Planet of the Dinosaurs is a 1977 science fiction film.
Set in an unspecified future, the film follows the journey of Captain Lee and his crew after they crash land on an earthlike planet, but millions of years behind in time. Encountering a wide variety of dangerous dinosaurs, the crew decides that its best chance for survival lies on finding higher ground and setting up a defensive perimeter on a higher plateau until their rescuers arrive. They soon encounter a deadly Tyrannosaurus rex and must figure out a way to defeat the creature and survive on the planet.
The film was a low budget endeavor with no major stars; actors James Whitworth and Max Thayer have the most film experience amongst the actors. Director James K. Shea instructed most of the budget to be spent on the special effects for the film, which included an array of award-winning stop motion dinosaurs, leaving little money for props or even to pay the main actors, all of whom seem to have been chosen based on how sexy they look in tights.
This film provides examples of:
- Alternate DVD Commentary: The film was done by Rifftrax in 2009.
- Asshole Victim: Harvey Baylor gets a burial after he dies, but the rest of the cast don't spend any time mourning him (and neither does the audience).
- Babies Ever After: Chuck and Charlotte have a son together after being among the survivors of the crash for so many years.
- Bare Midriffs Are Feminine: Derna isn't one of the crew, but rather Harvey's secretary, so she sports a midriff-bearing top and bell bottoms.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Harvey and Nyla happen upon a seemingly unattended nest of large dinosaur eggs. After fantasizing about the omelets he could make and speculating that the chicken that laid them must be absolutely huge, Harvey starts calling out for it. Cue the appearance of the enraged centrosaurine whose eggs Harvey was intending to fry up.
- Both Sides Have a Point: Lee favors moving to safer ground and looking for an area out of the way of large predators and other dangerous wildlife to make camp. While this works for awhile, Jim points out that they'll have to start proactively defending themselves sooner or later, especially once a Tyrannosaurus starts seeing them as easy prey.
- Chekhov's Gun: The main characters find some poisonous berries early in the movie. Said berries get used to kill the Tyrannosaurus at the end.
- Dead Guy Junior: Chuck and Charlotte's son is named Mikey, after their dead friend Michael.
- Fanservice:
- Cindy... who is immediately killed off.
- And then there's Chuck.
- The entire film centers on eye candy for women and for men and
for everyone. There are numerous scenes with men shirtless (in tights pants that almost look nude) or nearly shirtless, and the reigning motif is watching latex-clad bootie in endless walking scenes always filmed from behind and on the level of the derriere. In the final scene, the men are barely clothed at all.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: The brief glimpse of the Tylosaurus that eats Cindy. Also if you pause and look closely at the half-eaten carcass that the crew discovers their second day on the planet, you can vaguely make out that it's a Triceratops.
- Giant Spider: The movie's most horrifying scene.
- Hate Sink: Every second that he is on-screen up until his undignified death, Harvey Baylor is a complete whiny asshole that does even less to help the group than the others (who at least can be blamed for their dumb decisions because... well... the plot says so), tries to sexually harass his secretary and threatens to fire the other members of the crew (because he's their boss) which is something nobody cares about in light of the circumstances.
- Herbivores Are Friendly: Averted with the Stegosaurus and the Centrosaurus as well as the Polacanthus but played straight with the Brontosaurus.
- Human Aliens: Or rather, Dinosaur Aliens. Lee theorizes that as the planet they've landed on has the exact same environment as Earth, the native life forms have undergone a convergent evolution with the planet currently in its version of the Mesozoic Era.
- Immune to Bullets: While much importance is placed on the lasers, and how they can kill almost anything, the dinosaurs of this planet simply No-Sell the blasts and/or just get really annoyed when shot with one.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice:
- Harvey, courtesy of an angry Centrosaurus who was peeved that lasers were being shot at her when she was simply defending her nest.
- The Tyrannosaurus falls victim to this in the end, impaling itself onto a planted set of stakes while trying to get at the fleeing humans.
- Informed Species: None of the dinosaurs are referred to by name in the film but for the most part, they're identifiable (Tyrannosaurus, Allosaurus, Stegosaurus, etc.). Not so the angry mother ceratopsid that gores Harvey to death after he messes with her nest. Debates continue as to whether it's a Centrosaurus, a Styracosaurus note a Pachyrinosaurus, or something else entirely. The best it can be narrowed down to is that it's definitely a centrosaurine.
- Jerkass: Harvey. Fortunately, he's not in the movie for too long, considering that he dies at the hands of a Centrosaurus after trying to steal its eggs.
- Laser-Guided Karma: See the Jerkass entry just above.
- Latex Space Suit: Providing constant Fanservice even in the walking scenes.
- Mama Bear: A female ceratopsian attacks and kills Harvey when he tries to steal her eggs.
- Mr. Fanservice: Beefcake Chuck's sole reason for existing. The filmmakers find an excuse to have him strip within the first few minutes and then remains shirtless for the rest of the film.
- Ms. Fanservice: Averted and played straight. The first person to die is Cindy and she's only on screen for about 30 seconds before stripping down to dive into the water to go get supplies, but sadly she dies immediately. Derna is the straight example, as she is by far the prettiest girl there and she's in a midriff-bearing top and tight bell bottoms until her untimely demise.
- Only Sane Man: Lee & Jim at different points in the film. Lee, initially, as seeking high ground and shelter would be a smart alternative to fighting alien life forms you know next to nothing about. Once one of those life forms takes a liking to human flesh and begins relentlessly stalking you, however, all bets are off, which is Jim's prerogative in the latter half of the film.
- Sacrificial Lamb: Cindy is the first one to be killed by a barely-seen creature to indicate that the planet the group are marooned on is inhabited by hostile wildlife. As if the film's title weren't clue enough.
- Shoo Out the Clowns: The movie has some light slapstick and, uh, "funny" lines here and there in the first act, but pretty much all of it was related to Harvey. As soon as he dies, the movie's tone then becomes serious for the rest of its duration.
- Shout-Out: One of the dinosaurs that Captain Lee encounters near the end of the film when he is trying to get the T-Rex's attention is based on the Rhedosaurus, the fictional dinosaur from The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms. Ray Harryhausen visited the studio during production and gave his consent for the creature's cameo appearance.
- Surprisingly Sudden Death: Cindy gets chomped by a barely-seen lake monster within ten seconds of diving into the water.
- Take This Job and Shove It: Baylor's secretary Derna finally has had enough of his utter uselessness and imbecilic attitude and hands him a rock on which she'd scribbled "I QUIT" about halfway through the film. Baylor cements how much of an idiot he is even further by actually asking "What's this?" after she gives him several seconds to read the message before putting it in his hands and walking away.
- There's No Kill like Overkill: Jim's plan to finally take out the tyrannosaur involves tricking it into impaling itself on stakes. And just in case that won't get the job done, said stakes have been coated with poison berry juice. Either way, it works.
- Too Dumb to Live: Baylor disturbs a Centrosaurus' nest (he thinks it was that of a giant chicken) to poach her eggs and gets impaled by the mother.
- Undignified Death: Compared to everyone else, Harvey's death is the most humiliating. While running for his life after stealing an egg, meaning his death was entirely his own fault, the Centrosaurus mother chases after and then stabs him through the chest with her horn and comically flails her head to swing his body off. Invertedly, he's the only character to not suffer the Forgotten Fallen Friend trope, being given a decent burial and final respects from the rest of the crew.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: Chuck. He spends more than 90% of his appearance without a shirt.
- Weird World, Weird Food: "I was just wondering how many other things we're going to have to get used to. Things like eating dinosaurs."
