Re: Bogus mega-fauna/lizard cruelty z-grade schlock flick

["TIMOTHY BRIDGEMAN" <timlee3005@earthlink.net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: <zone65@bigpond.com>
To: <dinosaur@usc.edu>
Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2004 8:02 PM
Subject: Bogus mega-fauna/lizard cruelty z-grade schlock flick


> I bore witness last night to something from 1950 called 'Two Lost
> Worlds', a DVD I'd purchased on the promise that it featured scenes of
> rampaging mastodons and giant sloths against 19th century pirates - how
> can ya go wrong??
>
> Well... no mastodons OR sloths, but towards the end we see a 'blown up'
> young alligator (with glued-on dimetrodon sail) and monitor lizard
> pitted against each other in an extremely savage real-life tussle.
> (According to the chapter selection guide, these reptiles are the
> mastodons ...) The poor monitor was left suffering painfully near death
> at the end of it ... no animals harmed during the making of THIS motion
> picture?? My craggy butte...
>
> Peter M
>
Actually,the monitor and alligator weren't harmed in the making of THIS
film,they were harmed in the making of "One Million B.C."(1940).The makers
of "Two Lost Worlds"simply used stock footage from that film,as did
countless other dinosaur films made on the cheap.Not only do "enlarged"
lizards fail to be convincing as dinosaurs,but the way the animals were
treated on film,like the example mentioned by Peter M,make it more difficult
to watch.

John Bridgman