The Cave Painter of Lascaux

In this iconographic-animated adaptation of Roberta Angeletti's 2004 picture book of the same name, a bored young girl named Anna becomes separated from her classmates on a field trip to the Lascaux cave after she follows a set of footprints. When the flashbulb on her camera goes off—illuminating the 17,000-year-old paintings of cattle, deer, goats, and horses—the somewhat snotty-sounding Anna tells us how the cave people mixed and applied the paints to the rock surface (even though she earlier proudly claimed to have paid no attention to her teacher's lecture on the bus). Anna is startled by a tour guide dressed as a caveman, and learns—in an awkwardly shoehorned fashion—some more information about people during the Paleolithic period, before the pair are surprised (as is the viewer) by the appearance of a real caveman, who describes how early Homo sapiens lived in camps, not caves (which were sacred places). While the illustrations are solid and the information is accurate, the narrative feels forced and contrived, and Anna is not a particularly appealing or fleshed-out central character. Very optional. Aud: E, P. (R. Pitman)