The Lost City: 1935 B-Movie Chaos

Is this for you?

If you have a soft spot for crumbling sets, guys in pith helmets, and plots that don't make a lick of sense, you'll probably have a blast with The Lost City. If you need your logic buttoned up and your acting subtle, steer clear. Seriously, walk away now.

This thing is a 1935 serial, which means it’s paced like a sugar-rushed toddler. There is no such thing as a quiet moment here. Every single scene ends with someone falling into a pit or a lever being pulled, just to keep the audience coming back for the next chapter.

The Earthquake Machine

The main villain is obsessed with his earthquake machine, which looks mostly like a pile of wires and big, blinking lightbulbs. It’s hilarious how much power this thing has. One minute someone is talking in a room, and the next, the camera is shaking so hard I thought my monitor was vibrating.

The sets feel like they were built with cardboard and dreams. You can almost see the wires holding up the props. It reminds me of the shaky production values in The Drifter, though this one has way more explosions.

Observations from the Trench

• The dialogue is pure camp. People don't talk; they declaim.
• The lighting in the jungle scenes is so dark you’re mostly guessing who is punching whom.
• I’m pretty sure one of the extras in the background of the base scene is just trying not to trip over his own feet.
• The transition between chapters is jarring, like the editor was working with a pair of rusty scissors.

There's this one moment where a character is supposed to be terrified of a giant trap, but the guy playing him looks like he’s waiting for a bus. It’s those little disconnects that make these old serials so weirdly charming. It’s not a good movie by any stretch, but it’s active.

It’s a bit like watching Border Blackbirds if you took the grit out and replaced it with sci-fi nonsense. You aren't watching for the plot. You're watching to see how many times a man can wear a mustache that looks like it’s about to fall off his face. 🥸

Sometimes the movie gets lost in its own geography. One second they are in the desert, the next they are inside a mountain, and nobody seems to care about the logistics of travel. Why would they? They have an earthquake to stop!

Don't expect it to land gracefully. It just sort of stops when the money runs out or the plot runs thin. It’s a relic, plain and simple.