A team of British nannies working in New York have to retrieve a microdot containing vital information from the biggest exhibit in Room 13 of the American Museum -- a brontosaurus.

I read this 50-odd years ago and enjoyed the sheer ludicrousness of it, but it hasn't really worn well - especially the stereotype Chinese spies. The scene between Tarzan the parrot and the museum guard is still funny, though. ( )

El robo del gran dinosaurio, una historia de espías, dinosaurios y chachas, que empieza con los chinos ideando un sistema para acabar con la civilización occidental. Es tremendamente divertida: recuerdo una escena en el parque, donde hay espías de varias potencias diferentes, que se espían unos a otros. De ella se hizo una película, El robo del gran dinosaurio, de la factoría Disney, que, aún siendo divertida, perdía alguna de las escenas más procaces (por ejemplo, la búsqueda de huellas del pezón encontrada en el dinosaurio).

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1417328.html#cutid3

The original book on which the Disney film was based is set in New York, not London, in the contemporary early 1970s, so the Chinese are Maoists rather than followers of a warlord. Also the dinosaur gets dismantled by the nannies overnight rather than driven off on the back of the truck; and, most crucially setting the tone for the book, in the opening scene the Earl of Hastings is killed by his own cyanide capsule when his ex-nanny belts him across the face, rather than being held captive for most of the story like Lord Southmere in the film. The book concentrates much more on the work of the police investigators of the dinosaur theft, a special team of stereotypes brought together to fight international organised crime. One of the nannies is shagging her employer, while another is allergic to men; this is supposed to be funny, as are the freqent citations of Mao by the Chinese and their eventual fate (sent to Taiwan, where they will probably be executed). One or two jokes from the book made it into the film, but really this is for grownups who aren't looking for anything very worthwhile. ( )

Hilarisch! ( )