I know it has the deck stacked against it, but I'm holding out hope that 10,000 B.C. will be good. I want it to be good. Still, it's hard to overcome my doubts.

My skepticism about 10,000 B.C. begins with the trailer. It starts with these words on the screen:

BEFORE EVERYTHING WE KNOW

LIES A LEGEND

NEVER TOLD

OK, first of all, if it's "before everything we know," then, um, how do we know about it? If we know about it, then obviously it's not before everything we know; it's PART OF everything we know. I guess it could be the oldest thing we know -- i.e., before everything ELSE we know -- but that's not really true, either, since we know about dinosaurs, and dinosaurs lived long before cavemen.

Second, if the legend has "never [been] told," then I'm sorry, but it's not a legend. A legend is, by definition, something that is told. "A legend never told" is like "a famous person no one's ever heard of."

So the trailer is only nine words long and already I'm finding blatant syntactical errors. This does not bode well. Why does the trailer have to lie to us in the first 10 seconds? Still, plenty of good movies have dumb trailers. The trailer is not a deal-breaker.

The film itself seems to be about cavemen fighting with each other and with woolly mammoths. The cavemen are attractive and European looking, with great teeth, skin, and abs. Honestly, though, I don't have a problem with that. I understand that certain liberties must be taken when making a film like this. Real cavemen were short, swarthy, hairy, and filthy, and nobody wants to watch a movie with characters like that (much to the dismay of Danny DeVito's agent).

There is another hurdle to overcome in 10,000 B.C.'s quest for greatness. That hurdle is named Roland Emmerich. As the director of films like Universal Soldier, Independence Day, and Godzilla, Emmerich was Michael Bay before Michael Bay was Michael Bay. His movies have occasionally been blithely enjoyable (I think Independence Day is good enough); other times, they're just stupid (Godzilla, The Day After Tomorrow). It's hard to watch one of the stars of The Covenant wearing dreadlocks and running from saber-tooth tigers and not think 10,000 B.C. will be in the latter category.

OK, I've talked myself out of it. I don't really have much hope for 10,000 B.C. after all. Forget I brought it up.

* * * * *
Eric D. Snider (website) thinks 10,000 A.D. would be way more awesome.

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