Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls (2008)

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Oddly enough for an hour and 38 minutes of nothing the movie went by fairly fast as I waited breathlessly for the next thing to not happen. Senseless murders, a great white hunter that can't shoot straight and a safari without rifles, porters, tents or supplies. However, I guess that is all you can expect when you move king Solomon's Mines into the mid 1960s and it looks like you didn't have the slightest idea of how to make a movie. The Allan Quartermain in this movie is a joke and an insult to all lovers of the Allan Quatermain stories. Dialogue is lacking and weak, special effects none and the only interesting thing was about two worth minutes of National Geographic style footage which in itself made no sense either. With no beginning, a middle section of bad acting with a confusing storyline and one of the poorest endings ever, I don't recommend anyone wasting time watching this. I was going to rate this flick a 3/10 but I don't believe it's even that good. Finally, and this might qualify as a spoiler but is it really a "Temple of Skulls" when there's only a 20 or so skulls in the temple to begin with?

I was home sick one afternoon. Quite content, all warm and snugly in the basement, hot tea and the TV remote. What's on the Dish I ask, bored out of my head and not able to focus on much of anything but the TV anyhow....160 channels. Nothing on. But wait, a cheesy looking adventure movie. Hmmmm. It's got Alan Quatermain, and temples of skulls, that's gotta be good...No. No, no, and NO! It was everything and more the above criticisms list...Absolutely a terrible waste of everyone's viewing time. Who makes these movies, and why don't they wrap it after a few dismal "dailies", and donate the money to charity? Despite all the above inane, awful, embarrassingly awful scenes (you really did watch only to see if something would happen!), I couldn't get past the fact 4 people left on a treasure hunt in the wilds of Africa with street clothes, no weapons (on foot no less when half their journey took them down a well maintained dirt road), and a small rucksack (food? medical gear?, script? weapons? TP?, containing what????).With those obvious glaringly awful errors, shame on me for watching even another 20 minutes...it only got worse, and I turned it off. Then I got really sick!

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!

There are so many problems with this movie that I cannot even begin to count them. The most glaring error is that the title is Allen Quatermain and the Temple of the Skulls, yet there is no temple and there was only one skull in the entire film. A strange staff that the chief holds out to a young boy for breaking a rule and leading outsiders to their camp is beheaded by the staff when it transforms into a claw, rips his head off, and magically all of the tissue vanishes to leave a crusted, reddish skull. No reference to, explanation of, or attempt to find the temple is ever made. The title has absolutely nothing to do with the (lack of) plot. Secondly, it is unclear when the movie is supposedly set as a motion detector is clearly visible in a hallway, the scarf/bandanna Lady Anna wears around her head to conceal her crown is leopard print, and women in the 19th century did not wear heavy makeup or trousers! "Lady" Anna is no lady. She dared to wear a knee-length white dress without a bustle or corset, fell down exposing her stockings, and does not conduct herself like a lady of refinement at all.The love/attraction between Allen Quatermain and Lady Anna is contrived and forced at best. They have no chemistry and their love at the end of the film makes no sense and does not follow logically from their treatment of and reaction to each other throughout the film. Also, Lady Anna's character wears thick, caked-on makeup which was not the fashion in the 19th century. Also, she nor the other characters ever sweat, have pit stains from the scorching hot African sun, and never get sunburned. White people being baked by the sun for hours have a tendency to burn. Lastly, instead of looking for the Temple of the Skulls, the real plot of the movie seems to be accidentally finding an African tribal queen who is in hiding or exiled or something (I don't think we ever really found out the story there) and restoring her to her reign. So, why not call the movie Allen Quatermain and the Lost Queen or something like that? The plot is non-existent and nonsensical. The writing is so bad, it makes me want to scream, pull my hair out, and cry. My inner English major is yelling at the writer (who also directed this pile of garbage).This horrible film is so horrible that a new term needs to be created to properly describe the atrocity this mess really is.Do not waste your time. What has been seen cannot be unseen.