Primitive War
It’s rare for me to be blown away by a movie these days. I feel like those “Oh, wow! How’d they do that?” feelings that movies once generated have all been lost due to an overreliance on CGI and safe filmmaking. Recently I was so impressed by a scene in the film Sorcerer (released in 1978), I had to look it up to see how they managed to pull off such a feat. There hasn’t been a film, probably since The Matrix, that I’ve bothered to look up how they accomplished a particular shot or scene. There just isn’t much to be impressed with these days.
But this weekend, I watched a new movie that generated that sense of wonder for me, and it wasn’t the type of film you’d expect. I watched a direct-to-video independent Aussie film titled Primitive War that just blew me away for all the right reasons.
When I first watched the trailer for Primitive War I was skeptical. I am not a fan of the SyFy original movie/Aslyum feature style releases. I don’t find intentionally bad filmmaking entertaining, nor do I find injecting a script full of humor because you know your special effects or story won’t hold up as amusing. When I watched the Primitive War trailer, I felt like the film might be more in that realm of filmmaking. I was very wrong.
The story goes that Luke Sparke, read the self-published book Primitive War by Ethan Pettus and wanted to adapt the film. He shopped the story around to Hollywood studios, but no one was willing to make a dinosaur film when Jurassic World dominates the box office. He developed the film independently and managed to do the visual effects in-house to save on costs.
The production alone is a fascinating story, but when it came to the actual film, I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. The visual effects were solid. At times they were fantastic, other times they left a lot to be desired, but I can be forgiving of bad CGI when you make a film for $7 million, I’m less forgiving when you have a Marvel budget.
The writer of the novel, Ethan Pettus co-wrote the script and you can see the love and care for crafting an intelligent story. While no one is going to mistake this for The Godfather, every character serves a purpose and has an actual arc. The acting, which is anchored by Ryan Kwanten (True Blood), Tricia Helfer (Battlestar Galactica, and Jeremy Piven (Entourage) is more than sufficient. Sure, there are a few questionable accents, but again… this isn’t a Hollywood production.
What I truly loved about the film was it wasn’t afraid to show the dinosaurs, and on top of that, they actually went for a more accurate representation of the beasts. For the first time, since the first Jurassic Park, the dinosaurs were actually scary. They were vicious and unrelenting, and even the most innocent looking dinosaurs created for some truly horrific moments.
Now, obviously I overlook some rough edges because of the budget, but I appreciate that it tells a coherent and interesting story, featuring entertaining characters. With that being said, this is still a B movie. This is a fun, popcorn flick full of people being eaten and ripped in half. It’s not nearly as classy as Jurassic Park, but its definitely more entertaining than any of it’s sequels. This comes from a guy who considers Jurassic Park a perfect movie and enjoys the franchise.
I think what I loved most about watching Primitive War was being able to sit in awe for the first time in years. I sat watching the screen and wondering just how did they manage to pull this off for $7 million dollars. I mean, if the budget was $30 million, I still would have been impressed. So, I appreciate Luke Sparke for giving me a chance to wonder, “How did they do this?” in what I feel will probably be one of the last times in my life. It reminded me of why folks talk about the magic of the movies, and in a world of four quadrant films, uninteresting horror movies, and the trash that most streaming services put out, this was a very welcome watch.