Lock Me Up!: 100 Million B.C.

Sorry, no Cavemen or Raquel Welch here.  Today's film is 100 Million B.C., an Asylum film that raises a good question: can their version be better?  It's kind of hard to say, since both movies suck.  This one is at least rooted in Sci-Fi elements, allowing you to excuse some thing.  Roland Emmerich's 10,000 B.C., however, is a film that has as much historical accuracy as Bloodrayne: The Third Reich.  I won't go into great detail about the numerous historical issues with that movie, especially since Film Brain already did.  Let's, instead, talk about The Asylum's film, which is mostly-based on A Sound of Thunder.  Yes, it's based on one movie, while aping the title of another.  Only in The Asylum, folks!  The plot mixes real history- The Philadelphia Project- with silly sci-fi stuff- time-travel and Dinosaurs in modern-day.  The plot is nothing to write home about really, save for Michael Gross.  I should note that Greg Evigan is here, playing yet another character who sends military personnel off on a mission that endangers them all (see Journey to the Center of the Earth 2-D).  Nice guy!  This plot is super-goofy, especially as it goes into the Third Act.  To find out just how silly it is, read on...

In the opening scene, two rock-climbers stumble across a cave with writing in it (not shown) and a T-Rex skull.  This *kind of* matches up to what we see later, but just barely.

A bunch of Marines are sent on a mission to track down some people who were lost back in time in the '40s.  They were sent by a young Gross, so he's decided that he should go with them.  Sure- bring along the old scientist...to the land of Dinosaurs!

If this Warehouse set looks familiar, it would be because I'm fairly sure that it was used in Journey as well.  Did Greg Evigan ever leave the set or did he just move in?  Nice cheap plastic on your TIME MACHINE, by the way.

Hey look- the black guy dies first.  Yeah, that Trope continues on here.  Thanks, Asylum!

Oh God- who approved this shitty CG?!?  Put in textures, you stupid, stupid people!!!

The group stumble across some natives...who are obviously the people sent back in time before.  Oh and the guy that Gross came to save was already dead.  Plot point = dead!

They make it back to modern day, but Gross leaves the gate open long enough for the oddly-red T-Rex to come through too.  Your noble sacrifice just got a bunch of people killed.  You fail as a hero, Burt!

How does the movie get goofier?  Well, Gross' character $%@!s over time some more by going to Present Day as his younger self.  I won't bother to give you the film's explanation, since I'd rather not have Gran Mal Seizure, thank you.

After a lot of light jogging and silly CG, they trick the T-Rex into going into the portal, fusing it into the rock and tying the plot together.  Depending on your view of theoretical time-travel, this is either clever or bullshit!

Oh and our heroes undo their being trapped in time, screwing up the time-space continuum so that they can have sex at home and so that one guy's son is not going to be a jerk.  The End.

Can Ashton Kutcher go back in time to stop me from watching this movie?  I'm being a bit harsh to bring back that Butterfly Effect joke, but this is still not good.  The concept- Navy SEALs go back to save people who are probably already dead is goofy.  The execution is oddly-maudlin, randomly-paced and feels like two movies slapped together.  Seriously, they brought Michael Gross here and told him to act super-serious...in a movie with time-travel and Dinosaurs.  Kudos for a good performance, Gross, but you're in the wrong movie!  You should make vague expressions and never quite seem awake like Christopher Atkins or Greg Evigan.  The movie has a lot of faults- obviously.  The pacing is so weird, giving us a bunch of random kills early on and then nothing for a while.  Good to see that the Raptor can take out three people, while the T-Rex can only take out one!  Random other moments include a guy killed by a sea monster that shows up for one scene and those stupid carnivorous plants that were also in Journey.  Here's a fun game: take a shot every time that this Asylum movie feels exactly like Journey- which was also released in 2008.  By the end, that time-travel bullshit will make sense and you won't even consider how screwed up time seems by these selfish pricks.  Suck it, String Theory!  If you want one image to really sum up the quality of the film, this is it...

Next up, a rare Asylum film (but still with Greg Evigan).  How can an Asylum Western be?  Stay tuned...