Ferrell dinosaur comedy ‘Land of the Lost’ predictable, unfunny
Will Ferrell plays an explorer trapped in a parallel universe in the TV show adaptation Land of the Lost. Will Ferrell has never really been in an action film before, but he plays the exact same messed-up man-child character that he’s played in all of his comedies. I really do like Will Ferrell, but Land of the Lost is no action comedy. It lacks comedy, and the action sequences mostly retread other, better films.
The film opens up with Matt Lauer interviewing Dr. Rick Marshall (Ferrell). Marshall claims that some subatomic particles can be harnessed to travel to parallel dimensions, and take fossil fuel from there. Lauer’s dismissal of this theory leads to Marshall beating up Lauer. Three years later, the incident left Marshall alone, branded a lunatic by the science world.
But using some freaky-deaky machine that the film barely explains, Marshall travels back with a female assistant (who becomes the clichéd love interest) and a Southern druggie (played hilariously by Danny McBride). Soon it becomes clear this is no ordinary place, with aliens and jungles and vinyl turntables and caverns and motel pools. Marshall must get back to the normal world with his friends and evade a very intelligent T-Rex.
It feels all too familiar, perhaps because of the uncanny resemblances to Journey to the Center of the Earth? Ferrell isn’t even all that funny in it, he himself looks incredibly bored even when he’s running from a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Anna Friel just walks around and says her lines as the love interest, whose name I forgot. Danny McBride as the redneck whose name I also forgot is the funniest one of the bunch. The film alternates between epic special effects sequences and corny parts with awful alien suits that stuntmen are clearly in.
Oddly the best parts are the beginning and the end. Matt Lauer and Will Ferrell squaring off at the beginning was a funny scene in a huge disappointment. The end was good because A: Matt Lauer and Will Ferrell reunite and B: it finally was over. D+
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Michelle Rogers June 13th
I hope to start running your reviews in our new newspaper, A2 Journal, this summer, so keep ‘em coming. The paper launches July 9 and I think it will be awesome to have an Ann Arbor student contributing to an Ann Arbor publication. You certainly have the credentials. Keep up the good work.
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