Chariots of the Gods

The one promise the film makes is that it will present its case, and this it certainly does, in a generally persuasive manner.

No more than a pretty documentary travelogue with metaphysical pretensions.

They don't make films like this anymore, and we should be glad for that.

Now being a man of no religious faith at all, I was curious to see just how far this ultimate in conspiracy theories could be strung out by Harald Reinl and you know what, I think he makes a decent fist of asking some questions and suggesting some plausibly alternative answers to some long-held imponderables. Hollywood has long shown us bamboo scaffolding being use by willing (or not) labourers to build the pyramids at Giza or in Mexico, or to sculpt the effigies and tombs at the likes of (the original) Abu Simbel or at dozens of sites across Mesoamerica. Ok, so he does quote some highly spurious statistics and source a few Soviet-style scientific sceptics of all things deific, but a lot of the questions it raises about engineering, construction and man-hours do merit a bit of thought. Just how long did it take to build the tomb of Khufu at 2 tons per stone multiplied by one million stones that they had to raise up to four hundred feet off the sand? Why are all the stone heads on Easter Island so exact, and similar? Why was the obsession about the sun and the moon and stars so prevalent across the globe when contact between peoples was impossible? Could there really have been visitors from outer space who founded every religion on earth? Who gave us architecture or geometry or even fire and the wheel? Of course it’s all highly speculative stuff, this, and is very easy to cynica…