Time for something very obscure and very fun, with some history behind it, too, because when i think old monster movies from Korea, my mind goes immediatly to good old Pulgasari/Bulgasari.
And guess what, i’m gonna give myself a pat on the back, and you might too, since in 1994 the director of D-War: Dragon Wars and Yonggary (the 1999 movie, itself a remake of 1967’s Yongary, Monster From The Deep), Shim Hyung-rae, caught wind of the international dinosaur-mania, so he concocted one of the most peculiar and strange kaiju films ever committed to celluloid, Tyranno’s Claw, far from the obvious Jurassic Park mockbuster the year of release might suggest.
Even though there IS a “goat scene” …. this is something else indeed.
I’m not even talking about the rituals to feed T-rex by the primitive people, but like, the cavemen themselves do stand out as they’re not the usual somehow coiffeured early man with perfect dentures and manes, NOPE, these are some of the ugliest, buck-toothed, filthy looking and simianesque cavemen ever, doing a lot of nasty shit like eating disgusting insect alive, acting like the dumbass idiots most “early men” supposedly were in comparison.
Sure, it also made to play for comedic effect, but even most comedic cavemen films do not have such “historically accurate” cavemen, or shit like the “cooked boar feeding frenzy” scene, or even them swarming over the poor swine in the related previous scene.
That already distinguishes the film, as do the effects, surprisingly good dinosaur effects, suits, puppets and so on, i did not expect this very good level of quality in terms of special effects from such an obscure Korean monster movie of the early 90s, like, the pteranodon suit it’s bafflingly one of the more accurate ones i’ve ever seen.
Nor i did expect to see a caveman dropkick or a caveman getting ambushed by a Pachicephalosaurus (which squeaks like a duck) when trying to take a shit, but that’s the beauty of rummagging through very obscure old movies, sometimes you find cheesy gems like Tyranno’s Claw with plenty of stuff that you would never expect to see coming.
I’ve found a low quality version on Youtube, not that i’ve seen screenshots or footage in any better quality than “VHS rip downgraded further via Youtube compression”, but i’ve seen it that way and at the time of writing it’s an option. Who knows, better options in this regard might come along.
Thankfully language barrier is not really a problem, the language is proper “UNGA BUNGA” gibberish and grunts, so the lacks of subtitles (at least i didn’t found any) isn’t a real issue that will hold you back.
I’ve not lead with the plot because there really isn’t much of one to speak of, but there it’s more going on than i expected, the main trust being a fat caveman that saves a girl he fancies (and that he shared food with previously in an act of simple piety) from being sacrificed/fed by tribe leader to a T-rex, they then escape and get chased by a posse sent by the tribe leader, irked and vengeful, and during this we see a lot of dinosaurs attack, them coming about fairly gruesome human bodies decomposing with worms in them..
Then the fuckin Skaven attack them, this movie it’s unpredictable, and hugely entertaining, so much i’m willing to let the expected low brow cavemen comedy bits slide, i mean on IMDB it’s categorized as a “family/for kids movie”. Can’t argue with that, most “for all audiences” movies about tribal people have people torch their hut Cannibal Holocaust style.
Regardless, while i wouldn’t call this a “good movie”, i can’t deny it’s quite the aged cheesy treat for dinofreaks, a really entertaining caveman romp with the extra delish of really good dinosaur effects.
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