Movie Trailer: Blade Runner (1982)

Movie Trailer: The Thing (1982)

Ask JKM a Question: My Favorite Year in Film?

A reader named Gene writes:

“Hello. Long-long time reader here. I know that you stated before what your favorite decade for films are. The 70's I recall?? But can you narrow it down to your favorite year for releases?

For instance, I realized that the year 1995 was a banner year for my personal best list....'Heat', 'Se7en', 'Usual Suspects', all in 1 year! ....what is yours?”

That is a great question, Gene. I love thinking about years in cinema history that I experienced, and remember fondly.

As usual, however, I am going to be evasive, and not name just one “great” or favorite year, but three favorite years. (Yes, I find it difficult to choose)

Here goes:

My favorite year for film is….1982.

Why?

Take a look at this incredible release roster for that year:

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

John Carpenter’s The Thing

Blade Runner

Tron

Firefox

Swamp Thing

Poltergeist

E.T.

The Road Warrior

Conan: The Barbarian

The Secret of NIMH

Q

The Dark Crystal

Creepshow

And (lest we forget….) Megaforce!

It’s amazing to me that the impact of these films is still being felt thirty-five years later. 

Star Trek is still going strong, Blade Runner 2 is due out in just months, 2015 gave us another Mad Max sequel, Fury Road, and a Dark Crystal TV series is on the way. 

Accordingly, I would nominate 1982 as the greatest year for genre movies in the 20^th century, and one that carried the most impact and influence, as well.

My second choice is 1979. This is a personal (and affectionate) choice. I was nine/ten that year, and the first wave of great post-Star Wars genre movies came to movie theaters…and thrilled me.

Here’s the roster for 1979:

Alien

Star Trek: The Motion Picture

Moonraker

The Black Hole

Buck Rogers in the 25^th Century

Time After Time

The Warriors

Mad Max

Last but not least, I am very fond of the year 1999. 

Perhaps I look back at 1999 so warmly because of what was happening in my life at the time. This was the year my wife and I bought and moved into our first house together, a historic home in Monroe, N.C.  I was writing full-time, two or three books a year, and everything seemed to be going swimmingly. The same year, we adopted our two kittens, Lila, who died in 2014, and Ezri, who is still going strong.

There was some amazing films released that year, including the following landmarks:

The Blair Witch Project

The Matrix

The Sixth Sense

South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut.

Stir of Echoes

Eyes Wide Shut

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

I would love to hear from readers on this subject. What is your favorite year in movies, and why?

Don’t forget to send me your questions at Muirbusiness@yahoo.com

Board Game of the Week: Tron (Ideal)

Trading Cards of the Week: E.T. (Topps)

Movie Trailer: Poltergeist (1982)

Movie Trailer: The Road Warrior (1982)

The Films of 1982: First Blood

In general, I am not the world’s biggest fan of the Rambo films. 

Parts II – III (I haven’t seen IV…) serve largely as awkward polemics in which a fighting man who is not really a “thinker” is put in the position of making political statements, and quite awkwardly so. 

The grandiose, high-flying words just don’t feel right or ring true coming out of John Rambo’s mouth.  He’s not a politician.  And he’s not a deep thinker, either.

I’m certain others will disagree with me, but the blockbuster 1985 film Rambo: First Blood Part II feels more like a laundry list of flag-waving philosophical talking points than a fully-articulated movie.

However, I am an affirmed admirer of First Blood (1982) the film that introduced the world to Sylvester Stallone’s character, a Vietnam veteran named John Rambo.

I resolutely admire this film not only because of the splendidly orchestrated stunts and action scenes, but because Rambo’s righteous anger is not directed at any one particular group or party, but at everyone in a system that has egregiously failed him.

In this way, First Blood is neither a right wing diatribe nor a left wing polemic.

Instead, it is an aching, emotional primal scream that transcends politics and partisanship. 

The brilliantly-staged film asks -- in a rage-driven bellow -- how the world could turn out this badly for someone who was only doing what he felt was his patriotic duty, and what he was called to do.

To put it crudely then, First Blood is simultaneously anti-war and anti-anti-war.

The film vehemently derides the system that landed men into armed conflict without the resources they needed to cope with the violence they witnessed, and then abandoned them upon their return stateside.

At the same time, First Blood decries the protest movement, which in some cases blamed soldiers for the decisions of their superiors, and the decisions of politicians in Washington D.C.

There’s more than enough anger to go around, in other words. And make no mistake: First Blood is an angry, emotional, reactionary film. 

Indeed, that incredible passion is the engine that fuels this work of art and provides it tremendous energy.

By contrast, later Rambo films attempt to suggest that might is right, and that if only Rambo were “allowed” to fight unfettered, we would have won the war in Vietnam. 

“Do we get to win this time?”  Those films asked, and that’s a deflection.  It’s the wrong question, and the wrong point to focus on.

Whether or not one supported the Vietnam War, this focus represents a deeply unsubtle simplification or reading of history.

Or described another way, First Blood is a veritable primal scream suggesting that the Vietnam War was a nation’s folly, and that elements of the anti-war movement are responsible for making it worse for those men who (bravely) fought in it than it already was. 

The later Rambo movies say, basically, if we could just re-fight the war, we’d sure win it this time.

There’s a lot of space between those two different philosophies. I find the first admirable, and the second delusional. 

First Blood still impresses as a work of art today as well because it recreates -- in small-town America, no less -- the deep contradictions, divides, and paradoxes that bedeviled the country in the 1960s and early 1970s.

First Blood isn’t a gung-ho, macho, flag-waving cartoon, either.  That’s merely the caricature that Rambo became later.  To some extent, critics have retroactively imposed that popular image on this initial film, and a re-watch reveals it just doesn’t fit.

On the contrary, First Blood is an angry, righteous -- and necessary -- exorcism of a national tragedy; one in which there is plenty of blame to share on all sides of the debate.

“We aren’t hunting him. He’s hunting us.”

Some years after the end of the Vietnam War, former United States Army Special Forces soldier John Rambo (Stallone) goes to visit in his friend, Delmar, in the Pacific Northwest, only to learn that he has died due to his exposure to Agent Orange. Delmar’s death makes Rambo the last survivor of his unit.

Rambo continues his journey through the town of Hope, Washington, but is intercepted by the town sheriff, Teasle (Dennehy), who fears that he is a drifter, and a dangerous element. Teasle drives Rambo out of town and when Rambo tries to return to Hope, Teasle arrests him.  Teasle finds a knife on him, and charges Rambo both with vagrancy and carrying a concealed weapon.

While incarcerated, Rambo is treated brutally by Teasle and his deputies, including Galt (Jack Starrett), Mitch (David Caruso) and Ward (Chris Mulkey).

This wretched treatment causes Rambo to experience flashbacks from his excruciating time as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, and to lose control of his impulses. His survival instinct kicks in, and Rambo injures several police officers, escapes the jail, and flees into the nearby forest.

Teasle and his deputies pursue Rambo into the wilderness, and before long, have a full-scale war on their hands as the Vietnam vet arranges for them to be fouled by booby traps and other dangers.

Rambo incapacitates the entire group, and Galt is killed, though the circumstances are not precisely Rambo’s fault.  Rambo attempts to surrender to authorities, but is rebuffed by Teasle, and nearly shot in the head.  Later, Rambo captures Teasle and tells him to “let it go,” but Teasle will not back down.

Before long, Rambo’s former superior office, Colonel Sam Trautman (Richard Crenna) arrives in Hope to help negotiate a peaceful solution to the war that rages. 

But Teasle has already called in the National Guard and State Police. 

Matters are escalating, and before long, there’s a very real chance that this war will have no winners at all…only casualties.

“We had orders. When in doubt…kill.”

Adapted from David Morrell’s 1972 novel of the same name, First Blood boasts a truly clever structure in the sense that Rambo’s mis-adventure in Hope -- an ironically-named town -- seems to mirror directly much of the Vietnam War experience and context.

In particular, Rambo runs up against a man, Teasle, who refuses to back down or to negotiate with him. Teasle’s only strategic move is to escalate, to the point that his own town is torn apart by his refusal to see reason, or to think outside the rubric of “total victory” over Rambo. 

In some fashion then, Teasle -- at least as depicted in the film -- symbolizes American leadership (from both political parties) circa 1964 – 1974 or thereabouts.  He represents unyielding, boot-on-your-throat authoritarianism.  It’s his way or the highway. If he cannot win with the forces under his command, Teasle will simply call up more forces and throw them at the cause too.  His “tactic” is overwhelming numerical advantage…and that’s it.

The paranoid quality of First Blood’s narrative arrives early, specifically in Teasle’s wantonly hostile actions in the film’s first act. He manufactures a reason to hate and fear Rambo on sight, trumping up charges of carrying a concealed weapon (a hunting knife, for Heaven’s sake…) and vagrancy. 

In keeping with the metaphor of the Vietnam War, Teasle’s trumped-up charges against Rambo serve as the equivalent of The Gulf of Tonkin incident… a manufactured reason to go to war.  Suddenly, Teasle has the excuse he needs to treat Rambo badly.

Oddly, Teasle’s actions make almost no sense on a practical level. They are only sensible if one considers the Vietnam War allegory.  Rambo’s hair isn’t especially long or ratty.  He doesn’t appear especially unkempt, either. And all he wants in Hope is a hot meal.  That’s all he “hopes” to find there. 

But Teasle is unreasonably and irrevocably hostile to Rambo…even telling him that his jacket with the American flag patch on it is bound to cause a problem.  If we understand Teasle as an avatar for imperialism and authoritarianism, he makes, at least, a modicum of sense as a dramatic character.  He becomes consumed by what “could” happen because of Rambo’s presence, not who Rambo actually is. 

And frankly, this sounds a lot like the (now-discredited…) Domino Theory. If Vietnam falls to communists, other states will also fall to communists too, the theory went.  There are a lot of “ifs” in that scenario that don’t involve -- at least directly – either reality or the present circumstances. 

Similarly, Teasle sees Rambo as a future threat not yet fully materialized, but it’s hard to see exactly why. Does Teasle think that this Vietnam Vet is going to start killing babies in Hope?  Is that his hidden (and paranoid…) fear?

Uniquely, Rambo takes on the characteristics of the Viet Cong in a sense.  He is “one” with the natural environment, using the forest to his advantage and acting as a guerrilla soldier when the first shots are fired.

He also sets booby traps for the pursuing officials, and many of his decoys and traps outlast superior firepower (the rubric of American forces in Vietnam).  At one point, Rambo even takes sanctuary in a mine or tunnel system, imagery which clearly evokes Viet Cong tactics. 

In more blunt terminology, both the Viet Cong and Rambo are deemed enemies of American authority in their respective wars. They represent some “outside” or “alien” world-view.

This shuffling of traditional heroic and villainous roles in First Blood effectively recreates the visceral confusion of the Vietnam War Era.  Americans were in Vietnam to fight the Viet Cong, and yet when stories came back about the behavior of some American soldiers, the tide of public opinion in the States turned against the war.

For instance, the My-Lai Massacre -- the murder of several hundred unarmed civilians by American soldiers in March of 1968 -- scrambled traditional concepts of right and wrong, heroes and villains.  How could people feel patriotic knowing that innocent people -- families -- were being murdered in their name?

First Blood is very much reflective of this complex and difficult dynamic. Watching the film, we expect to be on the side of the law and order, on the side of police, national guardsmen, and state police, but find that these expected authority figures are alternately despotic and cruel, or (as in the case of the guardsmen) inept, heavily armed buffoons. 

By contrast we sympathize with Rambo, even though he is launching a full-scale assault against civil and military authorities. He destroys private property, threatens other soldiers, and creates chaos.

Once more, traditional lines of sympathy are scrambled, and it isn’t clear who we should be rooting for.

Should it be for the police to put down an armed threat who lays siege to an innocent town? 

Or for the wronged man fighting the system with every ounce of strength in his body? 

Of course, as the film’s central figure, we ultimately do root for Rambo, but he is clearly an anti-hero in this film (as opposed to the sequels, where he is the fully heroic arm of a resurgent right-wing establishment…).

In First Blood, Rambo is fighting the system -- the very system that we cherish -- but one that has been co-opted by those who refuse to compromise or see reason.

In my introduction to this review, I noted that First Blood is an “aching” primal scream, an exorcism, and a necessary one. 

This becomes especially apparent in the final scenes.  I believe that Sylvester Stallone’s greatest silver screen performance arrives in First Blood, in the last act, when Rambo lays out the details of his life post-Vietnam.

He can’t get a job, let alone keep one.

He is tortured by images of friends and comrades dying in war. 

He is hurt -- psychically-wounded -- by the fact that his countrymen view him as a murderer and a baby-killer when he went to war, essentially, at their government’s behest (and demand).  

Rambo did what was asked of him, even though it was destructive to him personally, and now he is hated for having answered the call.

Thus Rambo faces the true no-win scenario.  He is derided because the war was lost, and hated by both the establishment and the anti-establishment.

During Rambo’s rage-driven monologue, Stallone is as raw and open emotionally as we have ever seen him…as if driven mad by the contradictions of Rambo’s situation as a man without a country, even though he gave everything for his country.

It is rare for an action movie to resolve in a scene of intense dialogue like Rambo’s in the police station in First Blood, but that’s precisely what occurs here.  We get this huge catharsis -- not out of violence meted -- but out of emotional release.  Rambo finally speaks at length about who he is, and what he is become…and is heard.  To some extent, that seems to be all he wants…to be heard. 

Later films in the franchise, as I’ve noted, ask Rambo to pull a lot of partisan baggage re-litigating the Vietnam War.  But in First Blood, we simply get a portrayal of an angry man who has been abandoned at every turn, and must now reconsider what his country stands for, and what he stands for.

First Blood is all about Rambo’s consuming rage, and the fact that he has been taught by his country that the way to express such rage is through violence, war, and blood-shed.  Trautman describes the philosophy as “when in doubt…kill.”

Only in the film’s finale, when Rambo unloads his emotions on Trautman, however, is Rambo’s war truly ended.  Violence and war ultimately resolve nothing, and that’s why First Blood is an anti-war film.  War did not make Rambo great.  On the contrary, war trained him to survive in only one heightened environment -- the battlefield -- but left him without the resources he needs to live among us, as a countryman, as a human being.

Although Rambo is described as “resilient” in First Blood, the opposite is actually true. He mounts a “private war” because he “just can’t turn off” the rage within him.  Accordingly, the final, haunting freeze frame of First Blood is a portrait of a man who -- years after the war is ended -- is finally taking stock of who he is, and why he is that way.

First Blood features involving, dynamic action scenes. Rambo’s escape from jail is a kinetic dance, a battle of violence that showcases John as a living, breathing weapon.  The scene on the cliff-wall, perhaps the most dazzling in the picture, is tense, and bereft of any obvious fakery or stunt doubles.  The action here is splendidly orchestrated, but again, the film’s real gut-punch comes in the substitution of Rambo’s self-expression for a deadly shoot-out.  The film goes out not with a blaze of fire-works, but a blaze of emotions and truth-telling.

Popular reputation to the contrary, First Blood isn’t a rah-rah cartoon or a two-dimensional action film like its successors. It’s the emotionally-affecting primal scream of a soldier hated and abandoned on all sides, who is just trying to mind his own business.

Sadly, he finds that he is to be denied even that modest freedom, and fights back the only way he knows how.

The way we taught him to fight.

Movie Trailer: The Dark Crystal (1982)

Lunch Box of the Week: The Dark Crystal (Aladdin; 1982)

Collectible of the Week: The Tron Collection (Tomy; 1982)

In 1982, Tomy released a small merchandise line for Walt Disney's computer fantasy Tron.  The line consisted of two light-cycles (yellow and red), and four 3.34 action figures from the film.

The action figures included were Flynn (Jeff Bridges), Tron (Bruce Boxleitner), Sark (David Warner) and a Warrior, one of the MCP minions.  

Flynn, Tron and Sark came equipped with glow-in-the-dark data disks (or frisbees), while the Warrior came equipped with the prod or staff he used in the film to push prisoners onto the game grid.

Like the characters in the film, the action figures looked kind of neon, and were actually transparent, with white outlining to suggest their computer circuitry look.

The light-cycles featured rip-cord technology (like you find on today's BeyBlade toys), and could house one action figure a piece.  The box legend for the light cycles went: "From the amazing world of Tron comes the futuristic Light Cycle that takes off like lightning."

Like the Indiana Jones/Raiders of the Lost Ark toys I featured not long ago here on the blog, the Tron toys were ones I somehow missed during my childhood.  I understand that NECA re-released the line (and added a blue light cycle) to celebrate the recent premiere of TRON Legacy, and so apparently I missed my second opportunity to pick them up!

Collectible of the Week: E.T. Talking Figure (LJN; 1982)

The summer of 1982 was a great one for genre movies, perhaps the greatest in my lifetime. It was the summer of Firefox, Tron, John Carpenter's The Thing, Swamp Thing, The Road Warrior, Blade Runner, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Poltergeist and another little number from director Steven Spielberg, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial.

At the time, I was much more into Star Trek than E.T., but many of my friends got into "collecting" mode over the blockbuster and sentimental film about a boy named Elliott (a young Henry Thomas) and his homesick alien pal.

LJN produced a line of E.T. action figures to spur the toy craze. Among the items available were an E.T. Pop-Up Spaceship, an E.T. and Elliott Powered Bicycle, an E.T. Wind-Up Walking Figure, E.T. and Spaceship Launcher, an E.T. Stunt Spaceship, and E.T. 3 and 3/4 inch action figures.

One of the most popular E.T. toys was this talking figure. Designed for ages 3 and up, this action figure stands approximately eight inches tall, features a painted red heart, and can utter such words as "home," "ouch" and "Elliott." The talking figure could also say his own name. three times: "E.T. E.T. E.T." All you had to do to activate the little guy was pull the string on his back.

My parents found this particular collectible on a yard sale excursion with my son Joel and bought it for three dollars. As you can see, it's in pretty good condition for a thirty-year old toy. Personally, I think it makes a good book-end with my LJN Gremlins action figure...

Below, an LJN commercial for the E.T. line.

Board Game of the Week: E.T. The Extra Terrestrial (Parker Bros. 1982)

Collectible of the Week: Doctor Who Tardis Playhouse (Dekker Toys; 1982)

If you saw my Christmas photograph from a few days back, you know that the TARDIS came to visit Joel’s holiday this year...filled with Doctor Who toys, including a bump-and-go-cybermat and a lego-like Cyber-conversion chamber.  

Specifically that holiday TARDIS is the Dekker Toys “Tardis” playhouse from 1982, an officially licensed product from the BBC. 

This TARDIS stands four feet high -- just a little taller than Joel at this point -- but is not alas, bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.  We’re still working on the issue of dimensional transcendentalism.

As you can detect from the images of the Tardis playhouse above, it was produced and marketed in the era of the fifth Doctor, played by Peter Davison.  Joel hasn’t seen any episodes of that age, yet.  We started our Whovian survey with Patrick Troughton (“The Tomb of the Cybermen,” “The Mind Robber” and “The Krotons”) but have also now watched “The Sontaran Experiment” and “Revenge of the Cybermen” from the Tom Baker Era.   I'm debating whether I think he'll be freaked out by the giant Wirrn in "The Ark in Space."

The Tardis playhouse is actually something of a tent, one held up by narrow PVC poles at the corners. And inside there is even a control room and view screen…a feature which Joel loves.

When I was a kid, I would have traveled to the ends of the Earth (or Zeti Reticuli, in Whovian terms…) to get my hands on a TARDIS playhouse like this one.  I understand that a full-sized, inflatable TARDIS is also being released soon for further Time Lord adventures.  I think it would look great in our garage when Joel outgrows the playhouse.

The Films of 1982 (From the Archive): Quest for Fire

Released in America on February 12, 1982, director Jean-Jacques Annaud's Quest for Fire (1982) is an adventure film that is authentically epic in scale and attempts accuracy in the language and physical depictions of its cave-man protagonists.

Importantly, Quest for Fire isn't historically inaccurate in a fashion that causes audience to laugh or wince. The cave-men here don't hunt a woolly mammoth and then wander immediately into Giza and find the Great Pyramids under construction, as was the case in Roland Emmerich's dreadful 10,000 BC (2008) for example.

Accordingly, critics approved of the Annaud initiative.  Variety's reviewer called Quest for Fire an "engaging prehistoric yarn that happily never degenerates into a club and lion skin spin-off of Star Wars and resolutely refuses to bludgeon the viewer with facile or gratuitous effects."  

In The New York Times, Janet Maslin concurred, terming the film "more than just a hugely enterprising science lesson, although it certainly is that. It's also a touching, funny and suspenseful drama about pre-humans."

In terms of theme, Quest for Fire -- based on the novel by J.H. Rasny - offers a unique narrative and commentary about man's unique capacity to evolve, to adapt to new technologies and developments in his always-difficult existence.  It conveys that theme in the milieu of our prehistory, when life was nasty, brutish and short. 

Set some "80,000 years ago," this "science fantasy adventure" (as it was billed in the original theatrical trailer) specifically concerns the primitive Ulam tribe. Director Jean-Jacque Annaud's observant camera introduces us to this Cro-Magnon clan and to the rhythms of the clan's primitive daily life.  These early scenes recall the opening of Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), at least to some degree.  As is the case in other Annaud films like The Bear (1988), it also feels like we're watching a documentary for the first fifteen minutes or so.  The realism factor is extremely high, thanks to the use of stunning natural locations in Kenya, Iceland, Scotland and Canada.

As a quasi-nature documentary, Quest for Fire is intense, revealing and involving. We see the tribes' people sleep (together, in a large communal cave), share a meal, battle enemies, and mate. Finally, the Ulam tend to their fire and this last bit is especially significant because the Ulam lack the capacity to make fire for themselves.  Accordingly, they have assigned a Fire Keeper or guardian to keep a small flame eternally lit.  

The on-set of rain is thus a major crisis.

Fire is "the great mystery" according to the film's opening card, and it is the one thing that keeps the tribe alive. It provides warmth; light, and the means to cook food. Without it, the Ulam would descend into darkness, cold and despair.

Yet, importantly, the Ulam don't understand the fire they covet. It's a thing to be captured, maintained and controlled.

Then, one day, the lurking Wagabu -- a tribe of primitive homo erectus -- launch a surprise attack upon the peaceful Ulam, and it's like a Stone Age 9/11 or Pearl Harbor. 

The sanctuary of the Ulam cave is breached. Men are killed in extremely violent and bloody fashion, and women are dragged away. And the sacred fire is nearly extinguished. The Fire Keeper manages to keep the flame lit for a short time, but soon it winks out, leaving the Ulam tribe -- now reduced to wandering in a primordial, misty bog --- little hope for continued survival.

The situation dire, three of the best warriors in the tribe, Naoh (Everett McGill), Amoukar (Ron Perlman) and Gaw (Nameer El-Kadi) are tasked with a seemingly-impossible mission: to find fire and bring it back to the tribe. The quest begins, and on this incredible odyssey across a wild landscape, the three men encounter sabre-toothed tigers (which chase them up a tree...), mastodons, and other terrors of the Paleolithic Age.   Although the film's subject matter is serious -- the very survival of the tribe -- Annaud incorporates wonder and humor into Quest for Fire's tapestry as well.

Not to mention horror...

In the film's most frightening scene, the Ulam triumvirate confronts the Kzamm, a neanderthal tribe of cannibals. Our heroes attempt to steal fire from these monstrous, hulking creatures, but it's a botched attempt that is tense and frightening. Still, during the struggle, Naoh and the others manage to free the beautiful Ika (Rae Dawn Chong), a beautiful female of the advanced Ivaka tribe. 

Adorned solely in body paint and otherwise totally nude, Ika is resourceful, bright and one of us...a homo sapien. 

She introduces the Ulam warriors to the concept of laughter, not to mention the wonders of the missionary position.  She soon becomes the team's most valuable player.  Soon, however, she grows homesick and decides to return to her tribe. 

Heartbroken by her departure, a smitten Naoh follows Ika back to her people, and after a series of ritual humiliations (including public sex with a line-up of very obese women...), is introduced to a world of new technology and knowledge. 

The Ivaka, you see, can make fire. It is an art they share with Naoh. Also, the Ivaka craft arrows, make pottery, and build free-standing shelters. It's all a brave new world to Naoh.  But after some time living happily among his new friends, Naoh is coerced by Amoukar and Gaw to return to their people   Ika, who has fallen in love with Naoh, goes with them on the trip. In the end, Naoh vanquishes a rival in his clan, and Ika teaches the Ulam to make fire. No longer is fire "magic;" something beyond the grasp of their understanding. Now it is a tool, well-understood and successfully harnessed.

Quest for Fire's final scene -- a beautifully staged, evocative medium shot -- reveals a pregnant Ika cradled tenderly in Naoh's strong arms as the couple expectantly gazes skyward, bathed in dazzling moonlight.  The implication is clear: the next generation will be one born with the knowledge to make fire, to build shelter, to carry light spears/arrows. Mankind has taken a big leap forward and we have witnessed the first steps of that journey.  There is no turning back to the dark caves of ignorance...or at least there shouldn't be. 

Even today, 80,000 years later, the human animal gets a lot of things wrong, no question. We pollute our environment and we wage war. But Quest for Fire reminds the viewer that the human experience is always evolving; that a new technology will be invented or discovered, or that a new understanding of our universe will be reached.  These things make our perpetual struggle for immortality that much closer to reality and our burdens that much lighter. 

You can watch, in Quest for Fire, how Naoh integrates new weapons, new science and new beliefs into his primitive way of life...and is the better for it, for the pursuit of knowledge. 

In just the span of this film, the dark, mysterious world of the Ulam becomes significantly brighter because of interaction with the Ivaka and their technology and know-how. This is nothing less than the story of the entire human experience: the great and unending quest to make our lives less uncomfortable; less difficult. 

I don't use the word "comfortable" lightly, by the way. I don't mean that we're lazy. I mean that the trajectory of human history is to make survival (and our children's survival) less a risk and more a guarantee: with science, with technology, with knowledge, and hopefully with wisdom. And that's why, frankly, it hurts me so much to see the anti-intellectual, anti-science proponents gaining so much traction in this country's national discourse today.  These are the folks who think we can pray away a drought in Texas.  These are the people who think we should turn back the clock on science.   If man had let such foolish irrationality win out in the prehistoric past....we never would have survived. We never would have learned to make fire. We would have died out in that murky swamp, waiting for the Man in the Moon to deliver us from evil. 

The march of progress, however, isn't always sublime or easy for everyone, as this film reminds us rather cleverly.  The Fire Keeper in Quest for Fire, for instance, is out of a job in the Ulam Tribe once fire is understood, his skills no longer necessary

So his situation may be the first case of down-sizing in human history... 

I also find it immensely interesting that in Quest for Fire it is a woman who brings civilization to Naoh's people.  She teaches Naoh how to make love and make fire. And, watching the final scenes of the film, one must countenance the idea that she also teaches him the critical (and in my experience, female...) quality of patience. Where - I wonder - would mankind be without womankind? 

Visually arresting, and packed with gory, intense action sequences, Quest for Fire is a fascinating adventure that considers with great verisimilitude "what might have been" in our long ago past. The shots that book-end the film -- nearly identical pans across a desolate dark valley lit by a single fire -- serve to remind us how hard our long journey towards the light has been, and that mankind's survival over the ages is not a miracle, not some gift from non-existent deities. 

Rather, it is the result of our own resourcefulness and ingenuity in the face of an often harsh and difficult environment.  The message: don't praise some imaginary God, don't praise fire. Or magic.  

Instead, praise the human spirit. It got us here, and it will deliver us into a better future...if we don't let the Neanderthals win.