A project that has been decades in the making, the most expensive film in the history of producer Charles Band‘s company Full Moon, the stop-motion epic The Primevals made its festival premiere last summer and was given a theatrical release through Alamo Drafthouse cinemas last month. A special edition Blu-ray release from Full Moon is forthcoming – but the Australian company Umbrella Entertainment has already started accepting pre-orders for their Blu-ray release of The Primevals, which has a release date of August 7th!
The Primevals (read our review HERE) was a passion project for visual effects artist David Allen, who earned an Oscar nomination for his work on the 1985 film Young Sherlock Holmes. He spent around twenty years thinking of and working on this sci-fi fantasy film. He first came up with the idea – a film that would combine live action with stop-motion animation to tell a story of time travel, Eskimos, yetis, robots, and giant lizards – in the 1960s or ’70s. Filming of the live action scenes were completed in 1994, and he was working on the special effects right up until he passed away from cancer at the age of 54 in 1999. Then the project sat dormant for almost another twenty years… until Charles Band and Allen’s longtime associate Chris Endicott (Avengers: Infinity War) were able to start putting the finishing touches on the film.
Here’s the official synopsis: Deep in the Himalayas, a group of Sherpas subdue and kill a towering humanoid creature. Its remains — including a brain that appears to have undergone some kind of surgery — wind up under the supervision of Dr. Claire Collier (Juliet Mills), who believes it to be one of the legendary Yeti. Joined by her former student Matt Connor (Richard Joseph Paul), a longtime believer in the creatures’ existence, big-game hunter Rondo Montana (Leon Russom), and others, Dr. Collier leads an expedition into the mountains to track down more of the abominable snowmen. Their trek results in an encounter with a tribe of primitive hominids — which in turn leads to the far more frightening discovery of beings they never could have expected or imagined.
Allen directed the film from a screenplay by Randall William Cook.
Umbrella Entertainment’s Collector’s Edition release of The Primevals contains two different cuts of the film and a feature-length documentary. Here’s the list of extras:
NEW! Video Essay – Howard S Berger on THE PRIMEVALS and ‘lost films’
Dark Dreamers episode: Charles Band
Video Essay – Jamie and Aspasia Leonard on lost monsters and Cryptozoology
The Making of THE PRIMEVALS featurette
Alternate extended version of feature
Trailer
Are you interested in The Primevals, and will you be ordering a copy of the Blu-ray? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
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