Quest for Fire (film)

Quest For Fire
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Jean-Jacques Annaud
Produced by	Jacques Dorfmann John Kemeny Véra Belmont Denis Héroux Michael Gruskoff
Written by	Gérard Brach J.-H. Rosny aîné (novel)
Starring	Everett McGill Rae Dawn Chong Ron Perlman Nameer El-Kadi
Music by	Philippe Sarde
Cinematography	Claude Agostini
Editing by	Yves Langlois
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	February 12, 1982 (1982-02-12)
Running time	100 minutes
Country	Canada France United States
Language	Invented language
Budget	€12.5 million ($17 million)
Box office	€40,602,910 ($55,260,558)

Quest for Fire (French: La Guerre du feu) is a 1981 film adaptation of the 1911 Belgian novel by J.-H. Rosny aîné (1856–1940). Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud and adapted by Gérard Brach, the film stars Everett McGill, Ron Perlman, Nameer El-Kadi, and Rae Dawn Chong. It won the Academy Award for Makeup. Michael D. Moore was the associate producer in charge of action & animal scenes.

It is set in Paleolithic Europe, 80,000 years ago, its plot surrounding the struggle for control of fire by early humans.

Plot

The film begins with a raid by the apelike Wagabu tribe on the Neanderthal Ulam tribe, who possess fire in the form of a carefully guarded small flame which they use to start larger bonfires. Obtained from a natural source, it must be fed constantly to keep it alive, for the Ulam do not know how to make their own fire. Driven out of their home after a bloody battle with the Wagabu, the surviving Ulam escape but are chased into a marsh by a pack of wolves. The Ulam fire tender escapes with the tribe's remaining fire, however after crossing a marsh, the moisture and wind douse the embers, leaving the tribe doomed to die from exposure and starvation. The Ulams refuse to resort to cannibalism and the elder decides to send three men, Naoh (Everett McGill), Amoukar (Ron Perlman) and Gaw (Nameer El-Kadi), out on a dangerous quest for fire. After a frightening encounter with a pair of saber-toothed cats, the Ulam scouting trio enters territory of the Kzamm, a Neanderthals' tribe who have resorted to cannibalism, and capture members of the Cro-Magnon (early modern humans) Ivaka tribe as victims. When Gaw and Amoukar pretend to be berserker madmen, creating a ruse that causes the Kzamm tribe to scatter, Naoh manages to steal some fire, but not without being injured in a fight with two of them. One of his injuries is a bite to the genitals, and he spends a fair amount of time in visible agony from this. After killing his opponents (smashing a rock over the head of the Kzamm tribesman who bit his genitals) and disposing of the Kzamm's remaining fire in contempt, Naoh rejoins Gaw and Amoukar.

A young woman named Ika (Rae Dawn Chong), an Ivaka prisoner who escapes with Naoh, follows them in gratitude, seeking protection. Despite attempts by Amoukar to drive her off, she follows, eventually taking advantage of a food-gather by Amoukar and Gaw to approach Naoh. She makes a primitive poultice, helping him recover from his injury. The four begin their trek towards the Ulam, followed by the Kzamm. Attacked by the hostile tribe, the group takes advantage of a wandering herd of Wooly mammoths to make good their escape. While they travel back towards the Ulam grounds, Amoukar attempts to have sex with Ika: she hides near Naoh, who then demonstrates his claim on her by raping her in front of the other two males.

One day, Ika recognizes that she is near her home. She tries to persuade the Ulam trio to go with her, but either the men's sense of purpose or the lack of a common language with the woman (or perhaps both) keeps them together on their way back to the Ulam. However, when Ika leaves them the next morning, Naoh is upset; at first he continues without her, but finds he cannot stop thinking about her. He turns around, followed by the reluctant Gaw and Amoukar. After Naoh leaves the others to scout a village, he is trapped in a marsh, nearly sinking to his death, but is discovered and captured by the Ivaka. At first, Naoh is teased and subjected to several forms of humiliation by the Ivaka, but eventually they accept him and show him their ways, initiating him into the tribe. Impressed by his physical features, they arrange for him to service all the high status women of the tribe who are large and big-breasted. The petite Ika is excluded from the services of Naoh by her tribe, and when she attempts to lay near him later that night, she is chased away by the other members of her tribe. The Ivaka is the most advanced tribe depicted. They have atlatls (spear throwers), arts (body painting, huts, ornaments, primitive pottery), and most importantly, the ability to make fire. When Naoh is taught by Ika how to make fire, he is overwhelmed and his life is changed forever.

Growing impatient, Gaw and Amoukar go to find Naoh and are also captured by the Ivaka. During their ordeal, they are disturbed to realize that one of the teasers laughing at them is Naoh, initially unrecognizable as he now wears the full body-paint of the Ivaka. When Gaw and Amoukar begin their escape during the night, Amoukar tries to inform Naoh of their plan but Naoh is affected by a crude fermented drink that he had been given by the Ivaka, and is unresponsive to Amourkar. Frustrated from the day's events, Amoukar 'persuades' Naoh to come along by knocking him unconscious. Ika follows the trio and helps them escape. Naoh and Ika make passionate love during a cloudburst, first by the initial, "animal" style short, rough copulation from behind seen several times before, eventually shifting around to the "missionary position", a position the Ivaka attempted to teach Naoh during his initiation. Intrigued and aroused by observing them, Amoukar approaches Gaw, who immediately rebuffs him. They also begin to finally understand the concept of laughter, something that had puzzled them earlier about Ika and the Ivakas. When Amoukar drops a small rock on sleeping Gaw's head, they all (even Gaw) burst out laughing.

On their way back home, the four run into a trio of Ulam hunters, led by Aghoo, Naoh's rival as dominant male of the tribe. Left by Naoh and Amoukar to guard the fire with Ika, Gaw is severely wounded in a fight with a mother cave bear, barely managing to escape. The other three members of the group find Gaw, and Amoukar carries him over his shoulder. When attacked by the Ulam rivals, the group uses several atlatls stolen from the Ivaka to dispatch their enemies. Thus the group demonstrates the advantages of embracing new technologies. Finally rejoining the Ulam tribe, the group present the fire to the delight of all. The fire tender, having been given the flame, prompts the tribesfolk into an outburst of joy. Due to the ensuing euphoria, the fire tender ends up falling in the water, extinguishing the fire. The enraged tribe nearly kills the fire tender, until Naoh, Gaw and Amoukar restrain them and scold the group. Naoh then tries to create a new fire the way he'd been taught, by using some sticks, dung and dry grasses. After several failed attempts, the more experienced Ika takes over, carefully rubbing the dry sticks together. Once the spark is lit, the tribe is overjoyed, cheering and overwhelmed again.

In the end, Naoh discovers that Ika is pregnant with their child. Naoh caresses Ika while they both gaze at the brightly lit moon.

Cast

• Everett McGill ... Naoh
• Ron Perlman ... Amoukar
• Nameer al-Kadi ... Gaw
• Rae Dawn Chong ... Ika

Ulam tribe

• Gary Schwartz ... Rouka
• Naseer El-Kadi ... Nam
• Franck-Olivier Bonnet ... Aghoo
• Jean-Michel Kindt ... Lakar
• Kurt Schiegl ... Faum
• Brian Gill ... Modoc
• Terry Fitt ... Hourk
• Bibi Caspari ... Gammla
• Peter Elliott ... Mikr
• Michelle Leduc ... Matr
• Robert Lavoie ... Tsor

Ivaka tribe

• Mohamed Siad Cockei ... Ota Otarok
• Tarlok Sing Seva ... Tavawa
• Lolamal Kapisisi ... Firemaker
• Hassannali Damji ... Old Man in Tree

Kzamm tribe

• The Great Antonio
• Jacques Caron
• Adrian Street
• George Buza

Wagabu tribe

• Rod Bennett
• Jacques Demers
• Michel Drouet
• Michel Francoeur
• Charles Gosselin
• Bernard Kendall
• Benoit Levesque
• Joshua Melnick
• Jean-Claude Meunier
• Alex Quaglia

Reception

The film was nominated for six César Awards in 1981, winning those for best film and best director. In 1983 it won the Academy Award for Makeup. Also in 1983, it won in five categories in the Genie Awards.

Historical accuracy

As an adaptation of a 1911 novel, the film's fidelity to the novel must be judged separately from its compatibility with the tenets of paleoanthropology at the time of its production.

The story of the novel takes place 80,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. The movie adheres to this date, but in the commentary accompanying the DVD release, the director Annaud stated that a much earlier date would actually have been more reasonable if he had made the film recently with modern knowledge of the subject matter.

The film, in keeping with the novel, presents three species of Homo: Homo erectus (Wagabu), Homo neanderthalensis (Ulam, Kzamm) and Homo sapiens (Ivaka). The Neanderthals are portrayed as the stereotypical cavemen, in an intermediate stage of development compared to the ape-like erectus on one hand, and the culturally more advanced sapiens on the other. According to current knowledge, Neanderthal interaction with early modern humans has taken place only significantly later than 80,000 years ago, from about 40,000 to 20,000 years ago.

The sapiens tribe (Ivaka) is depicted as using body ornamentation (jewellery, body paint, masks, headgear), fully developed language and simple technology such as gourds as vessels and the atlatl, features that in combination amount to full behavioral modernity characteristic of the Upper Paleolithic.

The Neanderthals are depicted as Caucasian, the Kzamm even as red-haired, in a peculiar anticipation of the result of genetic studies conducted in the 2000s which concluded that some Neanderthals did indeed have red hair. The sapiens woman Ika is depicted as wearing full body paint, and is cast with a multiracial actress, leaving her racially indistinct. This is again in keeping with studies post-dating the film which established that light skin in European descendants of Cro-Magnon developed only towards the end of the Middle Paleolithic, or during the Upper Paleolithic.

Like the elements of human culture, human-Neanderthal interbreeding is likely to have happened later than the film is set. Scientists debate the extent to which H. sapiens and H. neanderthalensis ever interbred, based on continuing research, but some evidence discovered since the film's release suggests that such interbreeding did occur in Europe.

The language spoken by the Neanderthals was created by Anthony Burgess. The more advanced language of the Ivaka, according to Annaud's commentary on the DVD, was largely that of the Cree/Inuit native people of northern Canada, which apparently has caused some amusement among those in this group who have seen this film, since the words have little to do with the plot^{[citation needed]}. The gestural and body language was overseen by Desmond Morris, author of The Naked Ape.

In popular culture

The band Iron Maiden's song "Quest for Fire" (from the 1983 album "Piece of Mind") is inspired by both the film and novel of the same name. An episode of Family Guy parodies the film creating a novelty porno title from it: Quest for Fur.

See also

• The Clan of the Cave Bear
• Dance of the Tiger
• The Inheritors (William Golding)
• List of historical drama films

External links

• Quest for Fire at the Internet Movie Database
• Quest for Fire at AllRovi
• Quest for Fire at Box Office Mojo
• Quest for Fire at Rotten Tomatoes

Preceded by The Last Metro

César Award for Best Film 1982

Succeeded by La Balance