Rating: 
Summary: Fun movie, terrible DVD!
Review: I really enjoyed this film when it came out at the theater in 1976, and I have owned the open-mat full screen version on VHS for a while now. When I found out this was being realeased on DVD I was pretty happy & ordered it right away. To my horror, MGM has dropped the ball for a change, and this Midnight Movie release is a total flub!I became suspicious when I first watched the trailer, and right away it was obvious it was a badly matted, with the tops of people's heads clipped off. So I decided to ge out my open-mat full screen VHS and play them at the same time, switching between VCR & DVD player to compare. Here's where the fun begins... The opening credits on the DVD are totally matted, blocking off the top & botom of the picture, and to make matters worse, the edges have been clipped quite a bit as well. On the VHS the credits are near the middle, with a large empty area on the sides... The DVD has the credits zoomed in on, making them 3x as large, and going off the edge of the screen on the left & right. Things gets stranger... Some scenes on the DVD appear to be from a truely 'widesceen' print, but approx. 80-90% of the movie is just matted full screen, blocking off much of the picture, and cutting the tops of people's heads off! It looks like MGM took 2 prints; one a fullscreen (open-mat) print, and mabey a partial print that was widescreen, and spliced them together, then matted the fullscreen parts in an attempt to 'blend' it in. Arrgg!! A few more problems I noticed, are that the color seems wrong on the DVD, way too much red. (yeah, its supposed to be red, but not THAT red.), and that the VHS copy I have exibits very little to no speckles at all on the source print, but the DVD is riddled with speckles, especially noticable during the opening credits. The DVD does however look alot better than the VHS as far as clarity, detail and sharpness goes. I really waited a long time for this to come out on DVD, and I didnt even have very high expectations, considering the B-grade of this flic, but this DVD has turned out to be a huge dissapointment for me. Dispite it's great low price, I have already returned it. Shame on you MGM, this DVD is a mess! Stop trying to be cash in on the trendy 'anamorphic widesceen' craze by selling terrible FAKE widescreen bunk!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Good movie that you'll remember
Review: I remember watching this movie a few years ago after my granny told me that she was gonna watch it and that I should. I did and I thought it was pretty good. It wasn't the best of its kind that I have ever saw, but it was pretty good. An inventor and his sidekick go on a journey to the center of the earth in a huge drilling machine. Once they get there, they don't discover lava or fire, they discover a lost world and a prehistoric tribe. They get held hostage and from that point on is when At The Earth's Core turns into a good movie. It'll keep you in suspense wondering how they're gonna escape and go back to the surface. If you like one of a kind adventures like this movie, I would definitely recommend getting At The Earth's Core. The only drawbacks I could see was that it was a little bit boring at the beginning, but it gets better all along. The special effects also weren't the best ever seen, but then again it what do you expect of a movie that came out back in the mid 70's? One more thing, most of the time I don't remember a movie all that great after just watching it once. But it's been about 2 years since I saw At The Earth's Core and I still remember most of it. It'll stick with you.
Rating:
Summary: Great Cheesy Fun
Review: I sympathize with Burrough's fans who wished for a more serious treatment of their beloved author's work, but they need to take the film for what it is. It is clear that the actors were having a great time making it, Cushing is great in an out-of-character role, Caroline Munroe is delicious, the Mahars are hilarious (like kids in big rubber parrot suits flapping their arms while hanging by their necks!) as are the afro-ed natives idiotically dancing around in celebration, and when the fire-breathing toad fell off the cliff and exploded, we were howling in stitches and had to replay that scene again and again. Add to this a fast-paced, quirky directorial style and Doug McLure and you have a "B" classic. For those of you who just don't get it, go out and develop a personality, then you might be able to let yourself go and enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: Great Cheesy Fun
Review: I sympathize with Burrough's fans who wished for a more serious treatment of their beloved author's work, but they need to take the film for what it is. It is clear that the actors were having a great time making it, Cushing is great in an out-of-character role, Caroline Munroe is delicious, the Mahars are hilarious (like kids in big rubber parrot suits flapping their arms while hanging by their necks!) as are the afro-ed natives idiotically dancing around in celebration, and when the fire-breathing toad fell off the cliff and exploded, we were howling in stitches and had to replay that scene again and again. Add to this a fast-paced, quirky directorial style and Doug McLure and you have a "B" classic. For those of you who just don't get it, go out and develop a personality, then you might be able to let yourself go and enjoy.
Rating: 
Summary: 99% fiction, 1% science, but completely entertaining
Review: Let's see, we have dinosaur puppets, flying reptiles with wings made from what looks to be old raincoats, villains wearing rubber masks from Rite Aide (or the British equivalent) and good guys wearing afro-wigs. On the other hand we have Peter Cushing playing the wacked old scientis (one of his best roles), Caroline Munro, some very colorful sets, plenty of action and Doug McClure (well, actually he should probably reside on the first hand). Some people have held their noses and waved this one off due to the cheapo effects, but the final question should be is this an entertaing film? And the answer would be yes, it is an enjoyable film. So if you like science fiction with dinosaurs and cavepeople and don't care if the creatures are rubber, then this could be a film for you.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable but not the best of its genre by a long chalk.
Review: This adaptation of the Edgar Rice Burroughs novel was billed as one of the follow-ups to 'The Land That Time Forgot' and stars Doug McClure again. This time he is a Victorian who, with scientist Peter Cushing, bores to the centre of the earth in a giant drilling machine and finds an underground world populated by primative tribes and bizarre creatures. This is a potentialy good film containing atmospheric music, imaginative backdrops and some excellently memorale scenes, but it's utterly sunk by the abominable special effects - men in ill-fitting monster suits stumble about, obvious models fall down and explode and a fire-breathing frog's flame-throwing nozzle is glaringly visible. Another thing contributing to this film's downward spiral is plot padding later on and some quite embaressing acting from Cushing, who is usualy an invaluable support to films. When my dad first saw this film he thought it was a send-up, and I can't blame him, but if you're a fan of monster films as I am then you'll probably get something out of this. It's certainly a lot better than the plotless drivel which seems to pass for monster films these days.
Rating: 
Summary: At The Earth's Core
Review: This film is about two Victorian scientists, Peter Cushing and Doug McClure, who use their drilling machine to discover a world within the Earth's core. They are captured by a warrior race, and enslaved with humans, but help start a rebellion and destroy the monsters ruling them. The special effects and monsters are good. The film ends with the two heroes returning back to their time.
Rating:
Summary: At The Earth's Core
Review: This film is set in the Victorian period, where scientist Peter Cushing and his assistant Doug McClure use a large drilling machine to travel from one side to another of a Welsh mountain, but instead drill it the Earth's core where they discover a world ruled by flying men-reptiles and their soldiers over human slaves. They find large monsters and insects. Both men are captured by monster soldiers and after Doug escapes during a rebellion, he returns with a fellow warrior, Ra, to destroy the monster rulers. Both are captured by the soldiers, but Doug kills a large hippopotamus and frees Peter, Ra, and Gak, a old warrior, together with a female warrior, Te'a (Caroline Munro), and a cowardly warrior, Ugal. Ugal tells Jubal, an ugly warrior, to kill Doug so that Jubal can marry Te'a, but Doug kills Jubal and helps unite the divided tribes to destroy the monster rulers. The tribes destroy the rulers' city, but Ra dies and Ugal is killed whilst trying to escape in the city. Te'a tells Doug she cannot go with him to his world, and when Peter and Doug return, they end up outside the US White House.
Rating:
Summary: YOU CAN'T MESMERISE ME...I'M BRITISH!!
Review: This is one of the best films of all time, I saw it for the first time when I was very young and it blew my mind. I has lost none of its charm over the years...the rubber monster suits are laughable. The Mahars, although they look like toys you'd find at the bottom of cereal boxes, they are still frightening. Doug Mclure excels as the adventurer and Peter Cushing as the doddering Professor Parry borders on insanity. Caroline Munro is as gorgeous as ever but Cy Grant steals the show as Ra, the token black guy sidekick. Although you can see the film isnt all that it still succeeds in taking you to another world with the chattering Sagoths, pink sky and weird music.
If ever the world's been evil to you just stick this in your DVD player and live an another world. Only comlaint I can make is the menus, which are a bit minimalist.
Rating:
Summary: What a guilty pleasure!
Review: This is one of those rubber-monster movies that is so clumsily made and filled with stupid movie physics so common to this genre, but I love it! Sorry, I can't help it, but watching this one, and more like it(also recommended: THE PEOPLE THAT TIME FORGOT and HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP for more laughfests!) is funnier than any so-called comedy these days! Peter Cushing is Dr Abner Perry, a mad Victorian scientist who invents the Iron Mole, a steam-powered drilling machine(?!) financed by David Innes, a token American played by Doug McClure, a mainstay of 1970s B-monster-flix. When they get lost drilling they wind up, quite literally, at the earth's core and encounter telepathic dinosaurs with lions' tails(honestly), rock bridges over lava flow which cavemen cross with bare feet, an exploding fire-breathing toad . . . and Caroline Munro is on hand as Princess Dia. Basically our heroes have to help the cavemen defeat the Majar beasts(telepathic dinos) and a race of apemen which resemble cast-offs who failed the auditions for Planet of The Apes!
Cushing absolutely revels in his role as Dr Perry. Throughout his movie career, he made all kinds of weird and wonderfully amusing horror flicks and even played the big-screen incarnation of Dr Who in two Brit productions. He knows it, and in this one he can't help but act tongue-in-cheek, which works and is fun to watch.
The SFX are truly Godzilla-style in execution. We get close-ups of men in rubber suits that make them look bigger, Majar creatures on wires(you can see them), exploding mushrooms, a killer plant made from paintbrushes and a pink lava sky! 'This cannot be the Rhondda Valley!' Mr Cushing exclaims. And later on, he asserts to the creatures: 'You cannot mesmerise me, I'm British!' Great stuff!
Oh, and Caroline Munro, who made a great Bond villainness in THE SPY WHO LOVED ME a year later, looks delicious in a loincloth bikini. So, overall, if you love this sort of thing to poke fun at, you can't go far wrong. I get a strange satisfaction out of watching bad movies at times, and this is one of my cheesiest entries in my list of 'guilty pleasure' flix. One could also say that it might have inspired THE CORE(2003), a forthcoming disaster epic with equally silly physics!
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