Les Extraterrestres. Sur les traces de l'étrange

I was 11 years old in 1973 when I read some of "Chariots of the Gods?" and saw "In Search of Ancient Astronauts," a condensed version of this 1972 documentary. As a kid, you are impressible and can be enthralled by these new ideas, that maybe aliens helped humankind along the way to advanced civilization.

As an adult seeing "Chariots of the Gods" 35 years later, I was amazed at the claims the narrator sometimes makes, leaving out significant background details and being excessively one sided. There are several specific examples. In the first, a visit is made to the Iraq Museum in Baghdad, where a set of curved tubes is said to be the exhaust port on the bottom of the rocket (and the base of a Saturn one is shown for comparison). However, no details are given of where the artifact was found, how old it was or what mainstream archaeologists thought it was.

In the second, there were statues in Mexico, who were claimed to be wearing odd hats, communication or utility devices on their chests and perhaps weapons or communicators on their belts. No alternative opinion was presented, such as the "communicators" might just be ordinary breastplates, and the hats some kind of ornamental warrior headgear. Additionally in Pelenque, Mexico, a sarcophagus lid for the Mayan leader Pacal is supposed to be a rocket ship, with no additional explanation given that his "rocket" might actually be a collection of Mayan symbols representing the king's passage to the underworld, and the meaning of these symbols unknown to few modern people except archaeologists specializing in pre-Columbian history.

I liked the crazy, spacey soundtrack, which ranged from early '70s electronica to New Ageish acoustic, and the cinematography, much shot from the skies -- the way these alleged "ancient astronauts" might have seen the earth! There just wasn't enough evidence presented that aliens created all these mysteries, which certainly are unexplainable.

Spacemen? I don't know. The theory that humans, not aliens, reached a high level of civilization thousands of years ago -- say more like late 21st century -- only to have it destroyed by a natural disaster, such as an ice age, seems like a more probable explanation for the supposedly advanced technologies in ancient artifacts and even the strange costumes. People knocked back to the stone age by a disaster over generations could have forgotten their heritage, old costuming and technology and have only traces, which to them might become religious legends. They might record them on cave or cliff walls in images that look more familiar to us because we are advanced, just like their distant ancestors. And artifacts that were fabricated with technology similar to ours thousands of years ago also could have come from these very ancient humans, not a bunch of extraterrestrials!

In the beginning there was the book "Intelligent Life in the Universe," whose co-authors (Iosif Shklovsky and Carl Sagan) cautiously postulated that the ancient Babylonian legend of Oannes might represent an instance of paleocontact. There were also the Tassili frescoes, whose nominal discoverer (Henri Lhote) believed that they depicted extraterrestrial beings. And that was pretty much it.

Then, in 1967, came Erich von Däniken. Millions read his book "Chariots of the Gods?" and millions more saw this documentary film that was based on it. The viewer was presented with beautifully-shot footage of various archaeological ruins around the world (accompanied by Peter Thomas's shimmering, irresistible soundtrack), and the belief that "aliens built the Pyramids" became cemented in the popular consciousness. So, too, did the patently ridiculous notion that the Nazca lines of Peru were landing strips for alien aircraft. Von Däniken later conceded that he had simply made this up.

And that's the problem: he was happy to make things up if it sold books. Shklovsky and Sagan had emphasized very specific criteria in the interpretation of ancient legends as reports of contact between earthlings and intelligent extraterrestrial lifeforms, hence their careful choice of a single legend which *might* represent such contact. In von Däniken's view, any legend or pile of ruins was fair game; if it was old, then it was attributable to aliens. It goes without saying that this total indifference to accuracy has done enormous damage to the field of Paleo-SETI.

(Incidentally, von Däniken's critics have been just as indifferent in their dismissal of the Paleo-SETI theory's particulars, and two wrongs don't make a right. Yes, von Däniken is a clown, but that doesn't explain away the Piri Reis maps, whose mysteries were documented well before the ancient astronauts craze in Charles Hapgood's "Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings." And yes, *some* of the Tassili frescoes were faked, but the two featured prominently in this film--the horned faceless figure and the so-called Great God Mars--evidently are not among the fabrications. This can be confirmed via a Google search, but of course most people won't bother.)

Documentary based on Eric von Daniken's famous book, which deals with ancient mysteries and specifically whether aliens visited Earth centuries ago. The gimmick in the book is to suggest outlandish theories but always to phrase them in the form of a question. This way von Daniken can always backpedal and say things like "I didn't say that the Bible has aliens in it. I just asked what if it does?" It's a clever huckster's trick but it served him well as he made a career writing books like this using the same technique.

I love the footage of the various locations and artifacts. That the footage has that vintage '70s look is an added bonus. It's talky and a little dry but still interesting and worth a look. As far as documentaries on ancient aliens or forgotten history goes, this is pretty good. For the absolute best in this type of material, you'd have to watch the Leonard Nimoy "In Search Of..." series.

Let me start off by saying that I love movies and documentaries about the paranormal, strange phenomena and unexplained mysteries. I particular enjoyed the old Rod Serling specials produced by Alan and Sally Landsburg, but I always regretted not having seen Chariots of the Gods.

I didn't miss anything.

On the face of it, this film would make a lovely travelogue of Mexico and South America because, despite the premise of exploring and/or revealing ancient mysteries, it actually does very little of either.

True, all the old familiar sites are visited, but the bland narration does little more than tell you that these places are associated with mysterious doings. It would be like a documentary on ghosts and hauntings showing only the exterior of the Amityville house and saying vaguely "...and the Lutz family claimed to have experienced something here, in this house."

The photography is very nice, the camera angles fresh and dramatic, but as I mentioned earlier, the narration (both the text itself and the narrators) is monotonously bland and surprisingly UN-informative; which negates any instructional value the film might have had as a documentary. Again, just change the narration and this could be a fine travelogue.

I suspect that the high ratings people give this title are based merely on that -the title and its association with the excellent and influential book- and less on the film itself. I also suspect that people are remembering the soundtrack LP (and later CDs) of the excellent Peter Thomas score -which ironically is almost unrecognizable in the garbled monaural sound mix of the film itself.

My opinion is that you should ignore this film and look instead at the much more dramatic and informative In Search of Ancient Astronauts (which is itself a far superior re-edit of this film, narrated by Rod Serling), or any of the other Landsburg productions, like In Search of Ancient Mysteries, The Outer Space Connection or Encounter With The Unknown.

For that matter, track down the old In Search Of... TV programs or Robert Stack ferreting out those Unsolved Mysteries.

Seriously, this is easily one of the most lunkheaded, stupid, poorly informed and yet enjoyable "documentaries" ever made. Very relaxing viewing. I read the book as a kid and adore the film as an adult, but please. It is an entertainment, not science, and can be fun provided you're stoned enough. What is so remarkable is that the book + film literally changed and influenced our popular culture in a manner that continues to this day; "Battlestar: Galactica", "Stargate", Jack Kirby's "The Eternals", several post-60s installments of "Star Trek", the list of pop culture forms that harvested Erich Von Daniken's fanciful ramblings goes on & on, and some are quite good.

See, the problem with this film is that it tries to teach its viewers to be lazy observers & simple-Simon thinkers. For example: You see lines scratched on a desert highland which resembles the patterns of an airport viewed from above. To conclude therefore that the lines *must* be the remnants of an ancient airport to the exclusion of all other possible conclusions just because that's what it looks like suggests a grave limitation in comparative reasoning.

It also presumes that ancient alien astronauts would need an airport to land their space ships with extended diagonal runways stretching across the desert soil as far as the eyes can see. That means you are limiting the technology available to the aliens to that which would require an airport -- You are creating a foregone conclusion with only one possible explanation fitting the lazily observed data. Von Daniken even says in his book that it cannot possibly be anything else. Oh really?

Which is the basis of all conspiratorial reasoning. You conclude beforehand that the building was blown up by a controlled demolition and then you cherry pick only those clues which support that conclusion & jettison those which suggest anything else. Need spaceships? Look for depictions of angels in flight. Need space suited aliens? Any cave drawing with a stylized human figure will do, the more sloppily executed the better. Just make sure it's enigmatic enough to defy a literal interpretation and you're home free. Anything can be the result of contact with ancient alien astronauts once you let your mind wander far enough afield.

Then you start churning through the funny looking cultural artifacts, the bizarre statuettes and other cultural forms which do not resemble classically executed images of representation we are accustomed to. Bulbous head? Space alien. Stringy looking arms? Space alien. Seated or crouched position? Space alien. Non-human head attached to stylized form? Space alien. Imprecise written account from historical documents? Space alien. One would think we were passive observers in our own pre-history. I am sure the Mayans would have been amused to learn that their gods required oxygen helmets.

Then you muddle it all down with doublethink employing terms that sound scientific & reasonable, peppered with a tad of ridicule to put anyone who won't go along with your conclusion on the outside. Now it's you & a select few against the world with your secret insights and private knowledge. Everybody else becomes a bumpkin for following the "mainstream" thinking, which is usually remarkably boring in comparison to the idea of space aliens sweeping down from the heavens to teach our ancestors how to levitate railroad car sized blocks of stone. And then you pose these conclusions in the form of "questions" so that you can deny being dumb enough to have said so. You were just asking questions ... sound familiar?

But it's a fascinating movie with superb music, made by German film craftsman Harald Reinl with a visual power that is difficult to deny. One aspect of which is capturing the ancient monuments on film as they appeared in the late 1960s, before most of them were restored to their present day tourist-friendly look complete with snack stands & souvenir shops. You can really get a feel for how those Mayan cities were swallowed by the jungle, and what a jumbled mess Easter Island was before we figured out what the deal was with the statues, how they were supposed to be lined up, who made them, and why they probably did it. If the film served a useful purpose it may have been to inspire a generation or three of young scientists to figure out some of the riddles being posed.

For that matter the film represents a more innocent era for modern man, when we could gaze at mysteries like the Easter Island statues and just marvel at them in awe. Nowadays Easter Island speaks for a tragedy where a whole people were wiped out by outside invasion, famine, and eventually disease spread by contact with the Western world. Kind of a bummer compared to heroic alien cosmonauts descending in their rocket ships to immortalize themselves in stone for us to ponder over so many eons later.

If only it were. Also were I to criticize the film stylistically it is for being too one-sided. There's no voice of "the other" suggesting any contrary conclusions just like all good conspiracy theory entertainments. After all, that would distract from the stunning conclusions that all of our pre-history was shaped by contact with space aliens, since those blocks of stone are too big for even a modern day crane to move, etc etc etc. It's a marvelously stacked deck, though just as long as you are aware of that going in it can be fun to follow along at home. Just don't take any of it too seriously, the photography is great, enjoy the music, and pass the munchies dude.

4/10