Jungle women exploitation, if you can call it that, with a sandy beach full of lovely girls in tailored animal skin dresses (over bikini bottoms, no less) struggling to avoid the dreadful fate of marrying the brutish men of their own tribe. The acting is awful, with primitive dialog and awkward pauses that don't help. They're pretty much all equally stiff, men and women alike, with 1950s hairstyles and a comical mix of accents. The director doesn't do them any favors, cutting in awkward reaction shots and inserts that don't match.
The women--tho pretty--don't get wild for the first half hour, and even then it's only 1958 wild, which is to say tame enough for afternoon TV. Once their own men disappear, the ladies do a little dancing, a little swimming, fight off a couple of ape men, have a quick catfight, and go off to rustle the beefcake of the Goona tribe. Despite the refreshing protofeminism motif, the Scooby Doo plotting is painful. But the film is shot in color--partly on beautiful beaches and partly at the strange Coral Castle--so it looks pretty good, depending on the print you happen to see.
As film-making, it's strictly hack work. As exploitation, it's less titillating than a stroll on the beach--even back in '58.
The women--tho pretty--don't get wild for the first half hour, and even then it's only 1958 wild, which is to say tame enough for afternoon TV. Once their own men disappear, the ladies do a little dancing, a little swimming, fight off a couple of ape men, have a quick catfight, and go off to rustle the beefcake of the Goona tribe. Despite the refreshing protofeminism motif, the Scooby Doo plotting is painful. But the film is shot in color--partly on beautiful beaches and partly at the strange Coral Castle--so it looks pretty good, depending on the print you happen to see.
As film-making, it's strictly hack work. As exploitation, it's less titillating than a stroll on the beach--even back in '58.