Captain Jason Briggs (Ross Hagen) and his second in command, Sgt Ben Healey (Steve Barkett), are on a plane escorting three misfits to be court martialed, Private Wilbur “Turbo” Turbowski (Peter Spellos), Wayne “The Brain” Kincaid (Tom Shell) and John Skeemer (Richard Gabai) . Flying the plane is Corporal Buzz Brannigan (Bob Sheridan). Over the Pacific the plane develops engine trouble and crashes into the ocean near an uncharted island. Buzz is injured during the crash but all six men make it to the island.
While the men are scoping out the island, Buzz, who was left behind to rest, gets eaten by a dinosaur. A band of native women in skimpy outfits show up and chase the dinosaur away. The women speak English. They capture the remaining men and take them to their leader, Queen Morganna (Toni Naples). The queen wants to put the men to work in “The Pit”.
Briggs and Healey manage to escape for a time. One of the captors notices a tattoo on Skeemer’s arm and believes it is part of an island prophecy. The guys are now looked on as gods who are destined to end the island’s famine problem as well as its dinosaur problem.
“Dinosaur Island” was released in 1994 and was directed by Fred Olen Ray and Jim Wynorski. It is a fantasy comedy with some nudie cutie aspects. If you want to look at some boobs, this is just as good a way as any other movie. It’s mostly a sex romp with a few dinosaurs tossed in.
The dinosaurs are mostly a combination of hand puppets and stop motion puppets in not so great forced perspective as well as some giant thing on wheels that hangs out in Bronson cave. Not the worst I’ve seen, but not the best either. According to the film credits the dinosaurs were genetically engineered and trained by John Carl Buechler. One of the dinosaurs was used in Roger Corman’s film “Carnosaur” 1993. It was a stipulation by Corman that they had to use the prop to get him to finance the film.
Beside the bad dialogue, choppy editing and questionable acting there are some plot holes as well. For example, what was that “Pit” thing all about? Are there any men on the island? If so, are they in the pit? Is there really a “fountain of youth” aspect to the water on the island? Several plot devises were tossed about but never explored.
It’s not a great movie by any means, and the dinosaurs, what there is of them, are mostly cheap looking. The draw of the film is the nubile young women romping around the set, nothing else. There are also a couple mild soft core sex scenes tossed in. I’m not into boobs but I don’t have a problem with them, especially if there’s a dinosaur hanging around. Altogether the film is low budget silliness. It basically falls into the “so bad it’s good” category.