Warner Bros. Television
A made-for-TV movie from 1975 released by the Warner Archive Collection on DVD, Search for the Gods promised just about everything I could hope for in a made-for-TV movie. It starred some notable actors, including Kurt Russell, Stephen McHattie, Ralph Bellamy and Raymond St. Jacques. Its premise was full of intrigue: young explorers in search of a valuable medallion that would hopefully prove that aliens once visited Earth during prehistoric times, finally yielding the secrets of the gods. Naturally, this made me think of Indiana Jones. However, all it managed to do was leave a bitter taste in my mouth. I’m left wondering about the search for the rest of this movie because surely it wasn’t meant to end where it did, was it? I’m left feeling agitated with the gods for allowing this movie to have been made at all!
Search for the Gods begins with Lucio (John War Eagle), a mysterious Native American shaman, being attacked in the vast but beautiful deserts of New Mexico. Willie Longfellow (McHattie) happens upon the attack and manages to stop it. However, when law enforcement finally shows up, they cart both Willie and Lucio off to jail because they discover a peyote stash in the old man’s well. There’s something suspicious about the situation and the appearance of a stranger ‘round these parts. While in the jail overnight, Willie meets Shan Mullins (Russell), a mischievous youth who certainly knows his way around a jail cell because he’s routinely wanted for petty crimes in the area.
During the night, Lucio tells Willie some mysterious things intended to frighten and intrigue him. He tells him that all men must die because death is always with us, watching us, sometimes near and sometimes far, but always present and waiting to touch us. He senses his own impending doom and gives Willie a valuable-looking, shiny medallion with instructions to give it to his granddaughter Genara Juantez (Victoria Racimo). Naturally, he dies during the night. The next morning, Willie is promptly released because it turns out he is the son of a prominent judge in New England. He goes to visit the old man’s granddaughter, relaying both the message and medallion. He is followed by the nosy Shan, who turns out to be an ex-boyfriend of Gen’s and who is also curious about the medallion.
Gen receives a call from Raymond Stryker (St. Jacques), a wealthy man from London who is interested in purchasing the medallion. He found out she had it in her possession because Willie stupidly visited a pawn shop before taking it to her. He offers her ridiculous sums of money, but she decides to take the medallion to a local museum for analysis by the well-trusted Dr. Henderson (Bellamy), before making a hasty decision. If it was valuable to her grandfather, she believes it must hold something more than a material value. Dr. Henderson tells her it’s made of something that no one on Earth has likely ever seen before, and yet he was somehow able to date it to being at least 55,000 years old. Excitedly, he compares the medallion’s trident design to a similar pattern found in Peru that was long-believed to have served as an airstrip for ancient alien visitors from the night sky.
Further research indicates the medallion is likely part of a 9-piece object that was broken, scattered and hidden around the globe, as a very similar piece showed up in China some 50 years earlier. The trio stumbles upon a third piece of the medallion in a hidden cave at the local gorge, further adding to their curiosity about what kinds of secrets can be unlocked once all the pieces are put back together. Meanwhile, Stryker offers Shan $30,000 if he can force Gen to give up the medallion.
I won’t spoil all the plot development details for you, but the ending feels very abrupt. I felt like I was led on a 90-minute goose chase that ended with more questions than answers. I read on the Internet that this was supposed to have been a TV show pilot that unfortunately wasn’t picked up by the network. That makes total sense, as the gaps probably would have been explained in further detail during a series. I’m not sure if this would have been a great sci-fi series or not. It had some admirable elements, but it needed more fleshing out for me to make a proper ruling on that. But alas, the gods giveth, and the gods cruelly taketh away.
Why put out a movie that doesn’t have an ending at all? I want answers, damn it! What would the medallion have revealed? What message did the “gods” have for us? Were they ever going to return, or was that a once-in-a-lifetime visit to Earth? I’m left with a curious thirst for knowledge that will never be quenched, and this makes me a very frustrated film critic. It’s like if you watched the movie Stargate (also starring Kurt Russell, coincidentally) and it ended about halfway through before revealing anything at all about the interstellar teleportation device and how it worked! Sigh. Just about the only redeeming quality I can give to sitting through Search for the Gods is this beautifully haunting quote from Bellamy: “We’ve always been fascinated by the stars, wondering about them, haunted by them, because their light’s some half-remembered road we traveled once.” Search for the Gods feels like a road I half-traveled upon without reaching my final destination. If you have any intention of watching it, take heed.
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