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Ever watch a movie and just know that the only reason it got made was because the filmmaker behind it had just finished watching something themselves? That’s the distinct impression I get watching 10,000 B.C., the most laughably bad film to ever come out of the career of Roland Emmerich.

Yes, Roland Emmerich. The Day After Tomorrow Roland Emmerich. Godzilla American remake Roland Emmerich. Same guy. Even worse film. They said it couldn’t be done, but Roland was bound and determined to prove them wrong. And so he does with this inept exercise in trying to compete with the likes of Quest For Fire, Clan of the Cave Bear and the like.

For all intents and purposes, it appears Mister Emmerich finished watching a double feature of Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto and that BBC mini-series Walking With Prehistoric Beasts and had a great idea. To rip them off. At the same time.

It’s 10,000 B.C. (obviously) and we get to see the daily lives of a tribe that spends a good deal of their time hunting mammoths. There’s this guy, D’Leh, who looks like you’re typical young Hollywood punk, just with dreadlocks, and he’s got this hot girlfriend. But then this new, previously unknown tribe shows up – one that is extremely advanced. They got boats, man. And we’re not talking canoes. We’re talking full on Pirates of the Caribbean ships. In the time of mammoths and sabre-tooth cats. Anyway, these guys kidnap a whole heap of people, including hero-boy’s girl, and he just isn’t going to stand for that.

Oh, and D’Leh’s tribe speak perfectly fine English. Not all the other tribes, though; they get their own dialects and subtitles. But while the bad guys were learning how to construct pyramids, catapults and ships that would make Columbus envious, the good guys took a crash course in American Grammar.

The CGI is incredibly cheesy, the story is incredibly predictable and the direction has all the talent of a...well, to be honest, there’s not much to compare it to.

People, they actually use the line “He was my father.” In a serious tone. I fully expected the ghost of Andre the Giant to walk by after that.

One of the main bad guys is fatally wounded by being stabbed in the thigh. Think about that for a moment.

10,000 B.C. blows. Plain. Simple. But since this Warner Bros disc is a big-budget Emmerich deal, it’s got to be loaded with a lot of extras, right?

Wrong.

We get treated to a really pathetic alternate ending. And a smattering of deleted scenes, including one in which they didn’t even bother to fully rend the sabre-tooth cat.

Okay, I’m done with this movie. No more. Stop making movies, Roland Emmerich. Please. For the good of mankind.

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