Moreau's Other Island

In 1996, unnamed criminals against humanity splotched together a screenplay and managed to convince a major Hollywood studio to bankroll a movie entitled The Island of Doctor Moreau. Signed on to play the titular role was Marlon Brando; Val Kilmer was to play his assistant, Montgomery. Allegedly based on the 1896 book by H. G. Wells, whose novel was filmed twice before. First in 1933 as Island of Lost Souls, superb and still creepy to this day. Remade in 1977 with Burt Lancaster as the evil doctor and Michael York (Logan from Logan’s Run) as the shipwrecked castaway. This is the version I grew up with, sneaking it under cover of night without my parents permission thanks to new-fangled cable teevee piping all sorts of horror into our house.

As a disclaimer, I saw all three movies. I never read the source material, Wells’ novel, though I did have it as a littl’un. Think I bought it in a bookmobile, sometime in the late 70s. Nutshellishly, Wells tells of a man who washes up upon a Pacific island, only to discover it’s one big laboratory for a demented scientist. Doctor Moreau is surgically experimenting on animals in an attempt to make them ... humanish.

Anyway, the director of the 1996 flick simply imploded under the oceanic mass of the dueling egos Brando and Kilmer. John Frankenheimer was brought in to salvage the investment, and the big stinking pile of crapola that resulted sunk at the box office and remains the definitive low-point of the pretentious acting styles of the two actors. If you are interested – and, trust me, it makes a great read – the best take-down of this movie ever is written here.

But, please, don’t see this timesuck of a movie. If you have had that misfortune, like I have, may I recommend as a redemptive form of penance reading Moreau’s Other Island, by Brian Aldiss?

... minor spoilers ...

Moreau’s Other Island is a futuristic adaptation of Wells’ story. Two or three decades hence the globe is straitjacketed in brink-of-war tension. The space shuttle (!) ferrying a high-ranking diplomat crashes into the sea; our hero, name of Roberts, is picked up by Maastricht, the Montgomery stand-in here. Very quickly Roberts comes face-to-face with the bizarre hybrid inhabitants of the island, and realizes how dangerous his new situation is. Then, to his shock, a mechanical man walks down to the shoreline, firing weapons and cracking a whip, and the beasties flee into the woods.

The cyborg is Dart, a scientist suffering from crippling birth defects who has taken up the mantle of Moreau’s scholarship. In the book, Moreau is acknowledged as a fictional character; Wells’ story inspires a young Dart to seek to find a cure for his deformities by transforming animals into men … and worse. However, as with his literary predecessor, Dr. Dart is more than a little imbalanced. We find out that he is on the verge of completing genetic drug treatments of fetal cells to produce a “perfect” creature – one that will survive nuclear war to carry on the species. But there’s been an accident – something’s happened to Maastricht – so Roberts unfortunately will be needed on the island to help out. And the world totters at the edge of armed conflict.

This was one great novel! It was a fast read, too, less than four hours for me. More importantly, I couldn’t put it down, and read far into the night, way past my bedtime. While the science and the politics are a little shaky, they can be more than forgiven because Aldiss knows how to write suspensefully. What a rare gift! Every chapter brings a new revelation and a new cliffhanger. Secrets are pealed away like that oft-cited onion, and the action keeps you on the edge of your chair, even if it’s a big mushroom-colored super-comfy sofa. It was the rare book I wish was longer.

Yeah, I could nitpick. I’d have written the ending a little more tragically. There were a few incidents of deus ex machina that weren’t necessary. I wasn’t too happy with who died and who didn’t, but hey, at least it was unpredictable, which is an essential trait in a science fiction thriller. But really I’m quibbling here. These complaints probably comprise just a bare few percentage points of my overall experience.

Aldiss’ short story collection Who Can Replace a Man? floored for me as a kid. One of the books in my father’s secret stash I read on the sly. In the thirty years since I only read one other Aldissian work, a novella of which the only thing I recall was that it was a gripping read. Like Moreau’s Other Island. I think I need to bump something more substantial of his up in the reading rotation.

Moreau’s Other Island was published in 1980. The only real question is, why oh why oh why did that Hollywood studio not decide to bring this story to the big screen instead of that Brando-Kilmer-Frankenheimer monstrosity?