One Million Years B.C.

One Million Years B.C. (IMDb, Netflix), released 1966, dir. Don Chaffey.

There's a reason that One Million Years B.C. is more famous for the poster than the movie itself: the movie is not very good.

Of course, it doesn't even approach 100 Million BC, but it's still impessive how much it fails at. Most obvious, of course, is the special effects: the dinosaurs look like toys, except when they are actual animals spliced into the footage of the actors. But the worst thing about the movie is the story. More accurately, it has no story. It's just an episodic series of vignettes about life in caveman times, with people fighting (without speaking!) and getting eaten by dinosaurs. Probably the most consistent thread in the movie is how arbitrary everything is. Characters will break out into fights for no reason at all. The male lead runs away from his cave several times, and we follow him wandering around the desert until he eventually goes back home each time. And when nothing else is going on, a stop-animated dinosaur attacks. Or else a giant iguana. Nothing happens for a reason.

Maybe this is by design. Maybe One Million Years B.C. is a commentary on the meaninglessness of life and the random cruelty of the universe. Maybe its ultimate message is that only through sheer chance are we not plucked from the sky and mauled by pterodactyls.

But somehow I doubt the filmmakers had such philosophical goals with the movie. I think its ultimate purpose, its reason for existence, is to have Raquel Welch run around in a fur bikini. And, to be honest, that suits me just fine.