Alpha Movie Review

Alpha is a coming of age story set in the last ice age, but is also the story about how dog became man’s best friend.  Keep reading to find out why this is not a movie for the whole family.

Alpha is a fantastic adventure story, but it’s also an intense survival story and includes several scenes of intense peril.  A young man is left for dead by his tribe and when he wakes he must figure out how to survive injured and all alone in the harsh reality of the coming winter. He finds a friend in a wolf and the movie follows them on their adventures to return back to the tribe.

The official synopsis:

An epic adventure set in the last Ice Age. Europe, 20,000 years ago. While on his first hunt with his tribe’s most elite group, a young man is injured and left for dead. Awakening to find himself broken and alone — he must learn to survive and navigate the harsh and unforgiving wilderness. Reluctantly taming a lone wolf abandoned by its pack, the pair learn to rely on each other and become unlikely allies, enduring countless dangers and overwhelming odds in order to find their way home before the deadly winter arrives.

This movie is entirely in subtitles and not suitable for young children.  There are some intense death scenes (these are not your typical superhero-type death scenes) and quite honestly a little bit scary.  The movie is more suited for upper elementary age children or pre-teens.   My 9yo was able to follow along with the subtitles okay and did okay with the death scenes, he did have a lot of questions afterward though. Please consider seeing it first before taking young children.

I’m not a huge subtitle movie fan, but I really enjoyed the simplicity of this movie. The scenes were gorgeous, the story was great, and I just love a good coming of age movie.  Yes, it was intense and sad, but I still enjoyed it.