Unless you are an anthropology enthusiast, there is no reason to watch Quest for Fire (1981), though I will tell you about it anyway.  Actually, based on the little I have read about the film, neither is there much anthropological value in it.  I began to suspect as much during the opening credits when it talked about language, verbal and non-verbal, being fabricated for the movie.  Apparently, the filmmakers borrowed from the dialects of first peoples of North America.  When members of those peoples saw it, they were amused and confused in hearing words that had little to do with what was happening on the screen.  Still, the production did garner some Oscar attention, which was one of the reasons I chose it.  Another has to do with my Faith, as always, since a common criticism of Christianity is its lack of an explanation for the type of characters depicted.  Never mind that they are made up from whole cloth.  At least when it comes to Catholicism, there is nothing here that contradicts Faith.  Rather, it is boring and inappropriate in places, though I will do my best to interpret for you where God could be at work.

Speaking of work, Quest for Fire suggests that it once took a lot of it in order to bring light into the world.  That is a veiled reference to God, but not the proper context, and this movie needs a lot of context.  It is set in a time that has been alternatively known in popular culture as Caveman times, the prehistoric era, or the Stone Age.  The last one might be a stretch since these people, called the Ulam, still seem to be figuring out rocks, but if you can picture a Neanderthal, then you have a sense of those about whom I am talking.  It is Amoukar’s (Ron Perlman) job to keep the home fire burning while the others slumber, but he begins to sense that something is amiss.  Watching from the shadows are a group of hairy humanoids known as the Wagabu (honestly, they look like rejects from The Planet of the Apes franchise) that are eyeing the blaze with envy.  Amoukar ignores his suspicion for the moment, and in the morning the Ulam go about their various activities.  It is at this point that the Wagabu attack.  In the melee, Amoukar and a number of others flee to a muddy island in the middle of a bog.  They are looking forlorn until they notice Rouka (Gary Schwarz), the keeper of the ember, approaching.  Unfortunately, as he trudges out to meet them, the handcrafted encasement for the smoking fire carrier dips into the water and is extinguished.  A fight soon breaks out as to who will go to find another spark, with Faum (Kurt Schiegl) wanting to be the one to go.  Ultimately, it is Naoh (Everett McGill) who is sent, and he takes Amoukar and another companion, Gaw (Nameer El-Kadi).  From here, the movie is literally what the title says.  They wander around looking for fire.  At one point, they find a group of cannibals called Kzamm.  In the process of stealing an ember from them, Naoh rescues Ika (Rae Dawn Chong), who had been about to be carved up and eaten by the Kzamm.  Though Naoh and company treat her as a nuisance at first, she sticks with them for protection, to the detriment of her chastity, sadly.  Nonetheless, this proves a good strategy, at least in terms of survival, since the Kzamm soon find Amoukar’s group.  Hopelessly outnumbered, the Kzamm are checked by the appearance of a group of wooly mammoths.  Seeing their hesitation, Amoukar offers the extinct animals fodder and are able to move past them.  For Amoukar, Gaw, and Naoh, it is time to return to the Ulam, but Naoh goes after Ika when she leaves one morning.  Naoh had been the one to claim her, and his fireside tryst has become some semblance of real feeling.  He comes across a village belonging the Ivaka, Ika’s people, who are about to kill Naoh after he falls into one of the sandpits near their home.  It is Ika who intervenes to save him, but he becomes a play thing/prisoner.  At the same time, they astonish him by showing him how to make fire by essentially rubbing two sticks together.  Naoh is in the process of going native (if you will pardon the expression) when Amoukar and Gaw sneak into the camp and drag out Amoukar.  Seeing this as her chance to rejoin her love, Ika follows them.  Ika has other things to share, but the less said about that, the better.  At any rate, this time they are bound to return Ulam, but before doing so, they are confronted by Faum and a few fellow conspirators.  While Gaw and Ika battle a bear in protecting the ember, Amoukar and Naoh fight off Faum’s gang by using new weapons they took from the Ivaka.  Gaw is hurt while wrestling the bruin, but the four eventually find what remains of the Ulam.  In his excitement for having fire again, Rouka lets the spark once more fall into the water.  Naoh calms the renewed fears by showing them what he learned from the Ivaka, though eventually needing to have Ika complete the process.  Everyone appears to live happily ever after, with the last scene featuring a pregnant Ika with Naoh looking up at the moon.

Probably the most positive thing to be said about Quest for Fire is that there is a pro-life message at the end, even if life is cheap throughout most of the rest of the proceedings.  While watching it, I have to confess to struggling to come up with a Catholic perspective.  I kept wrestling with the supposed dilemma I mentioned in the introduction, about how Faith is supposedly out of phase with this kind of story.  The problem with this line of thinking is that Catholicism gets lumped with other Christian sects that take most, if not all, of Scripture literally.  The Church does not teach that the Earth is 5,000 years old, or whatever the number is among people of that ilk.  We even support the concept of evolution, which is something that a movie like this one almost begs to discuss.  The theory goes that the characters here depicted form our genealogical ancestors, which could be the case.  The operative word is “theory,” which has some similarity with “faith.”  It is tantalizingly close, but until the definitive “missing link” is found between our extinct forebears like the Wagabu and ourselves, the notion that they are our ancestors remains a matter of faith.  I realize I am in dangerous territory with such statements, but two things can be true at once, like the Holy Trinity, which is actually three things.  Evolution can be real, but it can also not yet be proven.  At the same time, it can also fit with Christianity.  In Genesis, there is a lot of space and time between people and text into which to fit these events.  More specifically, I see certain behaviors depicted therein as evidence of the Divine spark.  Without feelings imbued in us by God, like laughter and love, there is little that separates people like Amoukar from the animals they sometimes resemble.

Unfortunately, the actual animal behavior you see in Quest for Fire is mostly what you will see throughout its runtime.  It makes for a difficult watch, in its action and inaction.  Hooray for Ika and Naoh starting a family at the end, but be thankful you live in the twenty-first century and that you do not have to watch this sort of thing.