 Burt Lancaster plays a doctor conducting "nightmarish genetic experiments" on animals that turn them into part men. When Michael York gets shipwrecked on his island, Burt comes up with a plan to get rid of him. 1977, 104 minutes, Widescreen DVD
This is a good movie for people who want evidence that everything you can imagine in movies has already been done and been done better. Way before over-the-hill film legend Marlon Brando teamed with once-hot-leading-man Val Kilmer in the film version of H.G. Wells' The Island Of Dr. Moreau in 1996, over-the-hill film legend Burt Lancaster teamed with once-hot-leading-man Michael York in the same project in 1977.
Sure, Burt still had a few projects ahead of him that didn't reek of him trying to make sure his AARP dues got paid on time, but the days of major, mainstream projects were largely behind him by this time. And as for Michael York, though it's obvious he hasn't had trouble finding work in the last thirty years, he hasn't exactly found work in projects that any of us would admit to actually seeing (i.e. Austin Powers, Land Before Time VII), a far cry from early seventies glory that included Cabaret, some Musketeers films and Logan's Run. Still the presence of these two talents makes an otherwise routine take on the familiar story tolerable.
Having already run through this premise with Charles Laughton in 1933's Island Of Lost Souls and a bunch of nobodies in 1959's Blood Creature, I can't say that I was too excited at the prospect of sitting through some goof in his ape man make-up running down Moreau's laws whenever Moreau wandered into his cave hide-out with a bullwhip and a chip on his shoulder. I always thought that if your big project is to try and turn smelly animals into humans and you've done all this work and surgery so that they kind of resemble wolf men and they can actually talk and understand you that the first law should be something like, "always shave your back and use Aqua Velva so that you don't scare the shipwrecked hunks that wash up on shore periodically" but I guess the whole "walk on two feet" deal is a lot easier on Moreau's budget if he's going to have to start buying pants for these freaks. 
I have to say that I've always found the premise of the Dr. Moreau story to be a bit on the stupid side. Although I understand that this is one of those "man shouldn't play God" bits where the guy with the hubris to try and create his own version of life ends up all strung up in his jungle enclave, I just have never understood the point of taking bears, apes, and bulls and turning them into men. I also have never understood how Moreau could do all this back in the early 1900s while working by lantern light on a island in the Pacific and get all these animals changed so that they looked like stunt men in make up, but couldn't do a simple nose job on any of them so that they all still ran around with their animal snouts. Maybe they had trouble adjusting to their new manhood because they were self conscious of their pig noses. Every mad scientist should know that if their creature has a bad self-image, he/she/it is going to be prone to going on rampages (or "acting out" as the mad scientist would no doubt write it up in his monograph on the subject).
Michael York plays shipwreck victim Andrew Braddock who instantly has credibility with his audience since he has the same last name as Chuck Norris' character from the Missing In Action trilogy and therefore we can pretend that this Braddock is probably Chuck's long lost British relative. And like the Braddock who single-handedly went back to the Nam and finally won the war for us, York's Braddock also gets to oversee the destruction of lots of thatched huts and runs around in the jungle shooting deformed natives and rescuing people (well one person in this case, but it was former fashion model Barbara Carrera which is certainly more impressive than saving a bunch of skinny POWs).
Braddock is taken in by Dr. Moreau and even though Moreau is hospitable enough, something seems odd about him. Mainly, like what the devil is he doing on an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with his mercenary pal Montgomery, ugly man-servant M'Ling, and Barbara Carrera? Moreau tells him that he's working on something involving cells and stuff, but since I had signed up to watch animal-men go crazy and not for a class called "The Biology of 1905: How To Play God With Morphine, Gauze, and Hired Thugs", I zoned out, especially when I heard him use the word "eugenics". Is that like ebonics? Someone should do a movie where a scientist tries to create an ebonic man or something. Surely there's a Wayans brother that needs work. 
I think there is something that all us aspiring shipwrecked studs can take away from this film. If you are in the mad scientist's library and he opens up a cabinet to show you his embryo collection then you might want to start hatching some sort of scheme worthy of the Professor from Gilligan's Island to get your studly behind off that island. Surely you could find a way to tie some beakers, a gurney, and some coconut shells together to make jet ski if you put your mind to it.
Along with the doc's accumulation of abortion left overs, there's some other things that make Braddock think that maybe something is fishy about a mad scientist conducting secret experiments on an out-of-the-way island with only his mercenary, half-man butler, and sexy fashion model to assist him.
Just little things like the fact that Braddock is chased through the jungle by a bunch of creatures, Moreau tells him not to leave the compound after dark, and he hears lots of strange animal noises in the jungle. Oh and there was also the half-man, half-animal thing that he sees Moreau hauling away in chains.
Once confronted about this, Moreau says something about how it's just a really big embryo and he's just trying to complete his collection. I know how I am about my pog collection, so I understand the mentality.
Braddock wants off the island and Moreau tells him that it won't be a problem because once the supply ship shows up in two years, he can be the first one standing at the dock. In the meantime, Moreau thinks that maybe Braddock should get some team spirit and start pitching in on all the unholy experiments going on. That seems only fair to me if Moreau is going to letting this guy crash with him for two more years, but Braddock gets high and mighty with Moreau (when he isn't getting down and dirty with Barbara Carrera) and refuses to help. He gets his lifeboat patched up and attempts to leave with Babs, but Moreau jumps and drugs him.
This is where this version deviates from Island Of Lost Souls and Blood Creature (I can't remember anything about the Brando version except that Brando was really fat and pale). Since this book was never assigned to me in junior high, I have no clue whether the movie took it from the book or just made it up, but the next thing I know Moreau is performing a little experiment on Braddock where he injects him with some jungle juice that will cause him to turn into a beast! So even while Moreau spent all this time perfecting his drug to turn animals into people, he's also been working on his double-secret secret experiment to turn people into animals. Shoot, you don't need no drug for that, you just need to have their football team win a Super Bowl or something.
I suppose that once he starts turning into a beast and is locked in a cage, this provides Michael York the chance to flash those acting chops that got us all hot and bothered in that Omega Code sequel from 2002. He has this monologue where he tries to fight off the encroaching effects of the animal serum. It's causing him to lose his mind and he battles it by recalling his brothers and the good times they had sledding when they were kids. All the while, Lancaster is right next to the cage shouting encouraging things to him like "That's it! Give in to the animal within you!" and "Can't you just feel your mind evaporating just like your career!" Funny stuff. I mean, really dramatic, thought-provoking stuff about what it is that makes us men and the thin line between man and beast. 
About this time all of Moreau's animal-men decide to go nuts because they find out that Moreau has killed his mercenary buddy (because he objected to injecting Braddock with the serum) and this breaks one of the laws that Moreau preached to them. They get their hands on him and leave him a bloody mess and then advance on the compound. Braddock has only turned into a little bit of a beast (a little face paint, some hairy hands) and he gets his fashion model girlfriend and they head off to his lifeboat.
Back at the compound, the freaks are running wild and releasing all the regular animals that Moreau had in lockdown. The freaks start fighting the animals resulting in a pretty entertaining finale that has us watching such scenes as guys wrestling tigers, falling off balconies with panthers and crashing through walls with really big goats. I will never get tired of watching a guy in werewolf make up being dragged through a jungle camp by a mountain goat.
Since I've never been a fan of the premise, I can't say that this is worth your time, though it is certainly a cut above the other versions since you've got Lancaster and York squaring off (I know, I know, you should check out Island Of Lost Souls to see Laughton's creepy performance, but the 1977 version has much better animal attacks).
I was glad that the end of the movie consisted of Braddock stabbing one of Moreau's creatures in the eye with an oar instead some sermon from Braddock about how Moreau shouldn't tamper with anyone's genes (as opposed to when Braddock tampers with Barbara Carrera's jeans), but things went on way too long and I wanted to cry when Burt injected Michael with the serum because I was thinking that it was about time for the animals to attack and for Braddock to get off the island. Instead I was going to have to suffer through one more plot twist even though the end result was the same.
I wasn't too impressed with the make up either - it all pretty much looked the same except with the wigs and noses being changed or someone having a set of horns glued to their head. Everyone looked like some type wolf man or overgrown dog. Where were the panther-men? Or giraffe guys with really long necks? How about some sort of rhino dude? Rickety premise updated with okay results. Lancaster fans and Michael York relatives only.
Reviews © 2004
MonsterHunter
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