AllMovie

Diehard fans of 1950s dinosaur flicks may get a little enjoyment out of The Lost Continent, but most others are well advised to give it a miss. Of course, no one expects low-budget sci-fi films of the period to approximate great art, but they should be entertaining -- ripping yarns with plenty of action, some intriguing premise or other, and a whole bunch of special effects (perhaps cheaply done, but imaginative). What one gets in Continent is a lot of rock climbing; there's a stretch of at least 15 minutes in which the actors do little more than scale a mountain, passing by many of the same rocks several times. True, there's some dialogue here, but it's painful and seems to exist just so director Sam Newfield can have an excuse to pad out the rock climbing, which in turn seems to exist solely to give Continent a legitimate feature-length running time. Prior to the rock climbing, there's the usual backstory that's part and parcel of this kind of movie, presented in about as lame and uninteresting a way as possible. Things do pick up a bit for the last half of the film, when the characters reach the top of the mountain (and everything and everybody gets an exotic green tint); but the dinosaurs, which are the main reason for catching the film, are disappointing. The special effects and animation are not just cheap but uninspired. And while the pacing has definitely picked up, the second half is still nowhere near as exciting as it needs to be. The cast does what it can, but the material and the lackluster direction are too much for them to overcome.