One Million Years B.C.
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One Million Years B.C. is a 1966 fantasy film starring Raquel Welch set - loosely - in the time of cavemen. The film was made by Britain's Hammer Films, and was a remake of the 1940 Hollywood film One Million B.C..
The film is largely ahistorical. It portrays dinosaurs and man living together, whereas current scientific thought holds that the dinosaurs died out sixty-four million years prior to the date at which the film is set. Since a million years ago the closest thing to a modern human being was Homo erectus, it seems doubtful whether Raquel Welch could have portrayed one very convincingly. However, since it is a fantasy, Ray and Hammer felt free to put man and dinosaurs from differant times togther.
Sypnosis
Tumak is a caveman from the Rock tribe who is banished to the harsh desert because of a fight with the leader, despite surviving many dangers, like a giant lizard and a giant spider before collapsing on a remote beach, he is spotted by some of the Shell Tribe, who are hunting for fish, they are about to help him when a Archelon makes its way to the beach, after fending the giant turtle away, they take Tumak to their villige, where Loana tends to him, the Shell Tribe are much more advanced and civilized then the Rock Tribe, when Loana and some men are fishing, a Allosaurus attacks and Loana is trapped after saving a girl from the Allosaurus, the men fight with the Allosaurus, and the Allosaurus kills some, but Tumak gets a spear and impales the Allosaurus, then finishing it off, the Shell Tribe, not known to violence, shun Tumak and his way of killing the dinosaur, he and Loana go on a journey and encounter a Ceratosaurus, who fights a Triceratops in a battle, Tumak watchs the Triceratops gore the Ceratosaurus to death. They wander back into the Rock tribe's territory and Loana meets them - again there are altercations.
Bathing one day, Loana gets snatched into the air by a Pteranodon, who drops her bleeding into the sea after it is attacked by a Rhamphorynchus. Tumak believes her dead, but she has survived the ordeal. In further clashes with the jealous Rock tribe they meet again, and fight for each other before the whole land is engulfed in a volcanic climax.
Trivia
- As the Shell People are attacked by a giant turtle, the women call it "Achelon" which is the real scientific name for the animal.
- Robert Brown (Akhoba) wears makeup identical to that worn by Lon Chaney Jr. wore in the same role in the 1940 version (One Million B.C. (1940)).
- The exterior scenes were filmed in the Canary Islands in the middle of winter.
- This was Hammer's 100th production.
- There was a scene with a Brontosaurus being attacked by villagers that never made it to the final film, Michael Carreras decided that the sequence wasn't necessary.
- The film uses two live creatures an Iguana and a Tarantula. Ray Harryhausen is asked over and over about these two un-Harryhausen creatures and he confesses that they were his idea. at the time he felt that the use of real creatures would convince the audience that all of what they were about to see was indeed real.
- The publicity shot of Welch from the movie (see picture) became more famous than the movie itself, becoming a best-selling poster and somewhat of a cultural phenomenon. The image can be recognized by people around the world; even among those who are not familiar with the film.
- Dinosaur stop-motion effects by Ray Harryhausen.
- The poster with Raquel Welch on it can be seen in the movie The Shawshank Redemption as the last of three posters in Andy Dufresne's cell.
External link
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