Gender: Male Location: Sailing the seas of cheese.
In a way, you have to suspend your disbelief with all the Indiana Jones films. I haven't seen the fourth one yet, but in the first you had to accept the demons or whatever they were that flew out of the Ark and melted people's faces. In part two you had to accept magical stones and still beating hearts being ripped out of people's chests. Then there was that ghost guy at the end of the third one.
Gender: Male Location: Welfare Kingdom of California
I'll make my review brief.
Right of the bat...the film gets a 4 out of 5 from me.
Indiana Jones is back! But wait a minute...this isn't like previous Indiana films. This is a totally different setting. A much more challenging setting for our favorite archaeologist. He has enter the Cold War....and the McCarthyism era.
This is no longer the era of America united to fight Nazi Regime...this is the era of no trust and suspicion. And of course Indy is just another victim. This is also the era of the 50s. From Atomics to Jocks vs. Greasers (which there is a scene most of you will find quite funny) the whole Elvis and TV gang is there!
Best about this period is the Science fiction movie period. This is the entire theme through out the movie. Green Men from Mars coming to Earth...but we get so much more. This is where Spielberg put the mythos of Indiana Jones and set it right.
There is GREAT chemistry here! Indiana Jones + 1950s Science Fiction + Communist scare = Great formula! Spielberg became Tarantino for this Indiana Jones. The perfect mix blended together. Major props to Steven for sucha great feat!
The comedy was purely entertainment and clean. There is the scenes of the gophers in the desert, the malt shop brawl, Indy getting kidnapped and jumping from a car to a motorcycle, and so many others...oh, and of course "I hate snakes!"
Aside from the comedy and the fantastic combination I mention before there was also the memories to the previous installments. The Ark scene put a smile to my face, Marion return, the Picture of Henry Jones, An image of the statue of Kali...and others. If you are an Indiana Jones fan there is no way you can say you hate those parts of the movie. The memories were nicely put together for this film.
The acting was as good as the previous movies. Everyone exercise their skills to perfection. Harrison Ford with his charming style, Karen Allen and her lovely smiles, and of course the villains as always masterfully wicked and dangerous. I did enjoy Cate Blanchett performance the most. She looked great as the central villain.
Then we have the death scenes. You know, this is something that strikes me as odd. How can a PG13 film like Indiana can get away with such death scenes? They're not extremely gore or offensive but pretty disturbing. Every Indy film have these death scenes that kinda get you. How can they get away with it is a mystery itself.
The story for this film was way too large. Pretty much over the top. However, this shouldn't be a negative. It was expected that this film was going to top the previous films. Now, I'm not saying that this film was better than the previous films. But a story much more bigger than the others. Why? Well, why not? This film is very likely to be the last time we see the older Indiana Jones in action. This pretty much culminates the series.
There is SOOO much more I want to touch about this film. I don't want to get carry away (too late) but I'm just going to say. This is the Indy film that we were waiting for....
You prolly are asking this....if I like the film so much why the 4 out of 5?
Simple, read my thread in this forum:
NAZIS MAKE BETTER VILLAINS THAN SOVIETS.
That's why this film didn't get a 5 out of 5.
Nazis are far more sinister than soviets and I can't really take the soviet army seriously here...I think a Nazi She-wolf Cate Blanchett would have been perfect IMO.
So put on your hats! Crack your whips and go see Indy!
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull gets a
4 OUT OF 5.
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Last edited by WanderingDroid on May 22nd, 2008 at 10:29 PM
Im afraid my reaction to "Shia LeBeof and the occasional focus on the old man that used to called Jones" is less positive.
Once it was both established that Indy could survive being thrown a mile in a fridge thrown from taking a nuclear explosion, and therefore that any grounding in a believable world at all has been abandoned - every "danger" situation was a big exercise in flacid, impotent yawnsome predictability and the Indiana Jones movie levels of suspense/tension suffered all the way through, as the movie clearly was written by some of those cgi monkeys, who were assisted in smearing their cgi-faeces on the pages by randomly inserted comedy caddyshack rodents.
The whole Lucasfilm/Speilberg office party love-in vibe pissed all over the characters we knew and loved from the originals and Harrison Ford convinced me he was Indy in the 1st 20 mins like Ford convinced us with his enthusiasm in portraying Solo in the holiday special.
Actually, this is the Jonesian equivalent of that debacle, IMO.
The whole self-parodying tone was more 'Police Academy 4' than 'Indiana Jones'.
Bad script, weak plot shit villians.
Gutted for a great, great trilogy.
Speilberg'll never see another quid from me, if his recent run is what I'm paying for from now on.
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"Van Zan is the Pinocchio of feces." - Lestov16
Last edited by Sadako of Girth on May 22nd, 2008 at 11:26 PM
Yeah some of the more restrained bits of humor worked...
The coldwar paranoia thing in the US at that time..
But virtually everything else I felt got drowned....
yeah thats one point that I didn't like that a lot of critics complained about..... that the main characters never really felt like they were in danger. I think its because this one was aimed a bit more at kids then the previous installments. Well at least the first two anyway
Oh and when World War III comes around I'll remember to stay in my refrigerator in case any country decides to nuke us.
Yeah agreed, the Indy quote in the tent was one of those better ones:
"Untie me, I'll give you a big hug"
The 50's era was done well agreed there too.
All in all I think Indy still felt like Indy, sure times have changed, but he still had the same grin, the same smart ass remarks(most of them) and still an all around badass.
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When the darkness comes, keep an eye on the light no matter how far away it seems.
I haven't seen Indy 4 yet, but I'll have my review later tonight.
Spielberg is a great director, but he's made his share of stinkers too. I would hardly call "Minority Report" a very good film, and neither was War of the Worlds for that matter.
Needlees to say, I don't know why it has become tradition to "blame Lucas for everything" He didn't even direct this film, yet he's still taking the heat. With Star Wars you guys all used to say "Well, Lucas is responsible since he ws the director." I guess you should all blame Rick McCullam for Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. It's ok to admit that ROTS was good.
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I like George.
Last edited by Sith Master X on May 23rd, 2008 at 09:33 PM
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