See dinosaurs walking.........in Walking With Dinosaurs.
This over extended BBC dinosaur special may be beautiful to look at, but overall its a film that has some serious personality issues deciding whether its an animated documentary or a feature film about a young dinosaur's journey. We start out with humans, are given a talking bird that transforms in to a prehistoric flying creature, and then suddenly are transported into the dinosaur era experiencing life through the eyes of Patchi, a young dino that wants to prove his worth.
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| "Your breath smells like garlic." |
The modern starting point was needless and didn't add anything to the movie. Plus, Karl Urban couldn't look more disinterested in his role with a "what am I doing here?" smirk on his face the whole time. Both the child actors are given two or three lines making the modern exposition completely unnecessary.
Obviously Walking With Dinosaurs was heavily marketed to children, but sadly my ten year old appeared bored by the half way point. He said he liked it, but I can tell when he's passively answering yes to satisfy his dad. Younger kids will probably marvel at the spectacle of these rendered prehistoric creatures, but anyone over the ten year mark will most likely roll their eyes at the simplistic narrative, corny dialogue and plot holes you could fit a brontosaurus through.
Don't get me wrong. It's not a horrible movie. Walking With Dinosaurs looks great and pays undivided attention to the dinosaurs we rarely hear about. In that aspect, it's a fair piece of computer generated history. But, overall I would have preferred either a straight up documentary about this herd of dinosaurs. It could have been much more interesting if we were given more hard facts instead of a coming of age story.
-Review by Chris George