Unlike the other 1985 film review for Dino Dicember this year, this one is indeed a proper dinosaur film, and one that does know the target demographic its going for, not that a title like “Baby The Lost Legend” would led to people assuming the opposite.
It’s also another dinosaur themed by Disney, this time under the Touchstone Films/Pictures label
like One Of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing, thought thankfully no “Yellow Peril” age chinese stereotypes, we’re moving to Africa as the movie premises involves a couple of archeologists trying to track down the local legendary monster known as mokele mobembe, whom happens to share many characteristics with sauropods, dinosaurs basically, leading the two to find a family of brontosauruses deep in the jungles of Congo.
The two are followed by the African military, which seems the dinosaurs as a potential treat and will have to escape them in order to save the baby and its parents as well…
It’s technically a Disney film but not really (but also kinda is), as it stars off with a spy-style assassination during a city wide african parade, and while curiously it predates both Jurassic Park and the Africa-set rip-off that was Congo (the one with Tim Curry, the talking gorillas and the temple), but it’s obviously more reminiscent of another Spielberg movie, yes, E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, released just 3 years prior.
At the very least this isn’t Mac & Me, or one of the many horrifying, nightmare inducing ET rips-offs or spoofs (especially on the Turkish side), and i wouldn’t consider an ET clone, even though the inspiration becomes fairly obvious when you get to see the baby brontosaurus.
While i appreciate it taking place in Africa and showing some customs from there, even if just for visual variety’s sake, it’s also a film that clearly doesn’t want to be taken as a kids film, with plenty of violence, a lot on native people that just live there, but it also wants to be a relatively light heart comedy-adventure, and mix action with comedy like Raiders Of The Lost Ark did 4 years before.
Problem is, direction by Bill Norton (More American Graffiti), really sinks any attempt at that, the jokes often fall on their face, at best, as is the light hearted stuff, expecially when it becomes obvious if someone has to die for the good guys to get the dinosaur, a lot of African people will be tossed into the grinder, fuck it, we’re gonna Cannibal Holocaust your village if need be, alongside the more casual “random” racism, all with fairly dislikeable characters (even the supposed heroes) that have no depth or nuance, nor good action or comedy to compensate for that.
This isn’t Indiana Jones where it all feels so over the top and mostly the heroics are at the expenses of nazis or some inequivocable bad guys, plus the plot is too simple anyway, and it doesn’t even try to evoke that sense of wonder, as the movie works best when its showing the little brontosaurus being indeed a curious baby, but it’s gimmicky, feeling more manipulative than “charming”, and that isn’t the real focus of the film anyway, the dinosaurs being just a crutch for a reharshed game of white saviors VS big bad black military/poachers, a plot that has very little going on.
Pity is, the effects for the baby brontosaurus and its parents are quite good, dated in nature but still better than most of the CG for mid-to-low dino flicks, yet they feel wasted in a strangely meandering, ambitionless film that isn’t sure if it wants to be a sort of “dinosaur ET” or appeal to an older audience, so it unsurprisingly feels like a nothing burger.
even if decently acted, sporting real production values and feeling like a frigging masterpiece, compared to some of the crap i’ve reviewed on the rubric, Baby: Secret Of The Lost Legend comes off as a very confused bad movie that didn’t really know who it was made for, with the vibe of a children adventure film but a a lot of violence, sex, nudity and a lot of consistent racism.
You know, for the kids!
And i do mean it “going Cannibal Holocaust”, near the end of the movie, to save the dinosaur, the “heroes” burn down a village, sure, they meant to distract the corrupt army soldiers and nobody dies because of this fuckin movie still wanting to be a PG affair, but an entire village is destroyed just so the good guys can discover the dinosaur (which they don’t because it would be too mean spiritedinstead of the villainous scientist-white hunter, while a Danny Elfman-esque style tune plays.
This isn’t a bit i made up or stole from someone else, this actually happens in the film, and it’s just the perfect example of the tone massacre that defines this mess of a movie.
No fuckin wonder this too was left into obscurity (and like One Of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing, it’s quite racist, so maybe it is a Disney film after all), and there should remain, as is basically a film for nobody, maybe not even dinosaur buffs used to digest endless crap from the indie side of things.
There’s a TV recut under the Dinosaur…Secret of the Lost Legend title, released in 1989 by Disney via their Walt Disney Presents/the Magical World Of Disney anthology format, i didn’t bother with it as i simply watched the original, full lenght cut, but if you’re curious, you might wanna check that out.
Sure as hell i don’t nor have time at the moment.
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