Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls

Picked this up in a five-buck Echo Bridge 6-movie pack at K-Mart that also had some TV versions of Robinson Crusoe and mummy movies. Never laughed so hard in my life. Highly recommended for connoisseurs of bad cinema.

All those who give this movie a negative review should watch those abysmal big-budget studio Allan Quartermain movies in which Richard Chamberlain plays H. Rider Haggard's main character as a guy who wants to bed all of his male co-stars, in which Sharon Stone wears far too many clothes, and in which James Earl Jones plays an African tribal chieftain with such obvious embarrassment you can practically see the tears in his eyes and hear his thoughts saying, "Remember, Jim, this is paying for that vacation house in Old Saybrook, Conn."

And really, all that money invested in "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" still didn't make it make a damn lick of sense, and made me feel like George Lucas screwed me. "Star Wars made me very rich and very fat. Thanks. Here, I dressed up some of my feces as Indiana Jones for you to look at for two hours."

At least this one doesn't pretend to be anything other than crap, and on that level, it's a helluva lot more enjoyable than "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull."

Stuff you gotta love:

-- The swarm of millions of somethings that are as big as birds, buzz like bees but looks like a pixellated screensaver, which causes the entire cast to cower under a rock but which poses no threat or danger whatsoever.

-- The leading lady says she twisted her ankle and couldn't possibly walk on it, and in the very next scene is hiking up a mountain.

-- The leading lady's makeup is heavier than that lady's in your town who drives the pink Mary Kay car. Honestly, she looks like she's auditioning for a role as a Tammy Faye drag queen.

-- They reach the fabled King Solomon's Mines by walking in a general direction up a dirt road. And when they get there, they just stand around and do nothing.

-- Earthquake! For no reason!

-- Two white guys found captive in the African tribe who do absolutely nothing for the rest of the movie.

-- Everything collapses! For no reason!

-- The big fight between Allan Quartermain and the villain that looks like an improvised b-slap match between the Burger King and Abe Vigoda.

-- Finally, there is no Temple of the Skulls. It's never sought. It's never reached. It's never mentioned.

Folks, five bucks at K-Mart. Can't buy a Happy Meal for that.

Not just Allan Quatermain, but anyone who would watch this movie has to be out of their skull. This was such a terrible movie that I wanted to walk out of the theater and go home. The problem was I was already home, watching it on a DVD.

There were so many things wrong with this movie that it would be impossible to list them all, but I'll give you a few examples.

How about going off for a hiking expedition without taking any supplies, not even water or food. They didn't even carry canteens. All the bad guy, who was after them, had was a rifle and pistol and the clothes on his back - but no hat. I thought it got hot in Africa? No one was sweating. I know this because the leading lady's heavy eye makeup never ran.

How can the bad guy take out two crew members of a moving train with two shots but never hit Quatermain even when Quatermain is standing still or is only a few yards away. This happens several times in the movie.

And where did the earthquake come from? Just thrown in for good measure, was it? And when was the last time you explored a dark cavern without any lights? If Quartermain took the job to get the tuition money for his son and then gave it to his housekeeper to mail, what happened to the envelope when the housekeeper went on the trip with him.

At least they didn't have any trouble finding the unknown land where King Solomon's mines were, as a wide dirt road had been created for them to follow. The bad guy had a truck, so why did Quatermain and his party have to walk on the road? Since his house is in the country, you would think he would have a vehicle too.

I have watched many movies where the actors had to walk to get where they were going. I'm surprised that Quatermain's party ever got anywhere. I have never seen people move this slow. I walk faster inside my own house.

And what was that terrible flying swarm? Bloodsucking locusts? Day flying bats? Enraged hummingbirds? Would have been nice to know.

I could go on, but why? So I'll sum it up.

No plot. No character development. No one with any acting ability. On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd give it a -3.

Just look at the poster for this movie and straight away you'll notice the resemblance to the Indiana Jones posters, and the resemblance doesn't stop there. This is a blatant attempt to cash in on the recent return of the superior film franchise. Its not the first time the adventures of Alan Quartermain have been used to scrape some of the profits off the top of the Spielberg movies. When the original films where released a remake of "King Solomans Mines" was rushed out shortly after with Richard Chamberlain hamming it up as Alan Qaurtermain.

Although I don't really like the Indiana Jones movies I think its in very bad taste to copy them in order to milk some of there profits. This movie was pushed out faster than a novice skydiver on his first jump. Slapped together in under 8 weeks, and you can tell! this is a poor effort at storytelling. Sets and cinematography are quite passable but the plot has more holes than a tea bag, therefore Im not even going to mention any of the story because what you don't know wont bother you as the kind of person who enjoys this rubbish are those with the intellectual capacity of a retarded goldfish.

I have given this film 1 star... as the IMDb wont allow me to give it none! Give this movie a wide birth at all costs!

This film has a lot of memorable, really fun scenes, the characters are very likable, the acting was good, especially the villain... he was AWESOME, very entertaining. I could watch his scenes over and over again! The main actor was very true to the character of Allan Quatermain in the original book by H.R. Haggard. I thought he did a really solid job. This film was very well directed, had some beautiful cinematography, and is overall a really good, fun film that I would highly recommend.

This is by far the best film that the Asylum has ever done. I was very surprised at the quality of the story, the acting, the directing, everything was at a distinctly higher level than any of the previous films I've seen come out of The Asylum. I would say that this is a director to watch in the future. Very talented.

Wow - this movie should have been named Velveeta! The plot was non-existent, the acting was worse than a high-school play, and it was just plain cheesy. It seemed like the vast majority of the movie time was filled with completely meaningless scenes. Some of those filler scenes were twice as long as they should have been. The pauses on the various characters after finishing their line was reminiscent of watching a soap opera and the music constantly built to non-existent climaxes. This movie literally could have been 20 minutes long and would have not been any worse. I think the budget was mostly spent on the catering for the actors. This movie doesn't deserve any more words!