Published via Ecency

(source: tmdb.org)

In 20th Century BBC enjoyed reputation of the world’s best television and has set the quality standards many other televisions would strive for. Much of that was due to highly regarded content like nature documentaries, historic drama, comedy or crime shows. At the turn of millennium CGI allowed BBC to start competing with Hollywood in delivering material that was previously seen almost exclusively on big screen. A good example of this can be provided by The Lost World, 2001 two-part science fiction miniseries directed by Stuart Orme.

The miniseries is based on the eponymous 1912 novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, one of that author’s most popular works, known as the basis for groundbreaking 1925 Hollywood film which is considered to be the most famous depiction of dinosaurs in silent cinema. The new version, set in first decades of 20th Century, begins after famous scientist Professor Challenger (played by Bob Hoskins) returns to London after expedition in the Amazon jungle and claims that he has shot an animal believed to be pterosaur. Those claims are met with ridicule by his peers, but newspaper agrees to finance his next expedition that would be joined by big game hunter Lord John Roxton (played by Tom Ward), young reporter Edward Malone (played by Matthew Rhys) and Challenger sceptical rival Professor Summerlee (played by James Fox). During the voyage, Challenger reveals that the location of dinosaurs can be isolated plateau in jungle. In the Christian mission the expedition is joined by Agnes Clooney (played by Elaine Cassidy), young woman who volunteers to help interpreting native language, but also by her fundamentalist uncle Theo Kerr (played by Peter Falk). Using felled tree as improvised bridge, Challenger and other expedition member reach plateau, but Kerr deliberately knocks down tree to and leaves them stranded. Challenger soon discovers dinosaurs, but also strange “ape men” and native tribe whose members might shelter them or perhaps even find way back to civilisation.

Because it is a miniseries, 2001 version of The Lost World has more content and, as such, it had and mostly used opportunity to be more faithful to the original novel. That also allowed for characters to be better written and more complex. They are played by top British and Irish cast and Hoskins is good as temperamental scientist, while James Fox excels as his rival. Script, written by Adrian Hodges and Tony Mullholand, adds romantic subplot that didn’t exist in original novel, but it plays very naturally. The intended audience, however, would pay much more attention to depiction of ancient prehistoric beasts. BBC was very fortunate to have the same creative resources which had been used only few years earlier in renowned documentary series Walking with Dinosaurs and its follow-up Walking with Beasts. Those include CG models of extinct animals that are well-matched with live action shot on New Zealand locations that reasonably pass for Amazon jungle. The result is entertaining old-school adventure film that, on the other hand, lacks a bit of epic scope, which could be attributed to Orme’s somewhat underwhelming direction and lack of proper soundtrack. The Lost World nevertheless deserves recommendation and not only to dinosaur enthusiasts or fans of period adventure.

RATING: 6/10 (++)