Women of the Prehistoric Planet (1966)

The Worst Film Ever

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Wendell Corey spent the 1940s and 1950s as a dependable second lead and an occasional leading man in major motion pictures. By the 1960s however, alcoholism had badly affected his health while his acting career had slowed down considerably. John Agar's glory days (if you can use that term) occurred in the 1950s during which he made several science fiction movies for Universal. By the mid-1960s, he was appearing in trashy, low-budget fare like "Zontar, the Thing from Venus" and "Curse of the Swamp Creature". Both actors were at career low points when they made "Women of the Prehistoric Planet", and while the movie was destined to be pretty bad from the beginning, their lazy performances didn't help the film any.A spaceship on a rescue mission encounters a new planet, which looks a lot like the interior of a Hollywood movie studio. After a lot of hiking through the jungle and a few adventures, the crew discovers an old, wrecked spaceship, which was the objective of their mission. Afterward the crew returns to the main ship. One crew member (Irene Tsu) falls in love with one of the old spaceship's crew, and decides to stay as the mother ship departs. There's a twist ending, which you'll guess way before Wendell Corey does.Many 1960s sci-fi movies were filmed exclusively in studios, giving them an artificial, claustrophobic feel. This film is probably the most talky and stagy of them all, with not one scene shot outdoors. Corey was 52 when the film was made, but was in the final stages of alcoholism and easily looks 20 years older. Agar's performances, always pretty lazy, hit a new low here. He looks like a robot trying to act. Irene Tsu stands out as the only good cast member, but she can't carry the film by herself.After the spaceship lands, the film just meanders from scene to scene with little coherence. One preposterous scene has a crew member falling off a slippery log into a deadly pool of liquid, but it's obvious that the crew could have easily walked around the hazardous stuff! Stuart Margolin has an unintentionally funny death scene thanks to a giant spider. The script was so bad that I really felt sorry for the actors at times.This movie has apparently had longstanding copyright issues and is only available on old, out-of-print VHS tapes. If you want to see Agar and Corey in a really forgettable movie, take a look. Otherwise, don't bother.

Somewhere in space, where no one can hear you scream, the Cosmos 1 is heading off to somewhere else. The crew have been on this 6 month mission. They are an advanced space faring race with their futuristic lockers and guitar-looking radar wall screen and the tendency to do space/time conversion formulas. Somewhere else another space vessel, Cosmos 3, has problems. The ship and crew are being held hostage by Centaurians (think of Klingons without the brown paint and sash, but all Asian) and because of it they crash onto a "prehistoric" planet.The commander of Cosmos 1, Admiral King (played by the walking corpse of the late Wendell Corey), disobeys orders and goes on a rescue mission to Solaris. 3 months later .....Cosmos 1 arrives at the planet, where 18 years have gone by. A rescue party is sent down, lead by Commander "I don't like Centaurians" Scott with Dr. Farrell (played by the incomparable John Agar), Lt."Why won't he shut up" Bradley, Stuart Margolin as the Chief and some nobody who's expendable (think of the red shirt security officers from the original Star Trek series). At the same time, Linda (Irene Tsu) escapes to the planet to stretch her legs.On the "prehistoric" planet below, they find the crash site and the lone survivor; a Centaurian named Tang (Robert Ito). The rest of the movie is just a "stew" containing paper machete sets, stock footage of an iguana, a rubber iguana on fire, a sock-like jumping tree snake, a hopping spider plush toy, animal cruelty towards a chimpanzee (Teeko), stock footage, the admiral's slurred confused alcoholic rants and a trio of cavemen brutes. We top this with scenes upon scenes of the lecherous, chauvinistic, sexual harassing, karate practicing Lt. Bradley (who never shuts up). Visualize the Watney Smith character from Outlaw of Gor .... CABOT !!Though the budget of the movie (and by proxy the intelligence of the write/director) was low, the movie still manages to be infused with a thought provoking plot about race relations, cultural differences, not being understood, being different, going through turmoil and finding a resolution. As a rule, you probably won't need more than 5 or 6 shots of SoCo to be able to see this.You will probably recognize some of the actors. They had long and fulfilling careers, but you would not have bet on that after seeing this movie. Riveting performances like "crossing the log when we could go around or jump over the liquid" scene and Irene Tsu's unforgettable banana scene. This scene is both erotic, inappropriate and confusing (the skin of the banana ,and by proxy the banana itself, is bite-proof, yet not peel proof). Robert Ito's "hopping" interpretation of Tang will haunt me for the rest of my days. I highly recommend this movie if you are not alone, not on any sleep inducing medication nor in possession of a dissection kit and are watching the MST3k version of this movie. In my final thoughts I noticed a similarity between this movie and another MST alumni, The Clonus Horror. Now to a bit of SAT deja vu :The Clonus Horror is to The Island as The Women of the Prehistoric Planet is to …. a) Star Trek b) Star Wars c) None of the above d) Battlestar Galactica.... for those even remotely interested the answer will be in my next review.-Celluloid Rehab

Wow. A very cheesy space flick with corny humor to boot.Apparently, Centaurions aren't feeling good about being mistreated, there's a mutiny, nice model ship crash and the film mixes into a caveman/futuristic/love story. I was hoping for Wendell Corey's demise, but it doesn't happen (rats). The hotty Linda meets a guy named Tang. That's mostly all I can recall or all I want to. Do not reveal the ending of Biblical proportions!Loved the space age weapons...I think they were 38 calibers. What a vision to see a future with no lasers or disintegrators!

I must be used to the STAR TREK series plus its affiliated spinoffs plus CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND or maybe ET etc, but with this film, I have problems.There really is no chemistry between the actors. They speak to one another, but there is no comraderie. Everybody is put into his or her little box and that is where they stay.The only good things about this movie, as far as I feel are Tang (Robert Ito in pre-QUINCY days) and Irene Tsu. I actually felt that they really cared for each other. There was the chemistry that was missing from the rest of the movie.I also liked Lt. Bradley (Paul Gilbert). Why would they have such a clown in the midst of a bunch of zombies. His energies were wasted.The ending caught me off guard. I won't divulge it, but I'm going to look at this movie again tonight to see if I can pick up any clues as to what was revealed at end time of this movie.