(1966)
Dir - Don Chaffey
Overall: MEH
Remaking the 1940 One Million B.C. basically provided Hammer Studios with two things. One, to hire Ray Harryhousen to do the effects which for the time are as excellent as any and two, to put Raquel Welch in a fur bikini to give people something to look at while the dinosaurs are not on screen. As far as anything else even surface level compelling to be found, there is indeed zilch. Ursula Andress was first offered the role that went on to make Welch a household name, but she declined/wanted too much money and was probably better off for doing so. Today, One Million Years B.C. is mostly seen simply as a star-making movie for Welch as Harryhousen has done more iconic work in Clash of the Titans, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, and Jason and the Argonauts to name a few. It is virtually impossible to become engrossed in anything resembling a "story" going on here as completely indistinguishable, tanned, Caucasian cave people just grunt, fight, and walk around, only occasionally interrupted by real and stop-motion created monsters fighting and Raquel Welch swimming. Thankfully though, the US released version of the film cuts nine minutes to get it over with that much quicker.
(1967)
Dir - Michael Carreras
Overall: MEH
Though it was much less financially successful than the previous year's One Million Years B.C., the sort-of follow-up Prehistoric Women at least has dialog and a story, be it a rather elaborate one at that. Forgoing stop-motion monsters for a pretty lame mechanical rhinoceros, Prehistoric Women, (Slave Girls in its native UK), also swapped Raquel Welch for Bond girl Martine Beswick who has the most scenery chewing part in the film as a former slave turned cruel bad lady queen. The script is full of silliness like legends and prophesies being fulfilled, people who do not even know each other falling in love, and most of the characters doing either absolutely nothing to help their predicament or the most illogical things at the most inopportune times. Michael Latimer is pretty stiff in the dashing hero lead, but the attempt to switch the roles around and have women enslave men and not succumb to their manly wills gives the movie a deliberate feminist point of view that is not wholly unsuccessful. At the same time though, these brunette women also enslave blonde women for some reason and all of them are scantily clad and partake in sensual tribal dancing for no other reason that to provide as much sex appeal to an audience as possible. The twist at the end works well enough yes, but the film as a whole ends up being rather forgettable.
(1970)
Dir - Val Guest
Overall: MEH
The third in Hammer's "Cave girl" series, When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth is so exactly the same as the One Million Years B.C. remake that it is staggeringly unnecessary to exist in the first place. This is coming from a company that made eight goddamn Dracula sequels. It is an interesting and more "realistic" idea to have all of the dialog be a made-up speak, but for the cavemen and cavewomen to point, fight, chase each other, and then repeat once again for ninety-minutes while only saying about five fictional words, you are practically daring your audience to not lose interest. It is easy to get so bored that one cannot even keep track of who anybody is since all these white, tanned, greasy, scantily clad humans are practically doppelgangers of one another. The appeal to this sub-genre is questionable to be sure yet that said, a fan of stop-motion animation can certainly enjoy the actual dinosaurs which are very well done for the period. They have only aged moderately poorly as shots of a giant rubber fin crushing a man are a little too Doctor Who worthy to not laugh at.
(1971)
Dir - Don Chaffey
Overall: MEH
Hammer concluded their run of Stone Age men and women running about, dancing behavior style films with the very evasively titled Creatures the World Forgot. This is to say that the most furious beasts present are real life snakes and boars as no giant, stop-motion behemoths are anywhere to be seen. On this hand, this is the only movie in the series that can be argued as being historically believable, but by taking the chance of making it compelling for ninety minutes based solely on grimy, barely if at all clothed, blonde and brunette cave people fighting with one another, it completely fails on an entertainment level. Once again there is no dialog and even less grunts to help convey what is happening than usual, but there is a story that is as simple to follow as they come which only just keeps the film from being nothing more than documentary level reenactments. That said, it is far less fun to watch than most educational programs would be since at least in those we get some narration to teach us the ways of the primitive man. Here though, yeah we get to see some of the methods that they hunted and survived in the desert as well as some artistically licensed rituals, but with so very little to keep you invested, the movie cannot end fast enough.
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