A well-done fantastical portrayal of early humans
After a tribe of cave-dwelling homo sapiens in prehistory are attacked by neanderthals, three members of the group (Everett McGill, Ron Perlman and Nicholas Kadi) leave to apprehend fire, since they don’t know how to create it themselves. On their journey, they run into saber-toothed tigers, cannibals, a friendly female in body paint (Rae Dawn Chong), woolly mammoths and Ika’s more evolved tribe where the chief is interested in eugenics.
"Quest for Fire" (1981) is a serious attempt to depict people from prehistorical times in the tradition of “One Million Years BC” from fifteen years earlier (the one with Raquel Welch), although don’t expect any dinosaurs. Like that movie, there's no talking as we understand it; only grunting and primitive lingo.
This of course prevents the flick from being compelling in the sense of interesting or entertaining dialogues, which leaves us with a dramatically dull film with amazing locales and visuals. But there are some worthwhile scenes, such as a member of the Ivaka tribe showing Naoh their advanced knowledge of creating fire with a hand drill.
The special effects were shot live with no optical additions done in post-production. The Smilodons (saber-toothed tigers) were obviously just lions with long canine teeth added while the woolly mammoths were played by trained circus elephants.
Rae Dawn Chong does well in her role as the lithe girl, but don’t expect a stunning female on the level of Lisa Thomas as Sura in “One Million Years BC” or Beth Rogan in the 1961 version of “Mysterious Island.”
The film runs 1 hour, 39 minutes, and was shot in Canada (Greig's Caves on the Bruce Peninsula near Lion's Head, Ontario, and Cathedral Grove on Vancouver Island), Kenya (Lake Magadi) and Scotland (the Highlands and Tsavo National Park). I heard the mammoth scenes were done in Iceland.
GRADE: B-
