Mysterious Island of Beautiful Women (1979 TV Movie) User Reviews

What's mysterious is that I can even find this film...

[AlsExGal · 4/10 · 17 September 2020]

And yet two other very good made for TV films from that same year of 1979 - "Like Ordinary People" and "Murder By Natural Causes" seem to be lost to the ages.

CBS TV movie thriller from director Joseph Pevney. A planeload of oil company men, including Steven Keats, Clint Walker, Peter Lawford, and Guich Koock, is forced to land on an unknown Pacific island, where they discover a multi-ethnic tribe of beautiful woman living in the jungle. The two groups slowly start to interact, and Keats begins to learn who they are and how they got there, while a tribe of "head-choppers" from a nearby island sporadically attacks them all.

Featuring standard TV-movie production values of the time, this is really just an excuse to show a lot of pretty women in skimpy outfits, while aging male stars get to enjoy a tropical vacation while filming as well as acting with said ladies. The biggest surprise by the end of this one was just how little had actually occurred during its running time. Shot in Hawaii.

7 years old when I saw this

[BandSAboutMovies · 5/10 · 26 August 2022]

Also known as Island of Sister Theresa, this was the last movie that director Joseph Pevney (Man of a Thousand Faces) would make, working from a script by Gary Sherman (Dead and Buried) and Sandor Stern (The Amityville Horror).

When wealthy Gordon Duvall (Peter Lawford) uses his private plane to get Danny, one of his workers (Michael McGreevey), to the hospital, pilot Stu (Sandy McPeak) gets lost and they have to land on what they think is an uncharted and isolated island. Too bad for the men -- which include Mike (Steven Keats), Wendell (Clint Walker) and J. J. (Guich Koock) -- that a crash of women and nuns years ago turned that into a place where Lizbeth (Jaime Lyn Bower) communicates with the spirit of the long-dead Sister Theresa.

With a tribe of women that includes Snow (Kathryn Daniels), Chocolate (Jayne Kennedy from Body and Soul!), Flower (Rosalind Chao), Bambi (Deborah Shelton, Sins of the Night) and Jo Jo (Susie Coelho, Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo), the normal matriachal society moments happen -- "What is a kiss?" Snow asks one of the men -- and Lizbeth agrees to let the men stay if they take care of the cannibalistic headhunters that live on the island.

I mean, yes, it's cheesy, but how magical of a world did we once live in where this kind of stuff aired on TV with no warning? We were once better.

Predictable deserted island story with a number of television movie-of-the-week types and Hollywood has-beens

[bensonmum2 · 3/10 · 27 May 2006]

Mysterious Island of Beautiful Women is an utterly predictable deserted island story with a number of television movie-of-the-week types and Hollywood has-beens. The plot: A group of young Catholic school girls are evacuated during the Indo-China War. Their plane crashes on an island and the girls are left to fend for themselves. Fifteen or so years later, a plane carrying a group of men is forced to land on the island. At first the girls, now women, are leery of the men. But the women soon realize that the men and their guns may be able to help them defeat the headhunters who regularly visit the island.

Everything about this television movie is telegraphed from a mile away. The women's reaction to the men - predictable. The men's reaction to the wild women - predictable. The fact that the women's leader, Lizabeth, is a nut-case - predictable. The fact that the women's spiritual leader, Sister Teresa, is actually dead - predictable. The narrow escape at the end from the headhunters - predictable. There's not one surprising moment in the entire 90+ minute runtime. I was able to make coffee, do a load of laundry, and play with my son as I watched the movie and I didn't miss a thing.

The ending of the film is a real letdown. Mysterious Island of Beautiful Women builds toward a promised showdown between the stranded men and the "beautiful women" with the headhunters, but it never materializes. Instead, everyone hops on the plane and takes off. What a cop-out!

My favourite movie

[jennytork · 18 April 2002]

I absolutely love this movie. The plot is not predictable, though the actors seem wooden at times. It kept me on the edge of my seat and I wept at the final scenes. True, it requires a bit of a willing suspension of belief, but isn't that what movies are for? This is my favourite TV movie of all time, and I heartily recommend it to anyone and everyone.

A Severe Waste of Talent

[Uriah43 · 3/10 · 3 August 2013]

In an attempt to escape revolutionary troops during the war in French Indo-China, a Catholic nun and a small number of young female children board a plane in an attempt to escape to safety. Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean the airplane flies into a severe thunderstorm and crash lands on a deserted tropical island. Now, 25 years later, an amphibious airplane with a handful of men also encounters a severe thunderstorm which destroys most of its electrical equipment. So, in order to get their bearings the captain decides to land on what just happens to be the same tropical island. As they search the island the men discover a small group of women whose only knowledge of men comes from the headhunters who visit their island to rape and kill. Because these new men seem different the women are conflicted over what action to take. Anyway, so much for the basic plot. While the movie had plenty of talent and potential the fact is that except for Jamie Lynn Bauer (as "Lizabeth"), Rosalind Chao ("Flower") and Kathryn Davis ("Snow"), none of the other actors or actresses were allowed to demonstrate their abilities in any meaningful way. Clint Walker, for example, was terribly miscast as a disgruntled man with an attitude named "Wendell". Likewise, Deborah Shelton (as "Bambi") and Jayne Kennedy ("Chocolate") hardly had any lines at all. The result was a severe waste of talent. Not that it really mattered as the script was very weak and the storyline itself was extremely implausible. That said, even though the scenery was beautiful and the women were all quite attractive, the movie itself could have used significant improvement. Below average.

I Hate Men

[bkoganbing · 1/10 · 18 February 2018]

As I was watching Mysterious Island Of Beautiful Women I thought at first these girls might have been a part of Bob Hope's USO tour that got lost in the Pacific. Far from that these women who all look like they could get guaranteed employment as Las Vegas showgirls, but they are war orphans from Vietnam whose plane crashed in the Pacific. They were spirited away from the war by a Catholic priest. What happened to her is for you watch the film for if you want.

Anyway some headhunters every now and then visit the island for a little something something from the women. It gives this group of Amazons a bad attitude for the male species.

Which is carried over when an oil company plane gets lost and has to make a forced landing. Some of the men are Clint Walker, Peter Lawford, Steven Keats and Sandy McPeak. The women are led by Jamie Lyn Bauer who has the worst attitude of all and some of her group is Rosalind Chao, Jamie Kennedy, and Kathryn Davis.

No doubt the women are beautiful, most of the men are dogs and the headhunters are just doing their thing and counting themselves lucky they have the equivalent of a bordello on this island when they feel the need.

The guy who makes out best in this Michael McGreevey who was being airlifted out to a hospital in Guam. He plays his scenes with a bandage over his eyes, the better not to see what he's involved with.

OMG 70s movies were so good then, and bad now

[MiketheWhistle · 3/10 · 6 June 2018]

I have to believe that someone thought this movie was good 40 years ago, but I'd need to go in a time machine to find out.And to say this movie is sexist is beyond an understatement.Just glad I watched it on Svengoolie.

Bad Movie

[davidjanuzbrown · 1/10 · 5 July 2016]

I do not know where to start with what is wrong wit with this movie, so I will start with what is right: Rosalind Chao (Flower), who somehow gives a good performance. Every other performance is either wooden or invisible. Lets start with Deborah Shelton (Bambi): Anyone who has ever seen this woman in a movie knows she is a knockout. Why can't we see more shots of her? Lets move on to Jamie Lin Bauer (Lizbeth). Just look at her eyes and you know she is Psycho 101 straight out of Central Casting (and spoilers ahead: You know she is getting killed). Next: If you are on a guy and crash land on an Island with hotties, why would you not be making a play (especially for Deborah Shelton)? Well the only one who does is Mike Stapleton (Stephen Keats), who goes after Snow (Kathryn Davis), and spoilers ahead: He does end up with her. The only other one who might get a girl is the guy who had an accident to his eyes, because Rosalind Chao attached herself to him. Then there are the technical issues: The plane that the men crashed into the Island was short of fuel: One of the men (the pilot) is killed, but that leaves 5 to take off, Plus Snow, Flower and the the other women (Chocolate (Jayne Kennedy) and Jo Jo (Susie Coehlo), and Bambi's daughter), what about the weight issues? Did I forget relying on a 25 year old directional finder that was on the plane that crashed and brought the girls to the Island in the first place? Last but not least, I suspect Snow and probably Flower will be okay, but the others will have extreme difficulty adjusting to society. Basically the only reason to watch (if you choose to do so), is Chao.

Remember this from my Childhood

[jbwphoto1 · 7/10 · 13 September 2009]

I came upon this movie by reading Jayne Kennedy's bio. I saw this in the fourth grade. I sat and paid attention and didn't miss a minute. I could not remember the stars at all or much about the characters. I just remembered the babies being on an island due to a plane crash, had to be named by an older girl and that one of them was named Flower.

I was so happy to read posts by other reviewers who saw it and filled in all the details. It wasn't a bad movie and as one reviewer said, isn't the point of a made-for-TV movie to suspend reality for two hours? I would like to see this again and find out how it holds up. Also, the part about the war and which one was totally lost on a fourth grader.

Yuch

[DKosty123 · 2/10 · 30 December 2018]

The plot of this tv movie is just rubbish. I mean the beautiful women are easily the films only asset. There's so many other things wrong that even the plane crashes are a higlight. The script is so bad that when Svengoolie ran it on METV, his bad jokes were better than the film, and that's a pretty low bar.

There's no real reason for this mystery of a film. A bunch of young girls escape with a nun on a plane from French Indo China in 1954. 25 years later, a bunch of idiot men manage to find the island they escaped too and land on it because they are lost and outta gas. Then the men and women face off each not trusting the other.

I would imagine the writer of Amityville horror just seems lost in the script without any real spirits to base this on. The women are beauty contest winners and soap opera stars, along with Klinger's wife on TV's MASH and After MASH. This makes for potatos without the skins.

The wardrobe, and situations make no sense. Considering it was filmed in Hawaii, they should have at least gotten Jack Lord and Don Ho to appear. At least Jaynr Kennedy and Dallas Mandy Winger (Shelton) are a feast for the eyes. The rest of this is something to sleep through.

Farfeched film about sexy feral women

[bnelso-23793 · 8/10 · 30 December 2018]

In the more or less lead character Peter Lawford is obviously rather drunk and very full of himself as former Rat Pack member and former Kennedy brother-in-law. The actions his character does, like getting feral girl Flower to count to 10 and trying to swap goods to the feral women, seem extremely scripted and highly unlike the probably real him.

As for the sexy women it's a toss up whose the sexiest. Performer Rosalind Chao or stage-named actress Jayne Kennedy or the blonde Steven Keats falls for are definitely the three best.

Now as to the far-fetched part of the title. Why have these women not been discovered sooner by civilized people? It is supposed to be 1979 and presumably many planes and modern boats pass by the island all the time. One maybe answer is this. Chao's Flower character is most likely supposed to be Vietnamese and seeing her alone and acting like a native islander girl may have fooled previous modern visitors to the island. This film BTW was made by Alan Landsburg who made also "In search of" hosted by Leonard Nimoy and the plane propeller being worshipped in a god-like fashion by the women is a hint he did because he often talks about were religion came from. Landsburg is wrong if he ever tries to say the Bible has space traveller visitor origins as the Bible is true with incredible science like jet streams and round Earth and much more to back it up as God's word. But maybe a few, say, Pacific island cults have airplane visitor origins pretty much as in this film.

"Those Women Are Mean!"...

[azathothpwiggins · 30 December 2018]

Blown off course during a storm, a plane-load of big, hairy men (including Clint "Killdozer" Walker, and Peter Lawford) lands on the MYSTERIOUS ISLAND OF BEAUTIFUL WOMEN (including: Jayne Kennedy, Rosalind Chao, and Deborah Shelton!).

Said females are a semi-savage group of supermodel cultists, led by the goggle-eyed zealot, Lizabeth (Jaime Lyn Bauer). What terrible secret are they hiding? Why do they fear males so much? Who, on this uncharted island, keeps their hair and makeup looking perfect?

MIOBW is a blissfully absurd, made-for-TV movie from a time when such productions seemed "edgy". Harmless and utterly enjoyable from beginning to end...