Review

Review Date: 9-March-08
Spoiler Rating: Low
Juju Judgment: Junk

10,000 B.C. (2008)

Until a few days before its release I had no intention of seeing "10,000 B.C." because of its ludicrous misshaping of accepted historical facts. But then it occurred to me: since it was obviously not meant to be taken literally, why couldn't I enjoy a traditional hero quest set in a make-believe fantasy land which the filmmakers had chosen to call "10,000 B.C."? It is not too huge a leap from a long time ago to the land of legend.

So you might say I was in a generous mood when I entered the theater, and it would have held if blockbuster-hunter Roland Emmerich had given me more to go on. Not much more, for I did not hate this movie, but at least the recognition that my brain may reflect a growth in size and capacity since the last ice age. "10,000 B.C." unfolds merely by ticking off a list of Things People Expect of Prehistory and Myth. Pelt-clad, brown-skinned people crouching in yurts? Check. (Their perfect teeth are excused by Hollywood's own tradition of offering beauty to the god of profit.) A boy (Steven Strait) coming of age during a perilous journey to save his clan and beloved (Camilla Belle), learning from a mentor (Cliff Curtis) and vanquishing an unvanquishable enemy? Check. Latterly extinct animals like woolly mammoths, sabertooth tigers, and, um, giant pissed-off gosling thingies? Check. The tiger, by the way, is the thematic ancestor to the lion who was assisted by the Roman Androcles and later refused to eat him in the gladiatorial ring. Too bad Emmerich hurries the payoff to this fine old story as if his were more interesting.

For a while it is possible to coast along on the grand scenery, courtesy of New Zealand and Africa, and Strait's agreeable face. (One feels sorry for Belle, however. I can hear producers and studio heads saying, "Camilla Belle? Wasn't she the pretty girl who did nothing in that stupid movie?") But as it grinds to a finale "10,000 B.C." extinguishes any embers of goodwill. It borrows lamely from "The Ten Commandments," "Stargate," and "300" without adding anything new. Then, as the crowning element of non-glory, it uncorks a silly jug of tribal mojo that is supposed to provide a twist but is just embarrassing. Emmerich apparently thought his computer-enabled land of the past would be enough to satisfy Homo cinematicus, but a tale this uninspired only wastes drops in the current of time.

Copyright © 2008 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.