BMZ Review: Dinosaur Passage to Pangaea
By Ann Coates

Dinosaur Passage to Pangaea
Written by: Ann Coates
Source: Big Movie Zone
Date: November 11th, 2011

A stop-motion animated film, Dinosaur Passage to Pangaea focuses entirely on geology, and therefore acts mainly as a film for school groups and students with little interest for general audiences. For its purposes, the film does what it sets out to do -- teach kids about Earth's prehistoric supercontinent Pangaea, and the process by which it became the continents we know today.

Like most Giant Screen edutainment films directed to children, Pangaea suffers from conventional characters who tend toward the annoying. Attempts at humor fall flat. Despite this, the content of the film -- a claymation geology lesson -- executes the right mix of visual models and technical lingo to provide a brief, easy-to-learn guide to geology. The animation, although not top-notch like commercial films such as Coraline, should be sufficient enough to delight young kids. The environments are cute in their miniature scale, and much more intriguing than the bland characters. Along with the animation, the use of 3D should also entice non-geology minded students to further learn about our prehistoric past.

The title is a bit misleading as no actual information is given in regards to dinosaurs. Rather, the dinosaurs in the film are a mere plot device -- the characters must use them to travel across the supercontinent and that's all. The film never strays from its geology lesson.

For what it is, Pangaea is worth a school group trip to the IMAX theater, teaching about geology in an entertaining and easy-going way. It's much better than sitting in a classroom learning about tectonic plates while watching the clock tick by.

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