Mammoth

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Rating 1


Directed by Tim Cox

Written by Tim Cox, Brian Durham and Sean Keller, from a story by Don Guarisco

Starring Vincent Ventresca, Summer Glau, Tom Skerritt, Cole Williams, Leila Arcieri, Charles Carroll, Mark Irvingsen, David Kellaway and Marcus Lyle Brown


A meteorite carrying an alien life-form crashes into a museum and brings a frozen mammoth back to life, now controlled by the alien organism.

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This 2006 film was made for the Sci-Fi Channel and is typical of such productions. It is probably of most note because the cast includes the always reliable veteran actor Tom Skerritt and Summer Glau, who is best known for her roles in the television shows ‘Firefly’ and ‘Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles’. Although she has received very good reviews in both cases, I must admit that I am not overly fond of her acting and the same applies here.

The 25-year-old Glau rather unconvincingly plays a 16-year-old, but to be fair to her, this is a dreadful film that cannot seem to decide what it wants to be. It’s an entirely unsuccessful mix of comedy that is never funny, sci-fi that is so badly botched as to be embarrassing, and witless monster movie. I found the performance of Vincent Ventresca in the lead role as Dr Frank Abernathy, the palaeontologist father of Summer Glau’s character, utterly inexplicable, but like the other actors, he is hamstrung by a dreadful screenplay and, from my admittedly inexpert position, inept direction.

‘Mammoth’ seems to be going for the same kind of affectionate/humorous approach as the films ‘Evolution’ and ‘Slither’, but it fails on all levels. It won an Emmy for Outstanding Special Effects.

Review posted 21 March 2009




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