Walking with Cavemen 

The great follow-up to 'Walking with Dinosaurs' and 'Walking with Beasts', presented by Professor Robert Winston, explains the story of human evolution.

Stars:

Robert Winston, Alec Baldwin, Christian Bradley

Cast

Series cast summary:
Robert Winston	...	Himself - Presenter 4 episodes, 2003
Alec Baldwin	...	Narrator (US version) 4 episodes, 2003
Christian Bradley	...	Various hominids 4 episodes, 2003
Alex Palmer	...	Various hominids 4 episodes, 2003
Oliver Parham	...	Various hominids 4 episodes, 2003
David Rubin	...	Various hominids 4 episodes, 2003
Florence Sparham	...	Various hominids 4 episodes, 2003
Marva Alexander	...	Various hominids 3 episodes, 2003
Rachel Essex	...	Various hominids 3 episodes, 2003
Faroque Khan	...	Various hominids 3 episodes, 2003
Suzanne Cave	...	Various hominids 2 episodes, 2003
Ruth Dawes	...	Various hominids 2 episodes, 2003
Anthony Taylor	...	Various hominids 2 episodes, 2003
Badria Timimi	...	Various hominids 2 episodes, 2003

Storyline

The story of human evolution is told through the stories of representative members of the various species leading up to modern homo sapiens. It is ongoing climate changes that force human ancestors to develop, one by one, the unique characteristics of the modern humans. Though earlier species were superbly successful in their environments they were unsustainable when the environment changes.

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Plot Keywords:

human evolution | evolution | africa | voice over narration | prehistoric times | 

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Taglines:

Eye-to-eye with your ancestors.

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Genres:

Documentary | History

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Details

Official Sites:

BBC [UK]

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

27 March 2003 (UK)

Also Known As:

Caminando entre cavernícolas

Company Credits

Production Co:

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Discovery Channel, ProSieben Television

Technical Specs

Runtime:

30 min (4 episodes)

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

In Walking with Prehistoric Beasts (2001), the Australopithecus were portrayed via computer graphics and animatronic puppets because of their non-humanlike proportions. In this show, they are all actors wearing extensive makeup (minus the baby Australopithecus, which is of course a puppet). This method sacrificed anatomical accuracy for more expressive and diverse characters.

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Goofs

Since all the ape-men are modern-day actors wearing makeup, this means that several species have the wrong body proportions and also a much taller head.

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Connections

Followed by Walking with Monsters (2005)

User Reviews

HORRIBLE Documentary!

One Star. That's all this documentary deserves. I haven't felt this disappointed in watching a movie, let alone a documentary, in quite some time.

I'm a BIG fan of the "Walking With..." series, including it's Nigel Marvin spin-offs, for all their gleeful fun yet informative information. And although the subject of prehistoric man has never interested me nearly as much as other prehistoric creatures, the subject is still interesting and unique to explore. Having seen all the other docs from the series, I figured I need to see this one as well, especially after seeing relatively good reviews in other places.

Well for those of you who put up a good review of this doc... what were you thinking?! lol.

Though the information that they were able to get through was interesting, the presentation failed in every other way possible. It had a terrible flow, was incredibly unfocused in what it was trying to say (with information scrambled and sometimes out of of place), horrible effects (that includes the few moments of CGI and especially the makeup effects), and overused MTV-style camera effects.

Speaking of the makeup effects, one reviewer here mentioned how laughable the scene was when the cavemen come across this giant ape and how it looks a lot like a 70s man-in-suit horror movie. Well there are plenty of moments just like that were the people portraying the ape men looked ridiculous and acted ridiculous. None of this is helped by horrible camera positions and compositions.

The worst part of all is none of it is shown in an interesting or dynamic way, or looks remotely real. It doesn't even look like it was taken seriously. It also lacked any emotional punch that the predecessors of the series had. Remember the episode in "Walking With Dinosaurs" of the fate of the Ornithochirus (sp?)? That episode still gets me on the verge of tears every time I watch it. It's this sort of engagement with the subject that lacks here most of all. When you are more engaged in the subject and it's own personal story, even one that is just speculation, you care more about the facts surrounding it.

The only saving graces of this production are the fairly good narration (at least in the BBC version I saw) and the music. Otherwise, DO NOT bother even renting this one unless you want to have a good laugh (which I did frequently, but usually followed by rolling eyes). This does not belong on the shelf with the other "Walking With..." docs.

And does it make sense to learn that this doc was NOT produced or directly involved with the same people who did the others in the series? Hmmm...