Review of Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls

I'm not one of the filmmakers on Allan Quatermain, but I do happen to know the guys that made this film, and they did an absolutely amazing job, especially when you consider what they were up against. Consider this.... this film was made from pre-production to post- production in little more than 2 months (started around Jan 15, completed March 26). They turned up in South Africa with five actors, a crew of five people (Line Producer-Nick Everhart, Visual EFX-Scott Wheeler, Sound Mixer/BoomOperator/Grip/Gaffer-Trenton McRrae, Assistant Camera-Sara Renard, and Director/Cinematographer-Mark Atkins), $10,000 in their pocket, and 9 shooting days (a lot of travel time between locations). They put together a pretty impressive film here, with some very entertaining scenes (I especially love the bathtub scene, and the Zulu village scenes). They were able to obtain an authentic steam train, filmed in an authentic Zulu village, with AUTHENTIC Zulu maidens and AUTHENTIC Zulu warriors. They also filmed in Sudwala Caves, the oldest known caves in the world (240,000 million years old). The director wanted to make a film that was true to the adventurous nature of the book by H.R. Haggard, and had no interest in doing an Indiana Jones rip-off. Which, if you watch the film, you will see that this is NOT an Indiana Jones movie...it IS an Allan Quatermain movie. It was intended to be an old-fashioned romantic adventure film, and that's exactly what it is. It's a lot of fun, has quite a few very entertaining scenes... and some very solid actors. Post-production was also an insane roller-coaster ride.... imagine trying to edit an entire feature film, do all the CGI Visual Effects, shoot an opening scene, score the film, color correct, and sound mix in five weeks time! It is a near impossible feat! So I say hats off to these guys for pulling off a miracle, and making a really great, fun film under extremely challenging conditions! No, it's not a multi-million dollar production like Indiana Jones. But it has a lot of heart, and it's very entertaining.