Very well executed

Gripping story with well-crafted characters

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

This movie had so many problems. The cast is very unlikable, and the acting is hardly passable. There are even obvious things taken directly from the movie Predator. There is a scene in which someone is intensely looking into the jungle while another behind them whispers "over there" which was lifted directly from Predator. Not to mention the creatures see body heat and while they try and be original and tell us juice from what look to be grapes hide you from the creatures vision, you can clearly see the character covered in mud. At this point I was waiting for the main character to start yelling "kill me i'm here, kill me!" You are not missing anything by passing this movie up. That is coming from a girl that lives for monster movies.

In the opening sequence, a woman archaeologist and her team make a big discovery, a skull that is not quite human. At least the team was very excited about it. The Church sends Gallo to dispatch her, which he does.We do a jump shift to a boat at sea. Anna, Tom, Joe, Alexis, and Chris are on their way to a potentially rich business meeting. They rescue a man that's been left to drift at sea. He's out of his mind, for some reason. When most people are asleep, the rescued man takes control of steering and crashes the boat into an island.Their advanced location devices fail, but the radio works, and they give the Coast Guard their last approximate position.They find left over equipment from Gansis Research, which is supposedly connected to NYU. They also encounter someone/something which has a cheesy invisibility screen; shades of Predator. The next morning, Tom and the Gansis gear are both gone. The remaining four pursue.Something picks off Alexis, lifting her into the canopy, then dropping her to the ground.The three survivors find a video that they watch. It involves the 'lost tribe' a missing link (or dead end?) in human evolution. Supposedly the Roman Catholic Church would be upset about this since this would 'prove' that God did not create man on the sixth day.Gallo kills Joe, and was about to kill Anna, when something kills him instead. It was one of the lost tribe, who scares Anna, but goes back into the jungle.Chris is barely alive, and Anna watches the lost tribe Alpha Male kill him for a snack. The copying of Predator is repeated in regard to camouflage, and the lone survivor against heavy odds.Will Anna survive? Will the Coast Guard arrive in time?------Scores------Cinematography: 8/10, Gorgeous in daylight exteriors, better than usual in dark scenes. The final 10 minutes or so looked like it had a different cinematographer of lesser talent.Sound: 10/10 Nicely done.Acting: 8/10 Better than I expected.Screenplay: 6/10 Was it ever adequately explained why anyone would care about this lost tribe? No. Could a skinny, non-athletic woman survive any hit by these ultra-strong animals? No. Yet she survives what, 15 or so, plus a forty foot drop from a tree? I don't think so.

For a movie made for a million bucks, it definitely delivers. It is a tiny bit slow paced but that seems to work for it. Considering the budget its very well produced and has several very lovely young ladies in prominent roles. Its very violent and often gross but that is to be expected in what is basically a horror movie. The plot is a bit thin and the liberal philosophy is lame but the story does make sense and is fairly easy to follow for all that. Most of the cast are unknowns but they have some acting ability and I know I'm not alone in being a sucker for mysterious island adventures. Ah yes, I recall fondly The Most Dangerous Game and many others. Ignore the low rating you see here, if you like lower budget flicks that get a lot of mileage out of their investment...you will probably dig this one, a good looking film with lots of action and suspense.

Released in 2010, "The Lost Tribe" tells the story of a group of five people who become shipwrecked. The island they wash-up on shows signs of an abandoned archaeological dig and a mysterious pack of primordial ape-men.There's also an interesting subplot concerning evidence of the missing link found at the dig site and the Roman Church sending a hit-man (Lance Hendriksen) to terminate the evidence, including the scientists. Yet don't let this keep you from seeing the film if you find Darwin's theory dubious because, in the story, it's never proved that the ape-like creatures ARE the missing link. They could just as well be a previously undiscovered species of ape, like gorillas.I was surprised at how well-made the film is, particularly after reading all the negative reviews. Although this may be a low-budget flick, it's clear that filmmakers are total professionals. The photography, score, actors, locations, editing, F/X, gore, etc. are all excellent (not that I care about gore, but gorehounds will want to know).Unfortunately, there are some problems that force my rating down. First of all, there are the blatant rip-offs from "Predator." Just look at the DVD cover for proof. However, even though the film steals quite a few elements of "Predator," there are enough differences that make it distinct. For instance, the beasts aren't aliens, there are no commandos, the story revolves around a group of castaways, and the main protagonist is a woman.Speaking of women, the film should be commended for including the beautiful Brianna Brown as one of the castaways. This provides the perfect opportunity to have Brianna prance around in some alluring island attire, sorta like cutie Beth Rogan in the original "Mysterious Island" and a couple of the actresses in "Touristas." Unfortunately, the filmmakers have Brianna dressed in one of those long skirts that women put over their bikinis. So we have this gorgeous, shapely woman and they dress her in a floor-length skirt during the entire island sequence of the movie? Absurd.Another problem is that there's not much depth to the characters and the story beyond the deep love of two main characters and the sometimes-moving music. Still, that's more depth than films like "Anaconda 3," lol.The film runs 100 minutes and was shot in Panama.FINAL WORD: "The Lost Tribe" is professionally made and mixes together elements of "Predator," "Touristas," "Dead Calm" and "The Descent." The ape creatures are excellently done and totally brutal, but the film borrows a little too heavily from "Predator." Plus there's not much depth beyond the love story and moving music, which makes for a strangely uncompelling watch. Still, it's well worth your while if you're into these kinds of movies.GRADE: Borderline C+/B-