The Lost Treasure of the Grand Canyon (2008)

It's one of those cheap movies that they make by getting two well known people (not necessarily stars anymore), two take a week out of their "busy" schedule to make a quick film.The story in the film is pretty decent about an expedition to find another exception gone missing in an attempt to find a treasure of a long lost civilization that worships a CGI monster like a God.I also like Micheal Shanks performance as a snobbish archaeologist on the expedition for a personal agenda. It also has a great set of interesting characters played out by some good actors, including the other name in the movie Shannen Doherty.It's one of those things that when it repeats on Syfy, you'll catch it and you'll like it, but it's not worth going out of your way to see.

Of cause, a TV budget allows for just so much. There is a golden rule in the receipt of a good movie, that one is "You are only allowed to create one lie". But with some creations, this rule can be hard to obey, if you do not come up with an extra million in the budget.When this is said, the movie contains some great ideas with a great potential for exploring imagination and the inner child - but remains childish, or something that could fit a children's channel, if it were not for the blood and gore.There is no excuse for poor timing (like when few seconds to act, becomes 30 seconds of horrifying embarrassment), no excuse for poor scenery (like when two prehistoric native Americans are running on a path carved by 21. century wheel tracks) or when someone shot in the leg, is switching between unbearable agony and a little limp - with seconds in between.The actors delivered a far more convincing B movie act, which I would say were disgraced by an incompetent crew, a story that wouldn't even convince a 5 year old and a cutter and director who seem to have made a last effort in destroying this movie technically.

The story line is pretty basic. Nineteenth century archeologists seeking lost treasure find bad things instead. There are few stupidities perpetrated by the script/cast save perhaps those of Dunbar and friend (comic relief?), and Dr. Langford (well played by JR Borne) who is somewhere between evil and uncaring, and the self-serving bitch Hildy, nicely performed by Ms. Doerksen. Hildy's fate is cleverly left indeterminate. One hopes she wound up as the willing sex slave of an Aztec warrior, rather than as a meal. There are ample heroics by the good guys, Jacob Thain (Michael Shanks) and Dr. Jordan (the venerable Duncan Fraser). There is also a surfeit of evil (well, badness maybe) from the natives and from the monster (Quetzalcoatl – who never looked like this), poor CGI though it is. The still toothsome Shannen Doherty, though not the stone fox of her "Charmed" youth, does well with what little she is given by the script writers. Her role coulda/shoulda been much stronger. Speaking of writers, 20th century idioms, such as "hang in there" and "take him out", seem quite out of place in 19th century dialogue. And the human sacrifice scenes are thoroughly disheartening.

Michael Shanks and JR Bourne do make this one of Sci-Fi Channel's better offerings. Unfortunately, that bar isn't very high.Once again, the writers for the Sci-Fi Channel ORIGINAL Movies got so very ORIGINAL that they made a complete mish-mosh of the Aztecs, their culture and their mythology.• Half the "artifacts" looked more Mayan then Aztec; especially that stone "Key".• If they can't hire native extras of the right racial group, at least they could have sprung for some body paint for the ones they did hire. I'd not seen such pale natives in decades! Especially desert-dwellers. — And flip-flops? Are they serious?• I'd always thought that one of the purposes of CGI was to give movie-makers a range of monsters above the man-in-the-rubber-suit level. Their version of Quetzalcoatl was a joke! It was supposed to be a feathered serpent, not a lizard-man with bat-wings!• Human sacrifice? That, too, was MAYAN, not AZTEC!• And the dagger that Thain's (Shanks' character) father attributed to Pizarro? Pizarro conquered the Incas in what is now Peru. Cortés conquered the Aztecs in what is now Mexico.• Note to wardrobe dept: When doing period pieces, please try to keep in mind the period in question. That flimsy top Ms Doherty was wearing would have been thoroughly unacceptable for a lady of her character's station in that era.Do I need to mention the visible tire-tracks?Again, I have to admire the film-makers' ability to get paid for this.