinemaScope. The A-level actors help too. Claude Rains plays the flamboyant Challenger. Michael Rennie plays Roxton, perhaps a bit too cooly. Jill St. John and Vitina Marcus do well as the customary eye candy. David Hedison as Malone and Fernando Lamas as Gomez round out the bill.

The first film version of LW was a silent movie shot in 1925: screenplay by Marion Fairfax. The film featured stop-motion animated dinosaurs by a young Willis O'Brien. Fairfax followed Doyle's text, but Fairfax added a young woman to the team, Paula White. Ostensibly trying to find her father from the first failed expedition, she provided the love triangle interest between Malone and Roxton.

Allen's screenplay tried to stick to Doyle's text as much as Hollywood would allow. It carried on Fairfax's invention of the young woman member of the group as triangle fodder. Fairfax had Doyle's ape men (ape man) but omitted the native humans. Allen had the natives, but no ape men. Allen revived the Gomez/revenge subplot, which Fairfax skipped. Doyle's story had Challenger bringing back a pterodactyl. Fairfax made it a brontosaur who rampaged through London streets (spawning a popular trope). Allen suggested the baby dinosaur traveling to London.

Willis O'Brien pitched 20th Century Fox in the late 50s, to do a quality remake of LW. He had gained much experience in the intervening 35 years, so his stop-motion dinosaurs were to be the real stars. Fox bass liked the idea, but by the time the ball started rolling, there was trouble in studioland. Fox's grand epic Cleopatra was underway, but was already 5 million dollars over budget. Cleo would nearly sink 20th Century Fox when it was finally released in 1963. To stay afloat, all other Fox films' budgets were slashed. Allen could no longer afford the grand O'Brien stop-motion.

Allen's production is often criticized for its "cheap" dinosaurs, which were live monitor lizards and alligators with fins and plates and horns glue onto them. (more on that below) These were already a bit cheesy when used in the 1940 film One Million B.C.. O'Brien is still listed on the credits as "Effects Technician," but all Allen could afford was lizards with glued on extras. Somewhat amusingly, the script still refers to them as brontosaurs and T-Rexes.

The character of Jennifer Holmes starts out promising. She's a self-assured to the edges of pushy, and is said to be able to out shoot and out ride any man. Yet, when she gets to the Amazon jungle, she's little more than Jungle Barbie, dressed in girlie clothes and screaming frequently. She even does the typical Hollywood trip-and-fall when chased by the dinosaur, so that a man must save her.

Bottom line? FW is a finer example of the not-quite-sci-fi dinosaur sub-genre. The actors are top drawer, even if some of their acting is a bit flat. Nonetheless, FW is a fair adaptation of Doyle's

classic adventure novel, given the constraints of Hollywood culture.

The Movie Club Annals … Review

The Lost World 1960

Introduction

There was absolutely nothing wrong with Irwin Allen's 1960 production of The Lost World. Nothing. It was perfect in every way. I therefore find myself in the unique and unfamiliar position of having to write a rave review about a Movie Club movie that was entirely devoid of flaws.

Faced with such a confounding task, I half-heartedly considered faking a bad review, then praying my obvious deceptions would go unnoticed. But the patent transparency of my scheme convinced me to abandon it posthaste. After all, leveling concocted criticisms at such an unassailable masterpiece would be a futile and tiresome exercise, the pretense of which would escape nary a semi-cognizant soul.

Thus, having retreated from my would-be descent into literary intrigue, I start this review in earnest by borrowing a quote from the legendary Shelly Winters, spoken during the 1972 filming of Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure:

"I'm ready for my close up now, Mr. Allen.” Shelly Winters, 1972

Review

A bit of research into the casting choices of Irwin Allen, who wrote, produced, and directed The Lost World, begins to reveal the genius behind the virtuosity.

The first accolades go to Irwin for his casting of Vitina Marcus, the immaculately groomed Saks 5th Avenue cave girl with exquisite taste in makeup, jewelry, and cave-wear. No finer cave girl ever graced a feature film.

Vitina Marcus, as The Cave Girl

She was the picture of prehistoric glamour, gliding across the silver screen in her designer bearskin mini-pelt, her flawless coiffure showing no signs of muss from the traditional courting rituals of the day, her perfect teeth the envy of even the most prototypical Osmond. Even her nouveau-opposable thumbs retained their manicure, in spite of the oft-disagreeable duties that frequently befell her as an effete member of the tribal gentry.

By no means just another Neanderthal harlot, Vitina had a wealth of talent to augment her exterior virtues. Her virtuoso interpretation of a comely cave girl in The Lost World certainly didn't escape the attention Irwin Allen. In fact, he was so taken with her performance that he later engaged her services again, casting her as the Native Girl in episode 2.26 of his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series.

Leery of potential typecasting, Vitina went on to obtain roles with greater depth and more sophisticated dialogue. This is evidenced by the great departure she took from her previous roles when she next portrayed the part of Sarit, a female barbarian, in episode 1.24 of Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel TV series.

Vitina, as Sarit

Vitina's efforts to avoid typecasting paid off in spades, as she was soon rewarded with the distinctive role of Girl, a female Tarzanesque she-beast character, in episode 3.14 of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

Lured back from the U.N.C.L.E. set by Irwin Allen, Vitina was next cast in the role of Athena (a.k.a. Lorelei), the green space girl with the inverted lucite salad bowl hat, in episodes 2.2 and 2.16 of the revered Lost in Space TV series.

And with this, Vitina reached the pinnacle of her career. For her many unparalleled displays of thespian pageantry, she leaves us forever in her debt as she exits the stage.

For those who would still question the genius of Irwin Allen, I defy you to find a better casting choice for the character of Lord John Roxton than that of Michael Rennie. Mr. Rennie, who earlier starred as Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still, went on to even greater heights, starring as The Keeper in episodes 1.16 and 1.17 of the revered Lost in Space TV series. Throughout his distinguished career, Mr. Rennie often played highly cerebral characters with

unique names, such as Garth A7, Tribolet, Hasani, Rama Kahn, Hertz, and Dirk. How befitting that his most prolific roles came to him through a man named Irwin, a highly cerebral character with a unique name.

The selection of David Hedison to play Ed Malone was yet another example of Irwin's uncanny foresight. Soon after casting him in The Lost World, Irwin paved Mr. Hedison's path to immortality by casting him as a lead character in his Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea TV series. Although Voyage ended in 1968, Mr. Hedison departed the show with a solid resume and a bright future.

In the decades following Voyage, Mr. Hedison has been a veritable fixture on the small screen, appearing in such socially influential programs as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Knight Rider, The Fall Guy and The A Team. Mr. Hedison's early collaborations with Irwin Allen have left him never wanting for a day's work in Hollywood, a boon to the legions of discerning fans who continue to savor his inspiring prime time depictions.

Irwin selected Fernando Lamas to play Manuel Gomez, the honorable and tortured soul of The Lost World who needlessly sacrificed himself at the end of the movie to save all the others. To get a feel for how important a casting decision he was to Irwin, just look at the pertinent experience Mr. Lamas brought to the table:

Irwin knew that such credentials could cause him to lose the services of Mr. Lamas to another project, and he took great pains to woo him onto the set of The Lost World. And even though Mr. Lamas never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his talent is not lost on us.

Jay Novello was selected by Irwin Allen to play Costa, the consummate Cuban coward who perpetually betrays everyone around him in the name of greed. In pursuing his craven calling, Mr. Novello went on to play Xandros, the Greek Slave in Atlantis, The Lost Continent, as well as countless other roles as a coward.

Although Mr. Novella never appeared in the revered Lost in Space TV series, his already long and distinguished career as a coward made him the obvious choice for Irwin when the need for an experienced malingerer arose.

Jill St. John was Irwin's pick to play Jennifer Holmes, the "other" glamour girl in The Lost World. Not to be upstaged by glamour-cave-girl Vitina Marcus, Jill played the trump card and broke out the pink go-go boots and skin-tight Capri pants, the perfect Amazonian summertime jungle wear.

Complete with a perfect hairdo, a killer wardrobe, a little yip-yip dog named Frosty, and all the other trappings of a wealthy and pampered prehistoric society, Jill's sensational allure rivaled even that of a certain cave girl appearing in the same film.

With the atmosphere rife for an on-set rivalry between Jill and Vitina, Irwin still managed to keep the peace, proving that he was as skilled a diplomat as he was a director.

Claude Rains, as Professor George Edward Challenger

And our cup runneth over, as Irwin cast Claude Rains to portray Professor George Edward Challenger. His eminence, Mr. Rains is an entity of such immeasurable virtue that he is not in need of monotonous praise from the likes of me.

I respectfully acknowledge the appearance of Mr. Rains because failure to do so would be an unforgivable travesty. But I say nothing more on the subject, lest I state something so obvious and uninspiring as to insult the intelligence of enlightened reader.

Irwin's casting of the cavemen mustn't be overlooked, for their infallibly realistic portrayals are unmatched within the Pleistocene Epoch genre of film. Such meticulous attention to detail is what separates Irwin Allen from lesser filmmakers, whose pale imitations of his work only further to underscore the point.

To be sure, it is possible to come away with the unfounded suspicion that the cavemen are really just a bunch of old white guys from the bar at the local Elks lodge. But Irwin was an absolute stickler for authenticity, and would never have allowed the use of such tawdry measures to taint his prehistoric magnum opus.

In truth, Irwin's on-screen cavemen were borne of many grueling years of anthropological research, so the explanation for their somewhat modern, pseudo-caucasian appearance lies obviously elsewhere. And in keeping with true Irwin Allen tradition, that explanation will not be offered here.

1964 - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Season One, Episode 7 - "Turn Back the Clock", featuring Vitina Marcus as The Native Girl. Produced by Irwin Allen.

And then there was Irwin Allen's masterful handling of the reptilian facets of The Lost World, most notably his inimitable casting of the dinosaurs. His dinosaurs were so realistic, so eerily lifelike, that they almost looked like living, breathing garden variety lizards with dinosaur fins and horns glued to their backs and heads.

The less enlightened viewer might even suppose this to be true, that Irwin's dinosaurs were indeed merely live specimens of lizards, donned in Jurassic-era finery, vastly magnified, and retro-fitted into The Lost World via some penny-wise means of cinematic trickery.

But those of us in the know certainly know better than that, as we are privy to some otherwise unpublished information about The Lost World. The lifelike appearance of the Irwin's dinosaurs can be attributed to a wholly overlooked and fiendishly cunning approach to the art of delusion, which is that the dinosaurs didn't just look real, they were real.

While the world abounds with middling minds who cannot fathom such a reality, we must follow Irwin's benevolent leanings and temper our natural feelings of contempt for this unfortunate assemblage of pedestrian lowbrows. In spite of Irwin's superior intellect, he never felt disdain toward the masses that constituted his audiences. He simply capitalized on their unaffectedness, and in the process recounted the benefits of exploiting the intellectually bereft for personal gain.

The purpose of all this analysis, of course, is to place an exclamation point on the genius of Irwin Allen, the formation of his dinosaur exposé being a premier example. Note how he mindfully manipulates the expectations of his unsuspecting audience, compelling them to probe the dinosaurs for any signs of man-made chicanery. Then, at the palatial moment when the dinosaurs make their entry, he guilefully supplants the anticipated display of faux reptilia with that of the bona fide article.

Upon first witnessing the de facto dinosaurs, some in the audience think they've been had, and indeed they have. Irwin, in engineering his masterful ruse, had used reality as his medium to convey the illusion of artifice. His audience, in essence, was blinded by the truth. It was the immaculate deception, and none but Irwin Allen could have conceived it.

Indeed, the matter of where the live dinosaurs came from has been conspicuously absent from this discussion, as the Irwinian technique of fine film making strongly discourages the practice of squandering time on extraneous justifications and other such trite means of redundant apologia. For the benefit of the incessantly curious, however, just keep in mind that Irwin Allen wrote and produced The Time Tunnel TV Series, a fact that should provide some fair insight into his modis operandi.

Carl R.

The DC Weirdo Show

Who - Zou Zou

What - Unforgivable Blackness

Where - Bier Baron

This photo is fully copyrighted. Permission is granted to Weirdo Show and the depicted performer(s) to reuse the photo with credit: © Andrew Bossi, flic.kr/s/aHsmhgCQmz