Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

There are two techniques for shooting a low budget film, but having it feature giant monsters of prehistoric beasts. There is the Ray Harryhausen way which uses a combination of stop motion and rear projection. You create a monster using clay or some other type of adjustable figure and then splice the film together in a way that makes the creature look like it is in the city or terrorizing the cast. Then there is the Lippert and Bert I. Gordon way which kind of skips the creating the creature and instead they use real life animals. It works to some degree when making a film about giant creatures like Food of the Gods and Empire of the Ants, not so much when you are making a film about dinosaurs because no matter what you staple to your lizard, it is still going to look like a lizard and not a Tyrannosaurus Rex. This film is another Lipper/Bert collaboration, I actually think Bert got a bit better later as he would use more props like creating a giant ant puppet or two rather than using all rear projection, but in this one it is rather bad. Saw this one as an episode of MST3K and it features lots of critters being forced to fight each other to recreate primordial battles.The story is about a ship that is sent to a newly discovered planet that is named Nova. An expert on animals is sent, a geologist is sent, a doctor and a chemist. Seems they forgot to send along a pilot! Well, they manage to make it to the planet somehow and proceed to couple up. There is two guys and two girls and they may as well be going on a picnic as the ship looks like it set down in an Earth state park rather than an alien world; however, there is the foreboding island which we know is foreboding because the movie's music lets us know. They have to collect samples and such, but do spend an awful lot of time killing the native wildlife...for some reason, the animal expert is the quickest to pull the trigger. Well two of them finally make their way to the island and discover lizards...I mean dinosaurs and must try to escape and blow up the place because that is what you do when surveying a new planet...bring an atom bomb! This made for a funny episode of MST3K; unfortunately, it is preceded by a long short about some dude who dies in a car crash. Not the best short ever on the show as it goes on too long and it is not particularly funny. On the plus side, the movie portion of the show is a lot better as Lippert movies generally make rather funny episodes of the show.So, not a very good movie. I like an exploration film, but like I said the team of astronauts seem kind of annoying. You got the main guy who is constantly pushing the women right into the dirt making me think he really had something against them in real life, you have the blond chemist who constantly screams and nearly gets the ineffective doctor killed. Then there is the other lady who just has to go to the stupid island and when she gets there she constantly whines and tears up proof of their discovery of lizards...I mean dinosaurs. The only likable cast member is Joey the lemur who is constantly getting pulled around by the tail by the cast. Though I find it absurd that the one guy risks his life to save the thing.

This has to be one of the worst of the "B' movies. Idiotic plot,cheesy special effects,wooden acting. So many plot holes in this one:first,how does a planet just manage to enter our system without colliding with everything in its path(and with nobody noticing),and then conveniently park itself next to Earth? Next,if this new planet is so close to us,why does it take the rocket 4 months to get there? Why are all the animals so familiar? Then those gosh-awful "dinosaurs"! Blow up shots of an iguana,a caiman and a gila monster,"fighting" each other(tho I am curious if those were real fights,and if the caiman and gila were really killed,in which case it's cruelty to animals) Finally,how could they have possibly paddled a leaky rubber life raft far enough to escape being caught in the bomb's explosion? I remember this turkey being double billed with Monster From Green Hell,another clunker of the B variety,on Saturday morning TV.

Note: Anyone who is sensitive and dislikes the idea of watching reptiles rip each other apart should NOT watch this film. PETA members in particular are warned! This is a sad excuse for a film, but it is so bad that bad movie buffs might enjoy watching it just to laugh at how bad a bad movie can be. Did I mention it was bad?! The most obvious problem with the film is that the film makers took a ton of stock footage of practically EVERYTHING and strung them together in a "brilliant" attempt to pad the film and stretch it out to just over an hour while doing little actual filming. At the beginning of the movie, tons of stock footage of jet planes, V-2 rockets and military stuff fills the screen. Later, on the "other planet", we are treated to even more stock shots--most of which are nature clips that are sloppily integrated and rather irrelevant. It's made worse when the actors(?) all react rather poorly to these wonderful delights! Uggghh! I don't think I've seen another film (other than documentaries) that used so much stock footage.The film is about an expedition to a new planet that just appears out of the blue and drifts into an orbit near the Earth. How convenient, huh?! The four best and brightest(???????) that the USA had to offer would seem to indicate that people in the 1950s were all idiots, as again and again they do stupid things that anyone with a brain or training would not do. First, they explore so far from their ship that they get lost. Second, at night when one of them is supposed to be keeping watch, he and his hot babe go out in the darkness and he nearly gets torn to pieces by one of hundreds of animals that look EXACTLY like those on Earth. Third, every time anything bad happens, the blonde lady begins screaming or crying hysterically--even though she's supposed to be a respected scientist. Fourth, although they are to briefly survey the planet and return to Earth, they go way out of their way--many miles and into dangerous situations that they should have avoided. And, speaking of dangerous situations, the dinosaurs from the title are such scary monsters as iguanas and baby alligators that are filmed up close fighting. Oooh, scary stuff, huh?! To make things worse, the film makers actually toss the iguana onto the gator and just let them fight for real!! That poor iguana!! Even though in the film it supposedly wins this fight with the gator, you can clearly see the gator tearing into the iguana's flesh. There are also fur-covered elephants and giant armadillos (yikes).Although most of the planet seems awfully nice (except for the island filled with monstrous reptiles), the team's response to these discoveries is to nuke the island! Yes, I said nuke it!! I think the film makers chose to do this because, frankly, they had footage of a nuclear explosion (even though there was a hair stuck on the lens) and couldn't resist using it--even if it made no sense!! And the ending credits appear over top the mushroom cloud as the film then fades! Overall, a truly awful film--and one that even Ed Wood would have probably disliked! By the way, I could be wrong, but I think the 'pet' they discovered on the planet was a kinkajou.

Initiated into film with 1954's Serpent Island, which I would love to see, Bert I. Gordon got his chance to direct with King Dinosaur, whose being influenced by King Kong is indicated in in the title and the monster battles.The mini-epic, filmed in Bronson Caverns etc. on a mini budget, starred Bill Bryant, who had minor roles in some other films like CHISUM and appeared on TV in westerns as well. He plays one of four intrepid scientists who venture to newly discovered Planet Nova, which has just entered the solar system. Well, actually this occurs after a barrage of about 15 min of stock footage accompanied by Marvin Miller filling us in with about every piece of useless information we might need.Anyway, they eventually get to Nova and discover an island and some monsters, walking and talking a lot along the way.That's the main weakness of the script and film in general; an all-encompassing lack of genuine intrigue. However, it's kind of fun for sci-fi fans and devotees of Gordon's to see his slightly amateurish first feature, even if it means sitting through a lot of stale scenarios to get to those full-blooded reptile brawls.