‘Forty-five thousand years ago …” So begins this ambitious, confident feature debut from Scottish director Andrew Cumming. It’s a horror movie set in the stone age where a poor old early human is yomping about the Highlands in winter; no Gore-Tex or warm pub, just a tough bit of elk meat to chew on and the odd run-in with a hairy Neanderthal. What a god-awfully grim time to be alive – even before things go bump in the night.
The premise is simple: this movie is “Alien in the stone age”. It begins with six intrepid early humans washing up on a Highlands beach, all of them quickly and efficiently sketched out as characters. Adem (Chuku Modu) is in charge and evidently sees himself as a mighty leader of men. He’s travelling with family: his pregnant partner (Iola Evans), son, and younger brother. Beyah (Safia Oakley-Green), a teenage “stray”, is with them; she’s no relation to anyone, which makes her vulnerable (“strays eat last”). Finally, there’s a wily old adviser who starkly warns that “cold, starvation and bloodthirsty things” await them in this new land.
