In Search of Ancient Astronauts

In his books, von Däniken promoted the idea that the mysteries of the world can all be explained by space aliens, who inspired the ancients to write strange things in their literature, and helped them build archaeological wonders. Of course, his ideas don't stand up to any real scrutiny. As a child, I found the von Däniken fiction-disguised-as-documentary fascinating, because I didn't check behind his nonsense. Years later, I asked an ancient languages scholar to translate the text on an ancient inscription photographed in a von Däniken book. The scholar, lacking a sensationalized agenda, translated it as something like "King [somebody] ruled here. Scribe Gishga wrote this", in contrast to the book's translation about flying chariots of fire. His quotes from materials with well-known translations are distorted by taking selected passages out of context.

I'd give the movie a "1" for its academic dishonesty in a movie that pretends to be a documentary, but it deserves slight credit (maybe a "2") for convincingly presenting its indefensible claims. For someone who is aware of the dishonesty of the movie's claims, there might also be some camp entertainment value.