The earth's first cheesecake

TCM showed One Million BC early this morning, and I forgot to recommend it. That's a shame, since the movie hasn't been released to DVD. The story is fairly simple. Victor Mature plays a prehistoric man, part of the Rock Tribe, who gets banished from it and ends up finding love (in the form of Carole Landis) in the much more peaceful Shell Tribe. The movie is known for its special effective, which are very primitive, in that modern-day animals are used in rear-projection, made up to look like dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals (accuracy be damned!). The second thing is that there's very little dialog; what little there is is either in the framing story at the beginning, or in the form of grunting by the characters. Finally, there's Landis, who spends her scenes in the movie dressed in a pretty skimpy outfit. Yeah right.

Although you won't find One Million BC on DVD, it was remade. That 1966 remake, titled One Million Years BC, is available on DVD for your viewing pleasure. It's also in Technicolor, benefits from the special effects of Ray Harryhausen, and especially benefits from the presence of the buxom Raquel Welch. With people like Welch, who needs a plot?