Directed by: Mel Gibson
Starring: Gerardo Taracena, Jonathan Brewer, Morris Birdyellowhead, Raoul Trujillo, Rudy Youngblood
Corrected entry: When the prisoners are being led through the city, there is a shot of a horse's skull on a vendor's stand. Horses were not native to the Americas, but were introduced by the Spaniards.
Corrected entry: In the scene where Jaguar Paw's wife is stuck in the cave, 2 animals are fighting and one falls into the cave. These animals were Tasmanian Devils and are only found in the island Tasmania off the coast of Australia.
Continuity mistake: At the first few scenes of the film the natives are shown with dark, broken and corroded teeth. Halfway through the movie the main cast show pearly white teeth.
Jaguar Paw: Resting fathers, fly me your strength.
Trivia: As a bit of an easter-egg, Mel Gibson included a single-frame of an actor dressed as Wally/Waldo from the "Where's Wally/Waldo?" book series in the theatrical version of the film. It was reportedly seen as being in poor taste, so it was removed from the initial DVD release. However, he was allegedly added back into the film for the Blu-Ray release.
Question: When they come across the girl crying over her mother's body, one of the guards says she has the sickness, and when they arrive in the city, they come across an old man who has the laughing sickness - what sicknesses are they referring to?
Answer: It is not specifically identified, but it appears to be the degenerative neurological disease called kuru. It is fatal and believed to have been spread in ancient sub-tropical cultures by cannibalism. Its symptoms resembles the encephalopathy disease known as Creutzfeldt-Jakob (Mad Cow), which is also called the laughing sickness, and is contracted by eating contaminated flesh.
Answer: Kuru only happens when you eat your relatives and the disease was discovered and studied in Papua New Guinea where eating your dead relatives was a way to carry them with you. There are books about it, fascinating stuff. Eating strangers is safe, not that I recommend eating anyone. The disease the girl has is smallpox brought by the Spanish, thus the ships at the end of the movie are not the first Spanish to visit the area. The laughing sickness could be straight up madness considering the horrible times everyone is living through, or a side effect of the limestone quarrying.
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Correction: This is a perpetuated myth similar to that of "slaves built the pyramids". The heavy Spanish horse was introduced, but native horses have been in the Americas since 12,000 BC. There have been written accounts of visitors having seen horse and wagons in such places as ancient Mexico (Hui Shen tells of his account in the 5th century). And some native Americans tell of stories of their ancestors having horses before the Spaniards arrival.
Bishop73