Breaking The Maya Code (2008/First Run Features DVD)

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: C+     Main Program: B

 

 

With all the controversy about Mayan culture, David Lebron’s Breaking The Maya Code (2008) is a thorough, interesting, informative, rich look at the almost totally lost history of a civilization.  From invasion and genocide by the Spanish, most of their histories and books had been destroyed, but a few survived and though it took a very long time to translate the hieroglyphics left behind.

 

This 116-minutes long documentary painstakingly shows how hard this was to figure out, the implications, the hidden truths and as much of a reconstruction of what was lost as anything on the subject to date.  I expected a good program, but this is often exceptional and worth seeing, especially after Apocalypto and other such films.

 

The letterboxed 1.78 X 1 image is soft and seems to have originated on low definition digital video, but it is at least nicely edited and constantly offering interesting content and graphics.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is barely stereo, but plays back just fine for such a program.  Extras include text bios, a scrapbook slideshow and resources list.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo