It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Passable Pal. The story is not particularly engaging. Made up of elements from Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, H.G. Wells' Island of Doctor Moreau and Homer's Iliad - with a few slices of pseudo Old Testament thrown in - it seems both overly trite and tediously familiar.The acting is no great shakes either. For a change - not a welcome change so far as this reviewer is concerned - it is the male lead who spends most of his screen time displaying his physique, whilst the heroine remains far more demurely clothed throughout. This seems to be Mr Hall's only movie - which doesn't surprise me. True, the girls may think he's a good-looking lad, but he can't act for toffee, and has all the charisma and usefulness of a pistonless bicycle pump.Miss Holden is slightly more appealing. This was her second or third film and she did go on to enjoy a very modest career in the 60s. The support players, led by an appropriately villainous John Dall, have more to offer, with Berry Kroeger excelling as the vicious "surgeon".Pal's flat, lazily unimaginative direction with its plentitude of monotonously dull close-ups doesn't help the dialogue scenes any. Fortunately, the director has handled his action material in a more vigorous manner. The "ordeal by fire and water" packs a moderately exciting wallop. This and other sequences are further spiced by a few impressive sets and dazzling props.Of course it's neither the story itself nor the stars that will attract customers to Atlantis. It's the allure of those destructive-earthquake-watery-grave special effects implicit in the title. Despite some extremely obvious shortcomings and budgetary limitations - crude make-up for the human animals; easily recognizable crowd, arena, forum and fire shots from Quo Vadis; glaringly miniature buildings made of cardboard - the destruction of Atlantis is just impressive enough to justify the price of admission. Just!OTHER VIEWS: Berry Kroeger plays a wizard who turns slaves into pigs. We love the scene in which he compels one of his victims to repeat after him: "Every day, in every way, I'm getting to be a boar!" Climax aside, it would be difficult to think up a more acurate description of the movie itself. It held such promise too, but as it slowly unfolds, the story gets less and less involving, the acting more and more wooden. A bore indeed! - JHR writing as George Addison

On its own, George Pal's "Atlantis, the Lost Continent" is your basic B movie: lousy acting but very fun to watch. Paul Frees's opening narration, however, provides some insight into all the exploration that had been going on for hundreds of years. It's well known that the Vikings had come to North America about 500 years before Columbus's voyages, but there's evidence of contact between peoples from Africa and peoples from the Americas, such as an Olmec statue that looks African. And then the movie has the talk about how the animals suspect impending doom and start fleeing, while humans ignore nature's warnings. We've seen how true that is.Another thing that caught my eye about the movie is the casting of Edward Platt, best known as the Chief on "Get Smart" (he also starred in "Rebel without a Cause" and "North by Northwest"). Funny how these things work out. Anyway, it's a pretty enjoyable movie.

I can't remember the last time I saw this film. Maybe when Bob Wilkins was still doing his thing on KTXL in Sacramento? I'm not sure, really. Regardless, it's not one of Pal's better works, but it entertains. I've given some very harsh reviews as of late to stuff that's more technically sound, and those films are far more sleek than Pal's whole hearted effort to bring the mythical ancient world to a then contemporary audience.And that's the thing I like about this movie. It's genuine. Oh sure, maybe there were some rate cards given to a test screen audience or two, but Pal made a solid film regardless. The acting is wooden but passable for the time, the costumes are actually okay, though some of the scene regarding peril of the characters seem somewhat stagey and perhaps erroneous. But for all that, the film has heart.Pal's movie starts off with some propositions for the audience's inner pseudo scientist, and builds on the premise that the lost continent of Atlantis must therefore have existed. We then embark on a drama regarding a young man born on the wrong side of the tracks falling for the uptown girl.The effects are what they are, primitive and unconvincing, but palpable all the same in a 1960s kind of way. Some stock footage from Quo Vadis is incorporated to populate the lost city, so we get a sense of the grandeur of Atlantis. It's a relatively moderately budgeted film, so makeup, props, sets and the rest fit within the scheme of things.Truth be told I've rarely seen this film. In fact I've heard and read about it more than I've actually seen it. But, thanks to the good people at Warner Home Video, I was able to purchase a DVD-R version of this film, and relived some of my earlier years all over again.The other truth about this film is that it's really only meant for a certain segment of the sci-fi audience from the 60's and 50's... maybe the 70's as well.It is vintage sci-fi, so try to view it in that light. Take it for what it is and enjoy it on its own level.

I remember seeing this film as a 14 year old in 1961 at a Saturday afternoon matinée...my brother and I were supposed to go to a Detroit Tiger baseball game but it was rained out...what to do? We went to see this movie and I have always remembered it and loved it. Back in the late 50s, early 60s Hollywood was putting out a lot of science fiction fantasy films, like "Seventh Voyage of Sinbad", "Jack the Giant Killer", "Mysterious Island" and all of the sword and sandal Hercules movies with Steve Reeves and other musclemen. What could you not like about this film as a kid? A beautiful princess, a submarine in the shape of a fish, giant monsters fighting our hero in a fire/water pit, animal men with bull heads and horns, a giant sea monster Neptune showing our hero and his princess through the pillars of Hercules on their way to Atlantis and plenty of evil sorcerers and villains. A good love story to boot with our hero Demetrious winning the love of his lady Antillia and getting out of Atlantis just before the submerging and destruction of the mythical land. Edward Platt who was on the TV show "Get Smart" as the chief in a role as a minister/prophet who foretells the doom of the fabled continent. I fell in love with Joyce Taylor, the princess Antillia way back then....only problem is that our hero, played by Anthony Hall looked like he could have used some time in the gym training with Steve Reeves. On the very thin side for a hero to fight giants and evil rulers. Great science fiction stuff for the 60s.