FLINTSTONES IN VIVA ROCK VEGAS

"If you consider a brontosaurus breaking wind to be champagne humour you’ll love this movie. Everyone else be warned: it reeks so badly, a dinosaur fart would smell like a perfume factory in comparison. Harsh criticism for a kids flick? It isn’t. In both ways. It isn’t harsh criticism, and the film isn’t only aimed at kids. For a while I was at a loss to explain what send ups of Mick Jagger and nudge-nudge sexual innuendos were doing in the land of Bedrock. Then the boulder dropped. It’s also aimed at original Flintstone fans. Bad move. Five-year-olds will complain at the film’s banality; Hanna-Barbera-philes will feel like stoning the screenwriters. I thought that co-writers Kaplan and Elfont couldn’t do worse than 1998’s Can’t Hardly Wait; they could hardly wait to prove me wrong. The jejune jokes and pedestrian plot seem like they’ve been dug up from a prehistoric rock quarry. The drivel posing as dialogue was hardly likely to inspire brilliant performances, and a dazed-looking Baldwin plays Barney not so much as a dimwit of the Stone Age, but a drongo of the Stoned Age; while Kirsten Johnston’s facial expressions suggest she thought she was playing the alien rather than Alan Cumming – whose dual roles as Gazoo and Mick Jagged are rare positives in this dinosaur-sized disaster. Even some fun with the obligatory anachronisms – we still don’t know which came first, the dinosaur or the egg, but turquoise nail polish was apparently popular long before shoes and stockings – doesn’t provide much relief. The first Flintstones movie was bad. This prequel is a lot worse. Three words of advice if they’re planning a third live-"action" adaptation: Yabba Dabba Don’t!"
Brad Green

"It's difficult to know the intended audience for this latest Flintstones installment. Visually it looks like a kiddie flick - lots of bright colours, dinosaurs as fun park rides, and cute little creatures. The actors ham it up just as cartoon characters always have. Yet the premise is largely an adult one. Gazoo (Alan Cumming) has been sent from another planet to observe the mating rituals of earthlings. As an adult concept there would have been plenty of material to mine here, but as family entertainment this material is off limits and so the premise is unable to drive the movie. What we are left with is lots of colour and movement, few jokes that work, a less than engaging story, and Dino (Fred and Wilma's pet dinosaur) as a baby. Puppy Dino rates right off the 'awwww how cute is that' scale. Unfortunately, the human cast doesn't hold the same appeal. Apparently production was delayed to ensure Mark Addy's availability as Fred, yet he never quite captures the character. It may be something as simple as the Englishman's near miss on the American accent. But something doesn't gel, nor does his relationship with Kristen Johnston's Wilma. There appears to be no chemistry between the two and, uncomfortable as it is to suggest a Hollywood actress should be younger when the fight has always been for parts for older actresses, 3rd Rock from the Sun's 32 year old Johnston is too old for the part. She exudes a worldliness (to put it politely) that is not appropriate for the young Wilma. This casting error is symptomatic of the rest of the movie: lots of valid attempts and lots of misses."
Lee Gough