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Saw it at midnight. Really good! I really had a blast seen Indy crack the whip and run from deadly traps and making great escapes.

The villains were really good for Kingdom of the Skull. However, it does not feel the same. See, it would make more sense that the villains for this film were Nazis and not Ruskies. The thing is...Soviets weren't really big fans of Mythology or treasure hunting. They were more interested in space travel and nuclear weapons.

The Nazis were more mythical. It makes more sense to have had the film use former Nazis as villains trying to get to the skull and revive the Nazi regime during the early days of the cold war. At least that's how I see it.

So what do you think? Nazis over Soviets?

Go see Indiana Jones...you'll like it.

Nazis would have been better, but I dont mind the Soviets.
They mentioned something about waking up an army of undead or something? Could have just had some Nazis trying to revive the regime or something just as an added plot thing.

Soviets in the 50s were considered pretty much as evil as nazi's. Today we look at them them more mildly, and nazi's are still considered evil.

I think the Russians have/had great potential to become the better villains, but I also prefer the Nazi's over the Russians. Perhaps it's because of how each were different that one another in the movies. I wasn't at all indimidated by the Russians, the Nazi's on the other hand felt more evil, on a much grander scale.

Originally posted by Outbound

They mentioned something about waking up an army of undead or something? Could have just had some Nazis trying to revive the regime or something just as an added plot thing.

You know, the setting was actually quite perfect for that plot. South America during the 50s was the most notorious hide out for Nazis who escape Europe after the fall of the Nazi regime. It would have made more sense to use that story.

I didn't mind them and they fit for the 50's

Originally posted by WrathfulDwarf
You know, the setting was actually quite perfect for that plot. South America during the 50s was the most notorious hide out for Nazis who escape Europe after the fall of the Nazi regime. It would have made more sense to use that story.

I would have been a very forced "we need nazi's as baddies for Indy" approach.

In the end, the best villain yet must be Belloq.

On the russians and the occult, mythology Etc.... I reakon they were trying to do something like with the game Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine because With it the russians in it were excavating some babalyon ruins looking for some machine so they contact some god


So yea going by what they've been doing with the russians with that game and this movie they seem to be going after stuff so they can contact more godlike beings rather then go with the nazi path to look for some artifact so they can gain some ultimate power.

I agree that the Russians in this were inferior screen-villians to the Nazis.

However, the real reason that the villians had no "ooomph" behind 'em in this is, that even if they were well acted -which they weren't- the tone of the whole movie being a family cineplex comedy would never allow for true menace.

A decent villian would perhaps have been wasted on this flick in that context.

NO WONDER Connery turned the script down.

Originally posted by WrathfulDwarf
Saw it at midnight. Really good! I really had a blast seen Indy crack the whip and run from deadly traps and making great escapes.

The villains were really good for Kingdom of the Skull. However, it does not feel the same. See, it would make more sense that the villains for this film were Nazis and not Ruskies. The thing is...Soviets weren't really big fans of Mythology or treasure hunting. They were more interested in space travel and nuclear weapons.

The Nazis were more mythical. It makes more sense to have had the film use former Nazis as villains trying to get to the skull and revive the Nazi regime during the early days of the cold war. At least that's how I see it.

So what do you think? Nazis over Soviets?

Go see Indiana Jones...you'll like it.

Though, unless I'm mistaken, Stalin was intrested in the possible, though doubtful, applications of mind-control, which was what the soviets were going for. Albet, it was a lowly funded and not as highly sought as space travel and nukes. And he was always looking for knowledge that noone else knew, to give him an edge if the war went hot.

I do, however think that the Nazis would have given Indy 4 more of a classic feel, but, who would have been leading them? I just kinda wish that Indy 4 had stuck closer to the actual legends of the cristal skulls than it did.

all-in-all, however, I enjoyed it. Not as much as Raders or the Last Crusade, but I thought it was beter than Temple of Doom. ( I didn't really care much for temple of doom.)

Temple of Doom was more of a true Indy film than this one though.
Its a classic.

Whereas this one is just a cynical homage to better days at best, imo.

Its a sad day when an appearance by Scrub's "The Janitor" isn't funny too.

Well, I'll watch it tonight. I hope I'll like it.

Originally posted by Sadako of Girth


NO WONDER Connery turned the script down.

After that horrendous mess with League of Extraordinary Gentlemen I'm glad he retired.

I am now so curious about Frank Darabont's original script. Which is the one Lucas turned down... and now we have this. Has George been meddling again in JarJar mode?

Originally posted by WrathfulDwarf
After that horrendous mess with League of Extraordinary Gentlemen I'm glad he retired.

Yea i also read a thing on that movie where Sean did'nt get along with the director and apparantly they had $185 million for the movie did'nt look it tho.

Quarrels...

Cate Blanchett was great (as per usual) but I have to say, Nazis make more menacing villains than Soviets.

Y'know, Nazis were just bad - makes you appreciate how Alison Doody managed to make Elsa sympathetic - but with the Soviets, you reach a grey area, because the USA weren't quite the golden heroes they made themselves out to be either.

Blanchett did great. Too bad her character didn't have much depth scriptwise.

Nope. But that was common for alot of characters. They just didn't get the breathing space needed to justify their presence in the film.

Originally posted by queeq
Blanchett did great. Too bad her character didn't have much depth scriptwise.

Or at all.

Felt disappointed for her and Ray Winstone.

Her accent work was dodgy too.

I thought it was good as did a Ukranian friend I have. She does love Blanchett though.

Originally posted by Sadako of Girth
Or at all.

Felt disappointed for her and Ray Winstone.

Her accent work was dodgy too.

Ah well... we bought Connery's awful Russian accent in Red October...

I agree with the shallowness of the side kicks.

Compared to Sallah, Brody, Belloq, Mola Ram and even Short Round, Winston, Hurt and Blanchet had zilch to work with. Is Koepp to blame? Or Spielberg? Or that nefarious Lucas with his crappy SW prequels.? Cirucmstantial evidence suggests the latter.

Originally posted by queeq
Ah well... we bought Connery's awful Russian accent in Red October...

I agree with the shallowness of the side kicks.

Compared to Sallah, Brody, Belloq, Mola Ram and even Short Round, Winston, Hurt and Blanchet had zilch to work with. Is Koepp to blame? Or Spielberg? Or that nefarious Lucas with his crappy SW prequels.? Cirucmstantial evidence suggests the latter.
I don't get why Spielberg should listen to Lucas all the time... is he his prisonbitch or something?

Originally posted by exanda kane
I thought it was good as did a Ukranian friend I have. She does love Blanchett though.

Just inconsistant.

Originally posted by queeq
Ah well... we bought Connery's awful Russian accent in Red October...

I agree with the shallowness of the side kicks.

Compared to Sallah, Brody, Belloq, Mola Ram and even Short Round, Winston, Hurt and Blanchet had zilch to work with. Is Koepp to blame? Or Spielberg? Or that nefarious Lucas with his crappy SW prequels.? Cirucmstantial evidence suggests the latter.

We dont have to always site the SW prequels when slating Lucas...
'Revenge of the Sith' was way better than Speilberg's Transformers and War of the Worlds put together..

Originally posted by Jovan
I don't get why Spielberg should listen to Lucas all the time... is he his prisonbitch or something?

LOL Yeah and Coppola is top dog.

Originally posted by Sadako of Girth
LOL Yeah and Coppola is top dog.
so that makes... Indiana... Short Round .. Mutt... and Coppola? ?)

LOL
Indeed it does, you sick puppy lolz

Scary.

Originally posted by Sadako of Girth
We dont have to always site the SW prequels when slating Lucas...
'Revenge of the Sith' was way better than Speilberg's Transformers and War of the Worlds put together..
just for reference Spieldberg didn't make Transformers. Michael Bay did.

Obviously I have to go with Nazis in this one, I liked that they brought in the soviets though, they fit well, and I doubt it would've been any different if it had Nazis in it. Nazis have been depicted as the most evil of all groups for a long time now, though I think the soviets were worse along with Stalin, The Nazis will likely always be the preferable villain. I'm not sure if anything I just said made sense, but whatever.

We get it.

Originally posted by Menetnashté
just for reference Spieldberg didn't make Transformers. Michael Bay did.


Actually, Speilberg produced it.

He gave Bay the job and had the power to fire him and he didn't.

Speilberg and Bay toured the press together and Speilberg released a promo for it around the time of the movie's inception and talked about his movie and why he was a fan of TFs (which clearly he couldn't have been ) etc

The stain of Speilberg is undeniable.

Why do you spell his name wrongly? You hate him that much?

No.. I admit that was just genuine oversight.

You always spell it like that.

Yup. Hell of an oversight, huh...?

Hope he can forgive my minor dyslexia....!!

I think he made KOTC as a punishment for your sins.

That would be pure overkill by "the desolate one".
(And as unneccesary as the cgi in his movie. )

It'd be like killing an ant by hitting it with a 50,000 megaton nuke.




























































































But hey, as long as that ant is in a fridge.....

Originally posted by exanda kane
Cate Blanchett was great (as per usual) but I have to say, Nazis make more menacing villains than Soviets.

Y'know, Nazis were just bad - makes you appreciate how Alison Doody managed to make Elsa sympathetic - but with the Soviets, you reach a grey area, because the USA weren't quite the golden heroes they made themselves out to be either.

Pretty much. There's a line by Amanda Waller in the fourth season of JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED, speaking about the goverment's fear of metahumans compared with the old days with the Russians - "Our enemy is never as evil as we make them to be. And maybe we're not quite as good as we like to think we are."

The best thing about Nazis as villains, is that you can go as far over the top as you want to, because their evil was so great, and people will accept it. The Russians were intimidating & mysterious, but it never did come to war with them. Plus, they had many socialist sympathizers in North America & abroad; locking such people up just made the U.S. look as heavy handed.

I guess people should read up on the Stalin days.

Originally posted by queeq
I guess people should read up on the Stalin days.

Stalin did terrible things, but his legacy in Russia is mixed, to this day.
Just like Mao in China, where even more people died. The people in both countries were grateful for how they were transformed from backward, rural nations with a small ruling class, into world superpowers. Both suffered the worst during the Second World War - Russia by the Germans, China by the Japanese - and became far stronger against any future invasions after the war. It was just the draconian, unforgiving process of reform & change in both countries that made them wonder why so much suffering was needed.
They're even talked about renaming Volgograd back to Stalingrad in the past few years. Though by his last days, he had become so despotic & paranoid he may have been poisoned to prevent starting war against the West (similar conspiracy theories still float about Gen. George Patton - stationed in Germany after the war, constantly blowing off about the Russian threat - dying in a bizarre traffic accident.)
Winston Churchill was always suspicious of Stalin & Russian motives, but he had no problem siding with him against Hitler & the Axis. They did need Russia to occupy the Nazis for most of the fighting while they prepared to re-enter Europe; it cost 25 million Russian lives by the end, nearly half of the wars total.
The interesting thing in the film is, Stalin had been dead for four years by 1957. I thought they're could have been a line joking about Premier Khrushchev in there.

Hehehe

Nazi do make for better villians they bring an attitude of we're going to destroye you all and rule the world kind of feel, they were more willing to do horrific things toward people witch makes you want to see Henry Jones kick some ass a little more then against a communist. Now im not saying that some of those communist governments around the world haven't done some mest up stuff to but come on now were talking about Nazis. Plus you feel more satisfied at the end of the movie when the bad guys head shrivels up and explodes all over the screen. either way I still liked the movie.

I like the Soviets.

nazi and american black and white good and evil whereas with russians the americans wernt the good guys either so its hard to reach a conclusion.

Why? Once you replace the word nazi by German we have the same thing.

Originally posted by queeq
I like the Soviets.

Yep thats the problem.

Just not as hateable as the Nazis.

Its like having Jaws the shark as your villian for Jaws and Jaws two, then having that little Hitler monkey from Raiders be the villian in the 3rd. And the monkey wears little armbands/waterwings.

Nah, I meant liking them as evil. They were for a long time ya know.

But not in this movie, regardless of their past credits in the world of evil.

They were the villian equivalent of Star Trek redshirts.

"The diet coke of evil, the margarin of evil" as Mike Myers would say.

The 'Raiders' Nazis and the 'Crusade' nazis rested on no laurels and spent a good amount of screentime being genuinely evil, convincing and assuring the audience of their evil crudentials.
You didn't have to be a student of world history to see that those were some serious bad mofos, as the evil was there to see, and by the end of the movie, you were ready to see them get exploded and melted and stuff which was a fantastic popcorn moment.

Ah yes, I agree about teh way teh Russians were depicted. They could have been worse. Guess political correctness set in somewhere.

And nazi's can always politically incorrect be made evil. In their case the reverse is what gets people on their seats (see Die Untergang)

Very true.

So, I state mty case for truly evil Soviets, Stalin-style.

the Soviets could have made good villains, but unfortunately lucas and whomever else decided to make this film geared more towards kids then people who could handle guys getting their hearts ripped out/faces melted off.

I love how the whole movie is all light hearted and then there's the randomly placed ant death scene from hell lol. The tone was just way off IMO

Another kiddie movie eh? Maybe Lucas is going a tad senile in his old age.

Originally posted by WrathfulDwarf
Saw it at midnight. Really good! I really had a blast seen Indy crack the whip and run from deadly traps and making great escapes.

The villains were really good for Kingdom of the Skull. However, it does not feel the same. See, it would make more sense that the villains for this film were Nazis and not Ruskies. The thing is...Soviets weren't really big fans of Mythology or treasure hunting. They were more interested in space travel and nuclear weapons.

The Nazis were more mythical. It makes more sense to have had the film use former Nazis as villains trying to get to the skull and revive the Nazi regime during the early days of the cold war. At least that's how I see it.

So what do you think? Nazis over Soviets?

Go see Indiana Jones...you'll like it. Nazi's > Soviets


It's like comparing Stifler (who's kind of a dick) to Emperor Palpatine (the manifestation of Evil).

Huh???

Stiffler: American Pie movies reference?

Yeah I got that... but I don't understand the comparison, or why's funny. Unless it has something to do with Emperor's mom.

I believe he was just saying that Stiffler'd make a less effective Villian than Palpatine, which is true.

And that the Russians, instead of being portrayed in any particularly effective threatening way come off as relatively harmless dicks (like stiffler) when compared with the forces of evil in the previous films (Almost a Palps levels of evil), but thats all I got from that...

I dont think humour was the guys point.

Man your Emporer's Mum vision is the most twisted image you've ever created in my mind...!!!!

*Goes to throw up into some lettuce*

Originally posted by WrathfulDwarf
Saw it at midnight. Really good! I really had a blast seen Indy crack the whip and run from deadly traps and making great escapes.

The villains were really good for Kingdom of the Skull. However, it does not feel the same. See, it would make more sense that the villains for this film were Nazis and not Ruskies. The thing is...Soviets weren't really big fans of Mythology or treasure hunting. They were more interested in space travel and nuclear weapons.

The Nazis were more mythical. It makes more sense to have had the film use former Nazis as villains trying to get to the skull and revive the Nazi regime during the early days of the cold war. At least that's how I see it.

So what do you think? Nazis over Soviets?

Go see Indiana Jones...you'll like it.

Are you crazy? This movie was the most horrible waste of my time ever. I'd rather had my face punched into a heap of cowshit for 3 hours than ever have to watch this travesty again.


On topic though, Nazis are better villains.