Apocalypto Essay

To be general, any movie made in Hollywood with a budget in the millions will be geared in one direction: to make money. Take for example, the film Apocalypto, written and directed in part by Mel Gibson. This type of ‘crafted’ history is ill suited for study, for these films merely warp an already general understanding of the events they describe based on little narrative history to base it on. The film Apocalypto is one of those films: visually attractive, brash, gory and above all, degrading to a once formidable civilization, the Maya. Cynicism aside, the film is not in English, the dialogue is an estimation of how the peoples probably spoke back then (the time being the end of the Mayan civilization, which would be from 250CE-1700CE). Chiefly, the film portrays the Maya as sadistic, blood-thirsty and even, somewhat savage. This contends entirely with even novice’s now about the Maya, that they were, “deeply spiritual people,” and their knowledge have “been channeled by cosmological concepts of time and space… the certain of sentient humans… [along with] notions of the relation …show more content…
After those factors, weighed with the costs of monarchy and the great temples and pyramids, the Maya broke apart, forming separate poli, and then subtle and gradual ruin. This film displayed none of this splendor, but mostly themes related to thrillers and ‘guy’ films. With the film’s focus on the “hobbies” of the Maya, they completely avoid the subtle and esoteric nature of the civilization, the complexity of their religion, the mystique of their pantheon, and their profound genius with mathematics and agriculture. I saw no great civilization, just barbarism and disarray—along with fancy make-up and over the top action