Based on the children's books by author/illustrator James Gurney, the three-part, six-hour ABC miniseries
Dinotopia
got under way when a pair of teenaged half brothers, Karl and David
Scott, took over the controls of their father Frank's (Stuart Wilson)
private plane. Not surprisingly, the boys crashed the plane into the
ocean, whereupon they were washed on the shore of an unchartered
continent. While searching for their missing dad, Karl and David
wandered into Waterfall City, the capitol of Dinotopia, a hidden
civilization where human beings and dinosaurs peacefully coexisted. In
fact, some of the dinosaurs, notably a neurotic Stenonychosaurus named
Zippo, possessed human intelligence and spoke perfect English. Among
the many rules in Dinotopia was the edict that, once an outsider
arrived, he or she was never allowed to leave. As Karl and David
prepared to take their rightful places in their new surroundings, both
boys developed a strong bond with young Marion (
Katie Carr),
who was on the verge of becoming a "matriarch" of the Dinotopian
society. Unfortunately, the incursion of vicious carnivores, not to
mention an unanticipated human villain, threatened to destroy Dinotopia
and everyone living on the island. Decked out with special effects
courtesy of Jim Henson's Creature Shop and the British FrameStore CFC,
Dinotopia
was designed as the pilot for a proposed weekly ABC adventure series.
Co-produced by Disney Television and Hallmark Entertainment, the
miniseries premiered as an episode of the Wonderful World of Disney
anthology on May 12, 2002. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
