Review in a Hurry: Apparently life 12,000 years ago was nasty, brutish and poorly plotted, and without even any CGI dinosaurs to liven things up.
The Bigger Picture: Those who paid attention to the marketing of this Stone Age epic noticed that the early trailers played out almost entirely without dialogue. This turns out to be a savvy marketing decision, since every time someone in this film opens their mouth, something bad comes out.
10,000 B.C. is a failure on almost every level. The thuddingly dull and portentous story (Apocalypto-lite, and that wasn't exactly Citizen Kane), the unmentionable acting, the groan-worthy dialogue.
Even the set pieces are unengaging. The PG-13 rating means there's very little blood, and the caveman-doll characters essentially get the caveman-doll treatment when their screen time comes to an end: Like the movie, they roll over and play dead.
At least the woolly mammoths and saber-toothed cats look real; they're the most authentic things in an overstylized landscape populated by vacant-looking actors and fake greenery. You might find yourself cheering for them, since you know they're going to be extinct soon anyway.
Tough for them, but at least they won't evolve to make movies like this.
The 180—a Second Opinion: Almost worth sitting through the first half for the revelatory moment when you're forced to ask yourself: Is nearly the entire cast suddenly being attacked by what look like cracked-out ostriches? Why, yes, yes they are.