I was debating whether or not I even wanted to post anything about this 45 minute educational film, but I figured that I watched it with an audience in a theater, it has CGI, and it's stars Michael Douglas, so why the hell not?
"Dinosaurs Alive" is documentary about archaeologists in New Mexico digging up dino bones. There's also a brief history of a paleontologist named Roy Chapman Andrews discovering dinosaurs in Mongolia in the 1920's . The doc claims that Andrews was the person that the character of Indiana Jones was based off of. This simple suggestion was mulled over quite a bit during my viewing of "Dinosaurs Alive," I mean, why hasn't someone made a movie about discovering dinosaurs? I imagine that the first discovery of these giant bones must of melted people's brains.
Anyway, the dinosaurs closest ancestor, Michael Douglas (come on, scaly flesh, hooked beak, and beady bird eyes), does a decent job of voice-over work here, it probably helps that he sounds like what you imagine a talking reptile would sound like.
Either way, he's far and a way better at voice-overs than these young archaeologists. Definitely one of my biggest beefs with this movie is the awkward, obviously staged documentary footage. I could understand staging something if it was something incredible that you just didn't capture on film, but the stuff they're staging is just plain old digging and shit. Everything they said sounded like it was being read off a cue card, even their introductions! Why can't they just introduce themselves like they normally would? Why do they have to plan it out?
Whatever...So this movie should be about the dinosaurs, right? Well, they're pretty lackluster, and in "Annie Hall" fashion, in such small portions.
The only dino that manages to overcome the crappy CGI is the brontosaurus, those guys are awesome.
This was my first Omni max experience and I've got to say that it was pretty neat. Apparently at other locations, this movie screened in 3D, and I'm betting that would of been pretty good. I think the ideal imagery for the Omni max set up would probably be underwater footage. I imagine the entire screen being cover in water, and having fish swim near you would be pretty cool.
Anyway, "Dinosaurs Alive" is kind of a toss up, on one hand it's pretty lame, but on the other, it's about DINOSAURS!!!!!
"Dinosaurs Alive" screened at 3:50 on 8/24/08 the Chicago Science Museum.
1 comment:
it's more fake because that FILM cost more than your life. they have to make things quick and sharp. get what they need, etc.
stupid omni
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