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11 out of 13 people found the following review useful: Not quite walking with the beasties., 21 September 2004 Author: messiercat from Oregon
Like a lot of people I was impressed with the previous "walking with" achievements. This one mostly uses real people and has a whole different feel to it. The acting is superb and you'll forget you're watching people in makeup and hairy suits. That said, there seems to be a constant problem with productions that portray early human ancestors. I guess there's a tendency to think ancient means crude and sloppy, and that's the way these beings are shown. Think brutish as in "Quest for Fire". Somehow I think smashing an egg in your hand and getting only a bit of it, stumbling around and wasting energy or wearing furs in the cold that look like they''ll fall off in a slight breeze isn't the way these guys survived to become you and me. Probably it's meant to show how different thay were from us, but I hope future attempts might use a little more imagination. Worth a look though.
8 out of 9 people found the following review useful: Information and Inspiration, 16 June 2003 Author: Dan Woods from Ohio, USA
Walking with Cavemen, hosted by Alec Baldwin, is a look back at all the hominid (that's us!) species of the past 5 million years: who they were, what they were like, and how they died out. Along with being a very interesting scientific look at the information we have on these species, Walking with Cavemen also examines what it is that makes us human. I waited several weeks to watch this, and I was not disappointed.
2 out of 2 people found the following review useful: Potentially good program ruined by ridiculous presentation, 15 February 2007 Author: robhiphop from Perth Australia
I wanted to enjoy the "Walking With Cavemen" series and there were moments that were informative and sufficiently awe inspiring. The atmosphere of a serious look at human evolution was severely compromised, however, by the completely ridiculous insertion of the presenter, Robert Winston, into the action, as if he was traveling back in time to witness our ancestors first hand. Not only does Robert Winston have a silly looking mustache and an annoying manner, but we have to watch him racing about the prehistoric world in a variety of vehicles, as if he was the star of an action movie. In several hilarious moments, we even see Winston exchanging "meaningful" glances with our ape-like ancestors. By the time I saw Winston hovering above Africa, observing our ancestors from a hot air balloon, I was about ready to chuck the DVD out of the window in despair.Even if you take Winston out of the equation, this documentary is sketchy and implausible at best. The "script-writers" can't seem to resist building narratives out of the lives of our ancestors, for example, in the whole situation with "Lucy" and her baby, which is presented as if it was an actual scenario that took place. Every point that is made is essentially presented as "fact", and while I am no expert on the subject, I found myself immediately questioning how they could possibly know these things. For example, Winston seemed quite insistent that the Neanderthals had "no imagination". Philosophical speculation about imagination being an essential component of consciousness aside, the discoveries of what appear to be burial grounds, complete with residues of garlanded flowers about the skulls of dead Neanderthals, was completely ignored, and would suggest that the Neanderthals did indeed have sufficient imagination to at least have some sort of concept of an afterlife. The documentary went on and on, presenting little in the way of evidence for any of the assertions it put forward or the scenarios that were constructed, which were often embarrassingly cheesy and played for comic effect.As a work of fiction and imagination, perhaps, the "documentary" did succeed on some level, and the overwhelmingly interesting nature of the subject matter could not be completely sabotaged by the manner of presentation. But even the make-up, acting and special effects employed in the depiction of our ancestors had not progressed to any significant degree from 2001: A Space Odyssey, a film made more than thirty years beforehand. Particularly laughable was a moment when several of our ancestors were confronted by a giant and angry gorilla in the prehistoric jungles of Asia, which played out like something from a fifties B-movie about Cavemen vs. the Monsters."Walking With Cavemen" is still a mildly entertaining and informative program, if not to be taken entirely seriously as a genuine presentation of science. The less heralded (and unfortunately still unavailable on DVD) Channel 4 presentation "Neanderthal", was a much better effort.
HORRIBLE Documentary!, 14 April 2009 Author: scallenger from United States
One Star. That's all this documentary deserves. I haven't felt this disappointed in watching a movie, let alone a documentary, in quite some time.I'm a BIG fan of the "Walking With..." series, including it's Nigel Marvin spin-offs, for all their gleeful fun yet informative information. And although the subject of prehistoric man has never interested me nearly as much as other prehistoric creatures, the subject is still interesting and unique to explore. Having seen all the other docs from the series, I figured I need to see this one as well, especially after seeing relatively good reviews in other places.Well for those of you who put up a good review of this doc... what were you thinking?! lol.Though the information that they were able to get through was interesting, the presentation failed in every other way possible. It had a terrible flow, was incredibly unfocused in what it was trying to say (with information scrambled and sometimes out of of place), horrible effects (that includes the few moments of CGI and especially the makeup effects), and overused MTV-style camera effects.Speaking of the makeup effects, one reviewer here mentioned how laughable the scene was when the cavemen come across this giant ape and how it looks a lot like a 70s man-in-suit horror movie. Well there are plenty of moments just like that were the people portraying the ape men looked ridiculous and acted ridiculous. None of this is helped by horrible camera positions and compositions.The worst part of all is none of it is shown in an interesting or dynamic way, or looks remotely real. It doesn't even look like it was taken seriously. It also lacked any emotional punch that the predecessors of the series had. Remember the episode in "Walking With Dinosaurs" of the fate of the Ornithochirus (sp?)? That episode still gets me on the verge of tears every time I watch it. It's this sort of engagement with the subject that lacks here most of all. When you are more engaged in the subject and it's own personal story, even one that is just speculation, you care more about the facts surrounding it.The only saving graces of this production are the fairly good narration (at least in the BBC version I saw) and the music. Otherwise, DO NOT bother even renting this one unless you want to have a good laugh (which I did frequently, but usually followed by rolling eyes). This does not belong on the shelf with the other "Walking With..." docs.And does it make sense to learn that this doc was NOT produced or directly involved with the same people who did the others in the series? Hmmm...
2 out of 4 people found the following review useful: Enjoyable, though predictably racist., 30 July 2007 Author: reg-210 from Philadelphia
It would be nice to one day watch a documentary about human species where the theories didn't make it obvious which species wrote it. The idea present that the Neanderthals were "no match" for us -- us with our far weaker muscles, weaker bones, and smaller brains, is ridiculous. There are many things that could have wiped out the Neanderthals. Despite our wish for it to be true, us out-competing them is not one of the likely ones.Like most documentaries on subjects with more questions than answers, "Walking With Cavemen," presented vast amounts of speculation as if it were fact. Some of the speculation was questionable, like the degree they modeled earlier species' behavior after chimps, the claim that Neanderthals lacked imagination, and the depiction of Neanderthals' lifestyle. For example, showing them poorly sewn skins and living in caves. Of course all human species would live in caves from time to time, but Neanderthals primarily lived in tents.Yet for all that, it was good on several other levels. The best part was how our forebearers were depicted with the gravity and intelligence that they would have had, people who we would have been able to empathize with and relate to. The actors were excellent. The way they were physically depicted, by modifying the modern human form with prosthetics, gives a much more realistic picture than the other approaches that have been taken. The worst failing in the physical appearance department is showing every species but ours as unkempt, despite grooming being shown as one of our earliest behaviors.For me one of the best parts of the series (though one of the worst for another reviewer) was the host Robert Winston (I was fortunate to watch the British version). By stalking our forebearers in everything from jeeps to hot air balloons, he basically plays a throwback to the early British explorer/anthropologists in Africa, bringing with him all of British civility, and an deep intellectual curiosity and affection for his subjects.
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