Silent Sundays: The Lost World (1925)

“I will only marry a man of great deeds and strange experiences- a man who can look death in the face without flinching.”

           

            I remember absolutely hating learning about dinosaurs when I was little. I hate science to begin but when we had to learn about dinosaurs who look like giant lizards and reptiles and I am deathly afraid of lizards and reptiles so I would basically crap my pants when just looking at drawings of dinosaurs in books. I cannot even tell you how terrified for years I was to watch the original Jurassic Park. Now, it is really weird because I can watch Jurassic Park without a problem but I cannot look at dinosaurs in books. Yes, I am twenty-seven years old and I am still scared to look at dinosaurs in books.

            If I hate dinosaurs why on earth did I watch The Lost World? I do not know. I think it just came up in a bookmarks folder I have of silent films on YouTube. To let you in a little secret of how I run this blog, I feel the need to post a film every day and that sometimes means I just look for a film and stick the poster on here. That unfortunately happens a lot and it happened with The Lost World. Obviously I wanted to watch it eventually since I had it saved. Even though I hate dinosaurs and anything that has to do with them I wanted to watch The Lost World and when I scrolled through my bookmarks folder and came across the film I thought why not.

            A guy named Edward wants to marry a girl named Gladys. Gladys does not want to marry him because he is not adventurous. Dejected he leaves her apartment.

            The newspaper Ed works for is being threatened with a libel lawsuit by a Professor Challenger (Wallace Beery). The newspaper does not believe his story about finding actual real dinosaurs. He has tried to kill all the reporters from several different newspapers who come to his house. Ed’s boss sends to try to get into the lecture that Challenger is giving at a college. A big game explorer named Sir John Roxton (Lewis Stone) is also at the lecture. He tells Ed that there is much of the jungle that has not been explored Challenger’s statements should not be brushed aside.

            Everyone want Challenger to give them proof of these dinosaurs. He responds that he will give them proof if other people will come with him. He wants to form a committee to travel with him. Sir John and Ed agree to go with him but when Challenger asks Ed what his occupation is and Ed responds that he is a reporter the eccentric professor jumps off the stage and tries to attack him. Eventually the reporter and the professor catch up with each other and they have a brawl in front of the professor’s house. Later they are able to calmly sit down and discuss the expedition with Sir John and a young woman named Paula White (Bessie Love). Paula is the reason for the whole expedition. She has brought her father’s diary to Challenger. In the diary are her father’s drawings of dinosaurs he made while on an island. Paula was with her father but she does not remember much because she fell ill with a fever. She was able to make it off the island but her father was not so fortunate. Paula hopes to find her father with Challenger’s help. Ed decides to write this expedition as a human interest story

            The party soon crosses the Atlantic to the location of the island. Challenger says he is leading the party and the natives back out because they do not like him. At first they do not see anything until they get to a cliff side where they see a Pterodactyl and Brontosaurus. The Brontosaurus knocks down the felled the felled tree the party had used to cross over leaving them no other way to get back. This is exactly what happened to Paula’s father.

            Weeks and months go by as they travel further and further into the jungle. They come across the meat eating dinosaurs. They see the T-Rex and another dinosaur fight each other. The party is able to take shelter from the dangerous dinosaurs in caves. Sir John finds a skeleton. On the skeleton he finds a pocket watch with the initials MW on its face and Paula’s photograph inside. Before Sir John showed Paula the watch, Ed had asked her to marry him.

            Challenger and the other professor who came along spend time observing the dinosaurs. As they are observing one day a volcano erupts pushing both man and beast into the jungle. Ed desperately looks for Sir John and Paula who are safely hiding in a cave.

            Sometime later the party manages to make it out of the jungle along with a live dinosaur. Back in England Challenger holds another lecture at the college this time planning on bringing the dinosaur around to show them their proof. Ed comes in and gives Challenger with the bad news that the dinosaur has escaped from his hold. London is now in a panic with the dinosaur on the loose tearing down building in anger.

            While running after the dinosaur Ed runs into Gladys. She tells him that she could not wait for him and married someone else. Gladys was expecting him to be upset but he is beyond happy because now he can be with Paula.

            The dinosaur tried to cross Tower Bridge but the bridge could not hold the beats weight and collapsed. The dinosaur falls into the Thames and swims away.

            This silent version of The Lost World was not bad at all. There were some scenes that dragged but I always find that there are scenes that drag in most of the silent films I watch. I loved how the actors acted in front of a screen whenever they were supposed to be around the dinosaurs. King Kong did the same thing in 1933 and that was one of my favorite aspects of that film. I do not know why I find that cool and interesting I just do! Maybe it is because it is obviously not CGI and it is really cool to see how creative early film had to be to create the special effects for this film. The Lost World is definitely worth checking out if you are like silent films or are a weirdo and like anything that has to do with dinosaurs.