Review of '10,000 BC'
The young D'Leh (Steven Strait), son of a respected hunter, accidentally kills a mammoth and is crowned the chief hunter for his tribe. When the object of his affections, Evolet (Camilla Belle), is kidnapped by a band of mysterious warlords D'Leh sets out with a few of his fellow hunters to track them down. Crossing over the dessert they come across the kidnappers - Ancient Egyptians using slave labour to construct the pyramids. It is up to D'Leh to see about freeing his love and redeem his reputation in his tribe.
It certainly looks good on the screen but I found the whole thing quite boring. At just over an hour and a half long there is no time to develop any sort of empathy with the characters when there is so much happening. I can't say I particularly cared for anyone on the screen. Yeah, the action was moderately interesting but the only real spectacle was of the Egyptians and they are really only window dressing seeming to pose very little threat. This could have been interesting but it is a chance squandered by lack of a story and stereotypical “caveman” performances by it's actors - They obviously had lots of money, oh well. Indeed, the common and well-trodden “ancient man story” elements are all here: Saber tooth tigers (befriended by the lead, no less), mammoths, vistas of desserts, amazingly well-groomed and good looking main characters (where do they find a pedicure in 10,000 BC?), one dimensional bad guys that are all too easily dispensed with and, the killer blow, a plot thinner than wet tissue paper.
Surely we deserve something different? Ok, it looks better than other cave-man flicks but, in the end, it is just a remake of what we have seen before. If you only had one movie and it was this one, perhaps give it a go, otherwise I can't say I would bother too much with it, pick up a newspaper or read your email instead.
Rating: “Not great, but not the worse”
Review Date: 2016-06-11
Directed by: Roland Emmerich
Studio: Warner Brothers
Year: 2008
Length: 109 minutes
Genre: Action/Adventure
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443649/