SnoopyStyle A piece of a foreign spy satellite crashes on the island. The Professor uses it for a barometer and forecasts a tsunami. They tie the huts together and ride the wave into the ocean. Gilligan goes swimming with the sharks and accidentally sets the hut on fire. The fire actually attracts the coast guard and the castaways are finally rescued. They try to adjust to their new lives apart in the new world after 15 years on the island. Spies Dimitri and Ivan try to retrieve the satellite piece from around Gilligan's neck.I wasn't around for the original TV show and never really saw it even in reruns. Although I have seen some clips of the show and I get the general fun chemistry. Tina Louise is once again not in this to play Ginger. Judith Baldwin doesn't have quite the same breathiness. The other casts return and are somewhat faded by the years. The island still has some fun but once the group splits up, the movie loses any last bit of joy. It is fun to see the triumphant return and maybe the movie should work to end the movie at that high point.

Wuchak "Rescue from Gilligan's Island" came out 11 and a half years after the series ended. The movie was a huge hit on TV simply due to the show's gazillion of fans, multiplied by a decade of syndicated reruns. Unfortunately, the film doesn't measure up to the zany-but-excellent series, particularly the last two seasons.For one, at 95 minutes it seems to have a lot of filler. Many of the scenes could've been cut down by about 40%. It also seems rushed at times, like the actors learned their lines an hour before filming; and a lot of the humorous situations/dialogue aren't entirely successful, to put it nicely. Also, Tina Louise refused to return as Ginger, evidently because they didn't offer her enough money (which is funny because she wasn't exactly an in-demand actress at the time; the only significant role I remember her in after Gilligan's Island was in the 1975 film "The Stepford Wives"). The woman they got to replace Tina looks fine but she comes off as an airheaded bimbo and Ginger was never a bimbo. She's a sexy starlet, yes, but also smart.Most of the cast look pretty good a dozen years later and Mary Ann (Dawn Wells) looks incredible. Surprisingly, it's Gilligan (Bob Denver) who has aged the most, which is strange since he was supposed to be a "boy" of about 19-21 during the original run. As such, he should only be about 30-32 during this movie, but he clearly looks to be in his mid-40s or older (in real life Bob Denver was 29-31 during the series and was 43 at the time of this movie). Still, this isn't a big deal.BOTTOM LINE: "Rescue from Gilligan's Island" comes across as a lame version of the series with too much filler, but it's worthwhile for fans of the show because, of course, we have to know how they finally got rescued after almost 15 years as castaways. But, as they say, you can never go home again and neither can the castaways; they became their own family on the island, which is one of the reasons the show was so endearing.GRADE: C

sddavis63 "Gilligan's Island" is a classic. I love 60's comedy, because it didn't take itself seriously at all - it was just plain silly. "Gilligan's Island" was at the top of the list. I was among those 70's kids who ran home from school day after day to put on the TV and watch the repeats over and over again. It was just good and silly fun. This reunion movie was silly - although not as good as the TV series. It was a fitting thought. One of the problems with the series (as with many of the 60's series) is that there was no closure. It just came to an end. The castaways were just left on the island (just as World War II never ended for Hogan and his heroes!)The movie tried valiantly to overcome that. The professor (of course) figures out a way to build a barometer, and determines that a massive storm is going to cause a tsunami to hit the island. He then figures out a way to lash the huts together and use the tsunami to float the castaways out to the shipping lanes. It works, they get rescued and then we watch them try to readjust to civilization.The plot is paperthin. It was great to see the cast together and they all seemed to fall easily back into their old roles. (Tina Louise as Ginger was missed, though. Judith Baldwin tried with the role, but she just didn't have it down.) The whole subplot around the Russian agents trying to recover the disk Gilligan had found that allowed the professor to make the barometer was silly and totally unnecessary, but the castaways' trials as they readjusted to civilization was well portrayed and even believable - in a "Gilligan's Island" sort of way. Still, this wasn't anywhere near as funny as the TV series was. It had good and bad moments, and for some reason (as annoying as they can be on all the various 60's series) I really missed the laugh track. In general, it's a movie for those who liked the series and who want to see the cast reunited. Otherwise, something very important seemed to be missing. 5/10

Damon Fordham My friends, I thought "Gilligan's Island" was one of the stupidest shows of all time even as a kid. But back in the 70s, we only had 4 channels and not much else to do after we played and did our homework after school and you were too young to go out. So we didn't have much choice other than to watch tripe like this.Anyway, I recall watching some of this particular flick back in the 8th grade in 1978. I think I fell asleep around the time Thurston Howell orders some cigars from a man who is supposed to be Fidel Castro. Anyway, this was on a $3.99 DVD set at the grocery store with other public domain comedy films, so I said, "Why Not?" Now I know the answer to that last question. This was about every bit as dumb as the TV show, mixed in with topical 1970s humor about Jimmy Carter, Star Wars, Watergate, the Castro gag mentioned earlier, etc. along with Gilligan and the Skipper's poor man's Laurel and Hardy antics redux. About 20 minutes before the film ends, you can already figure out what's going to happen. You see, the late 70s was no golden age of TV comedy ("Hello Larry," "Sugar Time," and"Blansky's Beauties" anyone?) HOWEVER, there is one redeeming value of this that kept me from doing the Frisbee thing with this DVD (and from giving it only 1 star). This film did more than any original episode to show the way the characters (and the real actors, in a way) really cared about each other. I was actually touched of how each time the castaways back in civilization ran into those who wanted to exploit them individually, they stood together in each case as a united front. (This concern actually extended to real life as a very sick Jim Backus reprised his role in a later GI film out of friendship for the cast).So if you want a good movie, this ain't it. But if you want to see an interesting look at what real friendship is all about, this might help.