Curse of the Mayans (2017)

The 2 cave divers you see diving in the real cave were diving with 2 side mount cylinders as well as a smaller cylinder (deco or bailout bottle) and were wearing normal scuba masks, one with helmet with 2 lights on the side (typical cave gear). Yet when you see ALL the divers come up, they are wearing full face masks, only have a single centre back mount tank. They also talk about being low on O2 (not air) and earlier discussed oxygen percentages they had left. It should have been how many PSI or Bar they had left. I'm sure they just took some stock footage of cave divers and put the rest in, but even non divers can tell the difference in gear.

It's definitely a SyFy Channel wannabe, but actually with a far better plot and cinematography. The biggest con is it takes forever to truly get to the action with the "aliens". While the build up is decent it lacks energy. The direction and story building is there but the actors for the most part seem to just go through the actions. The fact that the build up takes so long and you invest in watching for a payoff the payoff comes slate and leaves the movie open as if this were a pilot or the beginning of a series of movies and with the premise used. Sadly, because of that the ending was empty as a standalone.

First clue that this wasn't going to be a good one was the intro-sequence that took 10 mins...To be fair - I thoroughly enjoyed how the cast switched from English to Spanish to Mayan (or something made up ?) seamlessly. No extraordinary accents, nothing so thick you couldn't make it out. Just a bunch of actors with great language skills !When 4/5 of the movie has gone by the diving and action starts taking place...the CGI and effects were effective and surprisingly good but not enough to save the movie....SPOILER ALERT Also an extreme logical blunder that really ruined it for me. WHY is it necessary to hold on to a timed explosive device to "fight them off as long as possible" ? Set it and forget it - run you fool ! Or in this case - swim.Also - why collapse the walls and stuff when 3-4 of the aliens ALREADY has pass you by and you just MIGHT NEED to know more about the containment devices used ??? Seriously - some scriptwriter was sleeping during class and when writing the script...ruined even more of the movie for me.Gave it a 2-star because of the actors doing a good job...perhaps even great given the material - hope to see more of them later !

While this movie wasn't "great", I gave it 5 stars for mixing fact and fiction with liberal doses of Zachariah Sitchin and Eric Von Daniken stories of Mayan mythology intertwined the "Gods" of ancient Mayan codex with a dose of Nibiru and Annunaki lore for good measure. Acting isn't bad and could have done more with substance in the storyline.I enjoyed that they used the current resurgence of interest in ancient archeology as the basis for this adventure action film, as there is many many places left to reveal in the South American jungles still hidden from modern eyes. No matter how corny some may see this movie as, there is an interesting mix of truth and storytelling introducing Reptilian Archons (AKA evil mirrored Chitarauri) as the exo planetary dopplegangers of every human soul, laying dormant until released by bumbling hands.Made by a better Director or with a bigger investment this movie could have been absolutely brilliant with a lot of potential. As it is, this is a fun adventure story that should not be thought about too deeply.Well worth 5 stars for it's overall content and potential. Not for it's casting, acting or average editing and cinematography.