No matter how much creators Sid and Marty Krofft talk up the movie’s devotion to the TV show’s spirit, I don’t recall Chaka the caveboy being chronically horny, or Rick Marshall gulping dino-urine and being sprayed with dino-loogies. The language here would’ve made my parents turn off the TV set.

Land of the Lost is just another rude, crude Hollywood ripoff capitalizing on fond pre-cable memories, like Starsky and Hutch and The Dukes of Hazzard before it.

After reading that, I started to think of the numerous clips that have been shown for LOTL and came to a unhappy realization that he may be correct. Recently, my kids (ages 8-14) have watched the entire series over again via the new DVDs. Part of the charm of the show was the unapologetic innocence. I would be a shame if they’ve lost that.

I’m still going to give LOTL a chance, and Sid and Marty the benefit of the doubt (that worked out so well with George Lucas). I’ll be there tomorrow with my entire family. No matter the quality, I hope that it’s a success so that someday I’ll be writing about the Sigmund, Pufnstuf and hopefully Lidsville movie.

There was one funny quote in the article that I’ll leave you with:

Plans are in the works for a movie version of the Kroffts’ psychedelic series H.R. Pufnstuf that recreational drug users in the ’70s enjoyed as much as the kids. Judging by this remake, it’ll be called Pineapple Express II.

For more reviews of Land of the Lost:

Associated Press
The Portland Mercury
Kansas City Star

Check back this weekend for the KROFFT.NET Review!

I like the poster, but wonder if it is going to confuse non-Krofft fans. It looks allot like last years Journey to the Center of the Earth. As a long time fan of the works for the Krofft Brothers, I worry that they’ll be labeled as copycats. All we can do is hope for the best.

Sid and Marty Krofft shows have been a large part of my nearly 40 years of life. I hope that Land of the Lost is the first of many successful ( and respectful to fans ) movies to come.

Tell us what you think.

Yes, the story is no longer about a park ranger and his children. Anna Friel (Holly) is Ferrell’s love interest in the film not his daughter, and McBride (Will) is not Rick’s son either. With my renewed faith in this production I’m now worried for the success of the project. This summer’s “Journey to the Center of the Earth” with Brendan Fraser was very close to this version of LOTL. What would have distinguished LOTL from Journey3D is the familial relationship between the characters. I’m afraid that the uninitiated will view LOTL as a knockoff.

I’m almost convinced that us old fans of “Land of the Lost” will be pleased with the movie. I just hope that the Krofft Brothers’ first feature film in over 30 years has wide enough appeal to be a huge success. The success that they (and us fans) deserve.

Picture via (MoviesOnline)

Take heart, geeks — [the director] Silberling is a bona fide LOTL fanboy. He’s also an incredibly Zen dude; on the day of my visit, Silberling is months into a complicated shoot, and yet he’s still grinning behind the monitor. Tonally, this Land has more of a comedy bent than the original series. You can’t put Ferrell, Danny McBride (Will), and Jorma Taccone (Chaka the Pakuni) on a set, allow them to riff freely, and not expect hilarity to ensue. The brothers Krofft are fixtures on the set. In an age of crass, unfaithful remakes, it’s great to see the original creators being involved as producers and treated with respect.

I like Will Ferrell, but many of his last few movies have been so over the top…they’ve bordered on the completely stupid. I did not want my LOTL to be just ‘another Will Ferrell comedy’. I didn’t want this Rick Marshall to be anything like Marshall Willenholly. Hopefully with Sid and Marty on set every day, “fanboy” Silberling feels a sense of responsibility or their legacy.

I admire Sid and Marty Krofft, and hope that “Land of the Lost” becomes one of the great movies of the year. Both them, and their fans, deserve the best movie possible.

The movie will preserve some of the campy aesthetic–the Sleestaks look much as they did 30 years ago–but little Holly has been replaced by a Cambridge-educated linguist in tight denim shorts. Ferrell is now a disgraced scientist instead of a park ranger, and the PG-13 rating means there’ll be one or two curse words.

Sid and Marty are getting a $1 million producer’s fee and 4% of the movie’s profits. Marty says someone’s already interested in making feature versions of Pufnstuf and Sigmund and the Sea Monsters. If he had listened to Sid, he says, they would have sold the rights to their shows long ago. Now he estimates those rights are worth $25 million. Among the people who offered to buy them out was pop singer Michael Jackson.

“Thank God that didn’t happen,” says Marty. “The minute you cash the check, then what? That’ll kill you in a month.”

In the article, there are very excited quotes from, of course, Sid who seems to be really enjoying his creations coming to life again. Believe it or not, this article renews my hopes in the new movie. This will “stretch their legacy to a new generation”. Anything that can achieve that purpose, I will support. Comments?

Also check out Forbe’s In Pictures: The Krofft’s Greatest Hits.

Despite their (quite literal) smoke screen, we did manage to get Ferrell to spill actual facts about which of the show’s classic characters will be coming to the big screen. “The [dimension-opening] pylons are in the movie, [Altrusian castaway] Enik is in the movie, and the Sleestaks too, but we couldn’t get Chaka,” Will teased.

Again, I have tired of the Will Ferrell brand of humor over the last few years, and I am not looking forward to seeing it in my beloved “Land of the Lost”. But, at least we get a LOTL movie. I still hope that we get more “Stranger Than Fiction” Ferrell than “Talladega Nights” Ferrell.

Space-time vortexes suck.

Will Ferrell stars as has-been scientist Dr. Rick Marshall, sucked into one and spat back through time. Way back. Now, Marshall has no weapons, few skills and questionable smarts to survive in an alternate universe full of marauding dinosaurs and fantastic creatures from beyond our world–a place of spectacular sights and super-scaled comedy known as the Land of the Lost.

Sucked alongside him for the adventure are crack-smart research assistant Holly (Anna Friel) and a redneck survivalist (Danny McBride) named Will. Chased by T. rex and stalked by painfully slow reptiles known as Sleestaks, Marshall, Will and Holly must rely on their only ally–a primate called Chaka (Jorma Taccone)–to navigate out of the hybrid dimension. Escape from this routine expedition gone awry and they’re heroes. Get stuck, and they’ll be permanent refugees in the Land of the Lost.

Based on the classic television series created by Sid & Marty Krofft, Land of the Lost is directed by Brad Silberling and produced by Jimmy Miller and Sid & Marty Krofft.

So it is official, Will and Holly are not Marshall’s kids. Oh, and he’s not a “ranger” either. I know that those are silly details, but this is KROFFT.NET, and I have obsessed over the tiniest details of a large group of cult shows for the last 14 years…so that’s my prerogative.

Also, is it “back through time” or “alternate universe”? They can’t make up their mind in a single paragraph. It can be one without the other, or both, or neither, but make a choice. This is more fodder that indicates they don’t care about the story, just about getting Will Ferrell to do stupid-funny.

I’ll still watch the movie (it’s Krofft…I can’t stay away). But, I won’t enjoy it.

Let’s hope that the filmmakers can make the second half of this movie work, because if they don’t, they’ll be responsible for one of the worst movies of 2009.

I didn’t read the review as I don’t want to be too spoiled for the film. I hope that the film doesn’t turn out to be “one of the worst movies of 2009″. I’m not looking for best…but I don’t want worst.

What do you think?

Anna Friel told fans that she plays a grown-up version of Holly in the upcoming live-action film adaptation of Land of the Lost, which she is shooting during her hiatus from ABC’s Pushing Daisies.

“Obviously, the 31-year-old version,” Friel said of her character at a panel for Pushing Daisies in Hollywood on March 15, part of the William S. Paley Television Festival. “Will Ferrell is [Rick] Marshall. And this great guy called Danny McBride is Will. And we all go to this mad world.”

Now I assume that being Holly, she won’t be Ferrell’s love interest any longer if they are “faithful to Sid and Marty Krofft’s 1970s children’s series. As speculated last week, being too faithful to the original series could be a bad thing for LOTL, but only time will tell.

At an article over at MovieWeb, something caught my attention.

Land of the Lost’s target audience? Boo! I came to a shocking realization the other day. The target audience for Will Farrell’s upcoming big screen version of Land of the Lost have no clue that there was ever a 1974 Saturday morning version of the show. Who cares if there are DVDs to prove it? They haven’t seen them. The majority of kids in the 5-25 year old age range, the ones that will be going to see this movie on its opening night, have never seen a real Sleestak. They aren’t familiar with Marshal, Will, or Holly. Or their Routine expedition. Or that kickass theme song. How did I discover this? I was with a large group of college students between the ages of 19 and 22, and the subject of Land of the Lost came up. They seemed excited about the prospects of a Will Farrell version until I started describing the show, and talking about the Sleestaks. “The Slee-whats?” One of the kids asked me. I explained. They just sat there with blank expressions. Then one of them said, “I like the part where the Jeep Cherokee goes into the ground.” Jeep? Cherokee? What the nuggets? The girl started singing the theme song, and it was then that I realized…These kids know Land of the Lost only as a 1991 remake that featured the Porter family. At it’s a shame. Because all of the ideas and aspects seen in that version of the show are going to be abandoned by Farrell and company. This is the official turning of the flame. Our pop culture doesn’t belong to us anymore.

There are a couple of things here. First, I don’t believe that this new movie will have anything to do with the either previous version of LOTL. Like it or not, this is a Will Ferrell comedy vehicle. Nothing else. Will recently said that he goes after scripts that “make me laugh”. So, we’re going to get an over the top comedy, not LOTL. Remember, the originals may have been campy, but Will doesn’t do camp, he does slapstick.

Secondly, this movie would NEVER survive by simply catering to nostalgia. There aren’t enough of us Krofft-fans out there. If there were, Krofftville would have succeeded. Yeah, in a time before “Jurassic Park”, simply having dinosaurs in a movie would have guaranteed success. But now, audiences want more. Most of the tickets will be sold to Will Ferrell fans.

I can only hope that the movie will succeed, and maybe, just maybe we’ll get a real remake of Bugaloos or Pufnstuf.