Marlon Brando plays the warped genius and Nobel-prize winning Dr. Monroe, uh, Moreau. He even had a midget sidekick like Mini-me from
Austin Powers II, who dressed just like his master and even played a little piano on top
of the Moreau's big piano. The little guy looked more like
Ross Perot with third degree burns and a tail.
Val Kilmer is not the hero; rather it's Brando's sexually ambiguous assistant geneticist Montgomery who takes drugs and fancies himself as Brando's protegé. The "hero" (Prendick, in the original H.G. Wells novel) is a
pathetic English UN observer plucked out of the water by Indonesian pirates and sold to Kilmer as experimental fodder. The ghoulies are pretty groovy, except when they use that cartoonish computer animation. Moreau's beasties are held subservient by remote-control shock therapy,
instead of the ominous 'House of Pain' from the original. His tux-wearing wolf-boy servants are complicated and sympathetic and his exotic daughter is beautiful; we later learn that she's one of Moreau's experiments too as she sprouts fangs. Britboy can't deal with the freaks and tries to excape to no avail and repeatedly breaks down.
The wily beast-men eventually revolt by tearing out their implants and the island devolves into chaos. Hyena-Swine-Man leads the killing, rudely interrupting a bizarre orgy led by Kilmer. Miraculously, they learn to operate "firesticks" (M16s and AKs) with their hooves within minutes of their rebellion. They also gain the ability to drive Hummers for about ten feet before they crash into a ball of flames. The Brit finally tricks the bloodthirsty animal-men into slaughtering each other.
At the end, the Brit puts together a makeshift raft as a very endearing and realistic looking baboon-person (much more convincing than Cornelius or Zira) tugs his hand and hugs him, begging him to stay. The Sayer of the
Law (you, know the wise old animal-man lawgiver stereotype) concludes that they don't need the help of science or doctors, and that it's better to walk on all fours anyway.
This is a patchy rework of the classic novel, which is
as gripping and intricate as any sci-fi can be. Brando's not bad in it; his role is reminiscent of Apocalypse Now, i.e., a reclusive genius who has created his own phantasmic but internally stable world, only to be upset by meddling outsiders.
I remember Oingo Boingo had a song loosely based on the story, called "No Spill Blood."