Sometimes you just need a movie where soldiers fight dinosaurs. And we’ve got one! Alasdair Stuart took a look at the trailer for Primitive War and here’s what he found:

0.15 – ‘You gotta be a lunatic if you’re gonna be a vulture.’

It’s a cludgy line but Ryan Kwanten makes it work. Kwanten was one of the best parts of True Blood, and I’ve always been surprised he didn’t blow up after that. But he has done a bunch of fun genre or genre adjacent movies of which this is the most recent.

0.23 – ‘Three days ago, I lost my green berets!’

Jeremy Piven, like Kwanten, is an excellent character actor. If you’ve not seen it, Judgment Night is an absolute (horrifically violent, brutal) treat and he’s excellent in that alongside an entire cast of really strong actors. I’m getting strong Carter J. Burke from Aliens vibes from him here.

0.39 – Transmission in the Night

I do love a good spooky radio message. If you can, track down Lucius Shepard’s excellent Delta Sly Honey for a far more metaphorical take on the heart of darkness and the Vietnam war.

0.45 – ‘You got one piece of the puzzle, that’s all.’

That sounds a lot like Piven explaining to his disposable new army men the trouble they’re in, doesn’t it?

0.56 – Montage Ahoy!

Is that Tricia Helfer?! And I love the choice to shoot the dinosaurs up close, largely locked off but in the rain at night. Just absolute nightmares of teeth and motion.

1.10 – FEATHERS

Feathered raptors! And at least one T-Rex!

1.14 – Cool Dudes

This is a blink and you’ll miss it but that looks a lot like Kwanten’s character, in shads and a bandana, hanging out with a long necked herbivore. Just two dudes hanging out, doing cool Vietnam dinosaur things. And is that…

1.12 – IT IS!

Creedence Clearwater Revival’s Fortunate Son, the quintessential Vietnam War protest song, gets the trailer treatment! This is what understanding the assignment looks like!

1.14 – Soldiers booking it past a T-Rex

This has such delightfully weird vibes. The Rex isn’t even that bothered! And who are they running from? Or what?

1.16 – The Lost World Riffed

The Lost World is, to me, the least interesting and successful Jurassic Park movie that isn’t Jurassic World. But the top-down shot of raptors stalking their prey through a cornfield is brilliant. Seeing that reimagined here as US soldiers in a firefight with pterodactyls is so much fun.

1.19 – Convoys

The fire team going one way, the herd going the other. The look of this movie is so fun.

1.26 – Helicopters vs Pterodactyls

Just that. If this movie hadn’t sold itself to me by no, this would have done it.

1.31 – Close Quarters

This brief shot of a group of the fire team just dropping what seem to be raptors is a nice demonstration of how this is going to be at least a partially fair fight. Up close? Team Dinosaur. At anything up to close range? The troops are going to take it.

1.34 – Yep, it’s Tricia Helfer

Hurray! She’s always fun!

1.35 – Well the bad news it isn’t Ryan Kwanten

But one of the soldiers appears to be fixing to fist fight some dinosaurs and sincerely why am I not watching this entire movie right now?!

And then we get a montage full of just absolute mayhem that cuts to…

2.01 – The Jurassic Park watering hole meets the Brown-water navy

The fire team, presumably extracting, along the river in one of the US navy’s brown water transports and the bank is covered in dinosaurs. Peaceful and weird and sinister. I love it.

 

Primitive War, adapted from the novel by Ethan Pettus, is out on limited release next week and as soon as I can watch it, I will be.

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