Why so much hype?

Well Deserved Praise

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

The Lost Treasure of the Grand Canyon: 1 out of 10: Well I was two minutes into the film and my girlfriend jinxed us. “Hey you know this movie isn’t that bad”. I turned pale… real pale. You don’t tempt the Gods like that. Not with a made for Sci-fi Channel movie. Not when one where the lead is Shannen Doherty. The words barely left her mouth and a CGI puppet began sliming a Frat Boy in a diaper. The Horror…. The Horror. If I am going to start somewhere I have to start with the Frat Boys in diapers. The movie claims these are Aztecs still hidden in the Grand Canyon at the end of the 19th century. (I know I know) Apparently they have been hiding from the white man for many years. Not to mention the Havasupai and the Painte and the Pai and the tourists at the Upper Canyon Ranch and perhaps the boys in blue down at Ft. Mohave. Anyway this lost tribe of Aztecs, like some Japanese WW2 sniper still hiding in a palm tree in 1971, is hidden in the Grand Canyon. What seems stranger is that they consist almost entirely of a hereto thou undiscovered group of Aztecs whom look like white college football players wearing diapers (well more of a mawashi) and war paint. I am all in favor of multicultural casting but I can’t believe that it isn’t a little insensitive to portray Native Americans as well extras in a Fire Island movie. Hold on a second Fire Island Movie????… The men are all buff and practically naked. The two woman are wearing pants and done up in to look twice their age. The monster spews slime on the buff boys for no good reason. Oh God no it’s Jeepers Creepers 2 all over again. The homoerotic horror film strikes again. Now I’m not sure that the over the top homoeroticism is directors Farhad Mann’s doing (or even intentional), but Mann is responsible for both Lawnmower Man 2: Beyond Cyberspace as well as Return to Two Moon Junction so with a track record like I am prepared to blame him for a Swine Flu outbreak let alone this film. So what else went wrong? Well the Quetzalcoatl design is all wrong (he looks like a puppet) and his CGI is bad by even the very low Sci-fi Channel standards. The sets look like Kirk and Spock are going to beam down at any moment. Half the explorers are grossly overweight; an unlikely condition in the far west wilderness that far from a Wal-Mart. As noted above Shannen Doherty who isn’t even forty looks forty-five and Heather Doerksen who isn’t even thirty looks fifty. And they have a five minute flashback at the end that repeats the entire film. But let’s face it buff white frat boys in diapers getting slimed from off camera and pretending to be Indians. Yeah that is just all sorts of wrong.

...not about the CGI or the budget. I can deal with those. I'm no expert, but they seemed acceptable to me. I figure SciFi channel movies are basically 2 hour episodes of the Outer Limits - story telling with a limited budget, usually done on 2 sets with a total of 10 people.Michael Shanks' character is ridiculous, and the archaeologist character is total type-casting, but I can deal with that.And its kind of ridiculous that *SPOILER* the critter explodes at the end. *SPOILER* But I can deal with that too.My questions are...Why is the sun never shining in the shots of the desert & the Grand Canyon? It looks like a foggy day in San Francisco. In reality that are is 100 plus degrees and blisteringly bright most days. Is it so expensive to send one camera guy to film some wide shots in the actual southwest for a few days? The plane fare from Vancouver or LA can't be more than a few hundred dollars.Who wrote this atrocious dialogue? It feels like a first draft.Who determined the accents the actors would use? They seem pretty random, and change from scene to scene. At least be consistently Canadian or Boston blue-blood or Californian.It seems like even if the filmmakers don't have a lot of cash for production they could still have a solid story. I imagine writing is the cheapest part of the entire process.

While I long ago gave up hope that the Sci Fi Channel would use its considerable assets in the pursuit of artistry, I've got to give credit where credit is due. THE LOST TREASURE OF THE GRAND CANYON is a passable Saturday afternoon feature. It manages to overcome the typical pitfalls of a Sci Fi Channel movie -- badly rendered CGI monster, limited sets, silly plot developments -- to showcase some low-budget ingenuity. And it does it with Shannen Doherty in tow...yes, that Shannen Doherty, the infant terrible of eighties teen television.Lest you think Doherty is the decisive factor, I want to clarify that it's director Farhad Mann's skill that elevates the picture. He has the good sense to keep the evil CGI god hidden for the majority of the movie. And even after it makes its obligatory appearance, he has the good sense to recognize that less is more. Unlike his contemporaries, who seem hell-bent on sticking their CGI creatures into as many frames as possible, Mann makes the monster secondary to the locations. Which brings me to the second major asset of THE LOST TREASURE: the photography. Mann also has the good sense to allow the beauty of the Grand Canyon to become a character in the story.Even Clay Carmouche's screenplay is decent. It's got its share of "Oh, no" moments, but it's got an equal dedication to recreating the atmosphere of an Edgar Rice Burroughs novel. It even sets it in a Burroughs style milieu.I'm not sure the picture deserves an 8, but in comparison to most of the Sci Fi Channel's oeuvre, it's a towering masterpiece. The only major issue I have is with the title. What did the Lost Treasure have to do with anything? It was mentioned, but almost in passing. Couldn't someone have come up with a better name for the picture? Guess I shouldn't think too hard. Nobody ever promised that the Sci Fi Channel was going to actually feature thought provoking science fiction.

I'm not even sure if this was a SciFi Channel production or not; if not, it certainly had all the hallmarks of one. Silly storyline, poor CGI, large plot holes, etc, etc, etc.I won't reveal anything about the plot - not that it would matter really, the same story has been done many times. Lost scientist, searchers, treasure, ancient god, ignorant tribe of lost natives, et al. This time it takes place, miraculously enough, in the Grand Canyon, in some area that has never, ever been seen before by white men.If you would care to spend two hours staring blankly at your TV while marveling at stultifyingly bad acting, this is the movie for you. You may be entertained during commercial breaks though. Also, Shannen Doherty is still somewhat recognizable, in a puffy kind of way.