Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
Werner Herzog gains exclusive access to film inside the Chauvet caves of Southern France, capturing the oldest known pictorial creations of humankind in their astonishing natural setting.
Herzog's singular access to Chauvet Cave yields breathtaking 3D cinematography of 32,000-year-old paintings, making this a genuinely one-of-a-kind cinematic experience. The visual documentation of humanity's earliest art is extraordinary and irreplaceable. However, the film meanders in its latter stretches, and the infamous albino crocodile epilogue is a famously bizarre, alienating non sequitur that divides audiences. There are no 'actors' per se — Herzog's narration is characteristically poetic but idiosyncratic, and the scientists interviewed range from fascinating to awkward. The novelty is near-absolute: no other film exists like this, combining exclusive prehistoric access with Herzog's eccentric documentary voice.