Review of Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women (1968) by Colin H — 03 Jul 2007

After an expedition gets stranded on Venus, a rescue expedition is lauched. Both run afoul monsters, and when they kill the creature they worship as a god, beautiful alien sirines with telepathic powers and the ability to control the elements.

"Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women" is a sci-fi adventure flick that was cobbled together with clips from a Russian sci-fi film that producer Roger Corman had acquired the rights to, and original sequences shot by Peter Bogdanovich; the storyline with the sexy, idol-worshipping, hip-hugger-and-seashell-top wearing sirines. There's a reason our astronaut heroes only hear the telepathic song of the aliens instead of coming face to face with them--the scenes were shot years and thousands of miles apart.

I don't know how good or bad the original Russian film was, but the result here is pretty boring and nearly pointless,and the segments featuring the astronauts is jumbled and with a plot that seems to unfold at random. It's a shame that the idea of the Venusian sirines was wasted in this effort, because taken by themselves there are some rather neat ideas and viduals involved. (The way they adapt and reject their gods even comes close to making an interesting statement.).

If you see this movie on the content listings of a DVD multipack containing ten or more movies, it should be viewed as a "bonus feature" to the package. In any other case, you're probably paying too much to own it. Although I like the space sirine idea, this is not a movie that's worth your money or your time.

Voyage to the Planet of the Prehistoric Women.

Starring: Mamie Van Doren, Peter Bogdanovich, Mary Marr, Paige Lee, Aldo Romani, James David, and Roberto Martelli.

Director: Derek Thomas (actually Peter Bogdanovich and Pavel Klushantsev).