⭑⭑⭑☆☆
Filmed in 1994, left unfinished and unreleased until 2023, “The Primevals” has all the charm of a movie that would have been fondly remembered as a childhood classic. Now, it is what one would refer to as a campy midnight movie — think “Atlantis” meets “The Room.”
The movie starts just as any of the dozen exploration movies of the ‘90s do: a grand discovery, some non-believers and a group of researchers dedicated to proving them wrong (and writing a book, of course!). The movie follows a team of explorers led by anthropologist researchers Doctor Claire Collier (Juliet Mills) and her past student, now famous author, Matthew Connor (Richard Joesph Paul) (whom had they cast as Brenden Fraser, I am certain they would have had a huge franchise on their hands). Ahead of the trip, they enlist famous retired game-hunter — with a name you will never forget — Rondo Montana (Leon Rossum) and two locals, Kathleen Reidel (Walker Brandt), another former student and their emotionally dark and distant guide for the expedition, Siku (Tai Thai). This group ventures into the Himalayas to track down the recently discovered, legendary Yeti.
Not far into their expedition, a ground-shattering avalanche drops them into ice caverns hundreds of feet below. Finding their way out of the caves, they discover the remains of an ancient civilization, sending this Yeti-exploration movie off the rails. Followed by the sudden discovery of an alien life form comes a battle for their lives and work.
Sometimes, there is a mess so hot that one can not help but keep looking at it, and sometimes, if you stare long enough, you find a gem hidden beneath all the mess. Packed with quirky characters who seem to be reading their lines rather than performing them, the most obscene camera work and off-beat dialogue, the movie has every ingredient to be bad, yet I had a blast watching it.
Ironically, seeing this movie is like opening up a time capsule of what could have been—a childhood movie that, at 20 years old, I scour the internet for after pulling its memory out of the depths of my mind, longing for a time when even the worst low-budget movies looked classically dreamy.
The movie, produced by Full Moon Entertainment, was a passion project for stop-motion animator and director David Allen (known for “Ghostbusters,” “Honey I Shrunk the Kids” and “Young Sherlock Holmes”). After 50 years in development, it was finished posthumously.
Following decades of trying to get the movie financed, after finishing principal photography in the summer of 1994, Full Moon Entertainment suffered a separation from Paramount Home Videos and was forced to shut down production. Allen left behind all the elements required to finish his movie, including storyboards, scripts, stop-motion puppets and equipment, to his colleague Chris Endicott. In 2018, he worked with Charles Band (the movie’s initial producer) to start a crowdfunding campaign that would finally fund its completion.
While watching this movie, it is quite clear that you are viewing an amateur piece of work, but the heartfelt dedication it was made with is presently felt.
The script leaves a lot to be desired. With a storyline that completely shifts gears and crumbles in the final act, totally disregarding its original plot, and lines that read so robotic (“Emotions…so beautiful”), it makes one wonder if somewhere in their limited budget, they got their hands on Artificial Intelligence writing programs decades earlier than the rest of us.
The acting somehow manages to be both cheesy and overdone while also falling flat on any development whatsoever (ask me if I really cared about any of these characters — misunderstood Yeti excluded — and I will say no).
But just as you likely would not have been critiquing the quality of a movie as a young child,
if you meet this movie on the level it suggests, one of a carefree science-fiction and fantasy adventure, you will find yourself wrapped up in too much whimsy to care much for the technical faults.
The dialogue, falling under the ‘so bad it’s good’ category, will leave you begging for more obscene one-liners you can not help but giggle about and repeat on your way out of the theater. I will think about “Looking into the eyes of a dying giraffe will change a man” for the rest of my life.
The acting, though not award-worthy (unless we are talking about Razzie’s), is enchanting—carried by Richard Joesph Paul’s emotionally ambiguous, never-ending smolder. It is just so ‘90s that you cannot believe what you are watching is real, in the most delightful sense.
What this movie was not lacking in any regard was clear artistic intent —the stop-motion visual effects were worth the 50-year wait. The otherworldly life forms portrayed entirely by claymation figures acting alongside the human ensemble left me to mourn the influence that a movie like this, with such ‘out-there’ artistic ambition, would have had on the cookie-cutter family films of the ‘90s.
Had the movie been given some talent with filmmaking maturity, a more fine-tuned version of this movie could have been reminiscent of “The Iron Giant,” a genuinely outstanding work of film even the most pretentious cinephiles are pleased to show their kids.
“The Primevals” was, if nothing else, simply a fun, memorable movie-going experience that satisfies all desires for a new (if we can call it that) cult classic you will be eager to see again and drag your friends to.
