Hammer fantasy which serves to show that Michael Carreras really isn't much of a writer or director but is a lot of fun. It's got something for everyone really: a ship containing an assortment of passengers (frizzy haired man with pencil moustache who looks like a pimp, a mysterious woman with an accent who looks like a man, slutty blonde who just wants to be rooted, alcoholic jazz playing pianist, molesting doctor) led by some odd sailors (an officer with unconvincing blonde dyed hair, Eric Porter as a harsh captain with a taste for beating people to a pulp), gets in a storm and wind up in a lost swamp area.
They hop off the ship then hop on again, a repetitive story beat which is just one of the many story problems this film has. The land they arrive in is populated by weird deadly sea creatures, a woman with large breasts and several of her friends who kept above the water with balloons and oppressed by descendants of the Spanish inquisition led by a crazed child.
It's kind of an insane, mad film that probably needed to be done with greater gusto. It definitely needed to get to the Lost Continent earlier - they could have started the movie with the main characters in the life boat waiting to see if the boat was going to blow up. Their adventures once they get there seem rushed. Also there's some silly decisions like inserting an awful theme song.
It also lacks some Hammer star power - Eric Porter was okay but no Cushing, Lee or Andrew Keir. Suzanna Leigh is a delight in low-cut outfits as an aspirational tart who looks as though butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, the support cast seem to be having a high old time. Not top rank Hammer fantasy but worth checking out as a slightly classier version of Slave Girls.
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