The film stars Raquel Welch and John Richardson, set in a fictional age of cavemen and dinosaurs existing together.

After surviving several encounters with various prehistoric creatures, Tumak collapses on a remote beach and is spotted by Loana and other women of the fair-haired Shell tribe.

As the Shell people are attacked by a giant turtle, the women call it Archelon which is the real scientific name for the animal.

This supposedly massive skeleton was actually only about 12 inches in length, made of plaster and shot against a blue backing and matted into the foreground.

Another technically complex scene in this part of the film was when a man fighting the young Allosaurus is trapped under a shelter: the dinosaur grabs a support and collapses it.

Harryhausen then placed a miniature part in the creature's mouth which, when all lined up on the rear projection plate, blended in perfectly.

The Pteranodon sequence took much time to create, primarily because of how hard it would be to make a model pterosaur pick up a real woman.

[6] Robert Brown (Akhoba) wears makeup similar to that worn by Lon Chaney Jr. in the same role in the 1940 version, One Million B.C.

When Andress passed on the project due to commitments and salary demands, a search for a replacement resulted in the selection of Welch.

Although reluctant, Welch said that the selling point was the chance to spend six to eight weeks of filming in London (while shooting interiors) during the height of its "swinging" period.

[10][11] The iconic image was copied by the artist Tom Chantrell to create the film poster promoting the theatrical release of One Million Years B.C.

Welch's depiction is accompanied by the film's title in bold red lettering across a landscape populated with dinosaurs.

[17] The original score for the film: It was first screened on 25 October 1966 at the Warner Theatre, London, with a general release in the United Kingdom on 30 December 1966, by Warner-Pathé.

Deleted scenes included a provocative dance from Martine Beswick, a gruesome end to one of the ape men in the cave and some footage of the young Allosaurus's attack on the Shell tribe.

[20] In 2002 Warner Bros. released a UK DVD, including a "Raquel Welch in the Valley of the Dinosaurs" featurette, a 12-minute interview with Ray Harryhausen and the theatrical trailer.

[22] In October 2016, a special two-disc 50th anniversary edition DVD and Blu-ray was released in the UK by Studio Canal, with new interviews with Welch and Beswick, new Harryhausen storyboard stills, and other promotional imagery.

This issue has more bonus material than the UK edition, including previous interviews with Welch and Harryhausen from 2002 and an audio commentary by film historian Tim Lucas.

[30] Among contemporary reviews, Variety wrote "the whole thing is good humored full-of-action commercial nonsense, but the moppets will love it and older male moppets will probably love Miss Welch";[31] and The Monthly Film Bulletin noted "Very easy to dismiss the film as a silly spectacle; but Hammer production finesse is much in evidence and Don Chaffey has done a competent job of direction.

Yet as dinosaurs and giant sea-turtles roam the volcanic earth in One Million Years BC, this is also a chance to appreciate the early work of the great special effects pioneer Ray Harryhausen.

"[33] Similarly, TV Guide concluded "While far from being one of Harryhausen's best films (the quality of which had little to do with his abilities), the movie has superb effects that are worth a look for his fans.

[35] Stock footage depicting the landslide was reused for Alex's daydream scene in Stanley Kubrick's 1971 film A Clockwork Orange.

The character played by Robert Brown (and, in the original, Lon Chaney Jr) is called Akhoba, a word used in the 1970 film to mean mercy.

[37] The film was adapted into a 15-page comic strip for the May 1978 issue of the magazine House of Hammer (volume 2 #14, published by Top Sellers Ltd).

In the 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption, a large poster of Welch in her role as Loana is used by Andy Dufresne (played by Tim Robbins) to conceal his tunnel digging.

Raquel Welch's fur bikini costume design and overall looks in this film served as the primary basis for the creation of the character Ayla for the 1995 video game Chrono Trigger.