Almost certainly Mel Gibson’s best as director, even if it does open with a quote from Will Durant’s THE STORY OF CIVILIZATION. (What library sale was Mel at?) This Mayan saga does a great job over its first act, not only in showing how a small tribe of intra-dependent family units lived & thrived, hunted & partnered in their forest domain, but in particularizing two separate Mayan groups who pass thru. A defeated clan, thin, sickly, ill-clothed & ill-fed, seeking a new start in a new village, followed by a warrior army from the great Mayan city that lies days away, men who presumably destroyed that crushed clan and now bring destruction to our hunter/gatherers. But something goes wrong with the film after our tribe joins the defeated men for sacrificial rites at the grand temple of death (blood, ripped out hearts, beheadings*), leading to a long chase which makes up the second half. Gibson’s story turns into a sort of Mayan ‘Perils of Pauline’ serial, with a cliffhanger ticked off every few minutes: Saved in the nick of time by Solar Eclipse; Saved from rising waters in a flooded pit (while giving birth!); Saved by waterfall leap; Close call from quicksand; Saved from an angry Mama Jaguar; Saved from giant nemesis with a Rube Goldberg hunting trap; many more. Ending with a surprise ‘reveal’ that shows the continuing influence on an impressionable 12-yr-old Mel who never forgot seeing PLANET OF THE APES/’68 on the big screen. By now, if you’re not holding back giggles, you’ve earned a complete 11-volume STORY OF CIVILIZATION set; available (used) for 20 bucks on Amazon.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Shot in a variety of systems (digital; 35mm; 16mm) that gives unintentional smear to some motion (a digital artifact?), in addition to intentional blur on forest runs.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: * Not my screwy thought, but Mel’s, who offers post-beheaded sight from a victim’s P.O.V. Turns out, death comes via hand-held camera.
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