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Land of the Lost Our rating: Your rating:   MPAA rating: PG-13 (for crude and sexual content, and for language including a drug reference) Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Science Fiction Theater release: June 05, 2009 by Universal Pictures Directed by: Brad Silberling Runtime: 1 hour 33 minutes Cast: Will Ferrell (Dr. Rick Marshall), Anna Friel (Holly Cantrell), Danny McBride (Will Stanton), Jorma Taccone (Chaka), John Boylan (voice of Enik), Matt Lauer (himself), Leonard Nimoy (voice of The Zarn) Related: Talk About It/Family Corner

It's not as if the public was clamoring for a remake of Land of the Lost. Young and old generally remain ignorant of the short-lived Saturday morning television program from the mid-'70s with campy dialogue and Z-grade special effects. As for the forty-somethings that actually remember it from their childhood, they typically regard it with nostalgia or embarrassment (if not both). I caught a few episodes during a recent TV marathon—to call Land of the Lost cheesy is an insult to cheese.

Yet who would have guessed that a big-screen adaptation could sink even lower? Sure, Hollywood has screwed up TV shows before, but you'd think a modernized Land of the Lost with better production values would play as well as the 2008 remake of Journey to the Center of the Earth. Instead, the filmmakers have aimed for the lowest common denominator with a movie too juvenile for adults and too crude for kids. If you hated the show before, chances are you'll hate this even more. If you loved it, prepare to find your precious childhood memories drenched (literally) in dinosaur pee.

Will Ferrell as Dr. Rick Marshall

Tone is the first big problem here. The filmmakers can't decide whether or not they're paying homage to the original or mocking it; that blend worked rather well for The Brady Bunch movies of the '90s, but not so much this time. Beyond sharing the same names, the characters in this movie have little in common with those of the series. Instead of a wholesome park ranger and his two children who accidentally find a bizarre lost world, we have three unrelated (and unlikeable) adults—two vulgar nitwits and a generic female in tight shorts for ogling.

The show's familiar elements are present at least. Creatures such as the ape-like Pakuni and the reptilian Sleestak, in all their fake-looking costumed glory, as well as the dinosaurs, vastly improved CGI creations reminiscent of Jurassic Park which trump the show's claymation and B-grade puppetry. There's even a brief appearance of the original's corny, banjo-driven theme song.

Unlike the deadpan seriousness of the TV program, the movie rarely takes itself seriously, playing it all for silliness. That would be perfectly acceptable if it were even remotely funny. Ironically, the old show took itself seriously and yielded unintentional laughs, while the new movie tries to be funny and fails miserably.

Maybe this isn't surprising since it's a Will Ferrell vehicle. For every Anchorman and Elf in his spotty track record, there's a Bewitched and Semi-Pro lurking nearby. Here he plays Dr. Rick Marshall as a whiny and arrogant buffoon whose theories about time travel and alternate universes are widely ridiculed and discredited, especially after an embarrassing tiff with Matt Lauer on The Today Show. (Since this is one of the rare instances where the humor works, the filmmakers knowingly deliver it twice.)

Anna Friel as Holly

Turns out Rick is not a complete idiot, or so says pretty grad student Holly (Anna Friel of TV's Pushing Daisies), who urges him to give his time travel device another try. Their field test leads them to a backwoods cave raft ride, guided by sleazy souvenir salesman Will (Danny McBride of Tropic Thunder). Before you know it, the three are transported through a portal to a strange new world accurately described as "a cosmic lost and found." Past, present, and future intriguingly collide in a jungle-and-desert wasteland littered with Viking ships, flying saucers, and restaurant signs. For an attempt at plot, the trio loses the time travel device upon arrival. Befriended by a half-evolved monkey man named Chaka (Jorma Taccone of Saturday Night Live), our heroes are pursued by a vindictive Tyrannosaurus Rex dubbed Grumpy, the Sleestak lizard people, and other monstrosities in their quest to find a way home.

All of this might have added up to the same sort of weird whimsy that made Ghostbusters and Galaxy Quest successes, but those were smartly made comedy blockbusters. This script is an overindulgent mess, reveling too much in its own goofiness to bother with details like clever writing and comedic timing.

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