A Spoiler-Filled Rant About Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
• Seriously, a horde of helpful monkeys swinging with Shia LaBeouf through the jungle? The fact that Shia LaBeouf swung from vine to fine in the first place?
• Indy survived a nuclear blast by hiding inside a fridge, and was completely fine after that? And why was there a jokey reaction shot to a prairie dog?
• Marion Ravenwood comes back and gets zero time to be a character? I don't know what's worse, squandering Karen Allen or ruining the memory of the relationship Marion built with Indy in Raiders of the Lost Ark. They had so much time in that movie to spend together on screen, building chemistry, but in the new film she just shows up and they trade some really awful zingers that don't at all sound like them, and then they're back in love.
• I get that Indy doesn't like snakes, but he's not terrified of them. At the beginning of Raiders, when his pilot buddy flies him out of danger, he only freaks out for a minute at the snake coiled at his feet before his terror just turns to anger at having the snake there in the first place. Even in the chamber holding the Ark, he puts up with the snakes well enough to set them on fire and rescue Marion. All that to say: Having him act like a baby and refuse to grab hold of a snake that he can use to get out of a sandpit seemed weak, and having him insist that Marion and Mutt refer to the snake as a rope was just lamentable.
• Way too much dependence on CGI. Special effects are tools to tell a story; form cannot drive function. The whole film felt rubbery and unmoving and cold because of the huge emphasis on greater and greater scenes of CGI effects. (And let's not forget the prairie dogs and monkeys.)
• Aliens? Really? When Irina tells Indy that the skull was not made by human hands, he responds with a skeptical, "Come on." That's exactly how I felt. Indiana Jones has always existed in a heightened, pulpy universe as a hero questing after man-made objects imbued with supernatural gifts. (The reason Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade felt so much better than Temple of Doom is because the story returned to the format of Indy fighting the Nazis for control of a Christian historical artifact.) But these religious objects, whether the Ark of the Covenant or the ugly stones from that Indian village, were always tangible, believable things. Having the crystal skulls belong to aliens does away with all that, and what's worse, it turns the film from an adventure into a (really) bad sci-fi rip-off. The plot was just flat-out ludicrous.
Comments: 7
I agree with everything you complain about, especially the fucking Spider Man LaBeouf scene, except for your rant about the alien element. A little ridiculous, yes. But aliens are less believable than the Ark or the Holy Grail? Not to an agnostic like me. Quite the opposite, in fact.
But still, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Colossal Disappointment was just that.
I think I set myself up to like this better than anyone else. I went in expecting episode 1 bad. Instead, I got not as good as the others but passable and enjoyable. I don't disagree with anything you've said. In fact, when Indy says "Saucer men from Mars" I was reminded that Lucas wanted that plot and felt almost as let down as I did when I first heard the word midiclorian.
But I still enjoyed it. The rumble at the diner was great fun. The jungle was ok. Except for the prairie dogs I like the nuke going off.
I don't know, it could have been better in a thousand ways, and most highschool students could find half of them (that is a dig at higschool students), I still thought that it was fun.
My expectation = They'll screw it beyond repair
My experience = They broke it bad, but it wasn't totaled.
Seth - Thing is, in those films, there was no supernatural element on screen until the very end. Sure, the pieces they sought had perceived mystical value, but they also represented legitimate artifacts in their own right. Hence, a sense of reality was retained until the end……something that was blown within 5 mins for Crystal Skull.
I, too, went in expecting the movie to suck... and so I wasn't disappointed when it did. I expected the overdone CGI and a plot with a doughy center.
What I wasn't prepared for was a director like Spielberg (a true child of the '80's am I) treating his work so self-consciously... Indy makes fun of his age? Have some respect for my childhood, Steve. It kinda reminded me of some horrid Kenny Chesney song with people sitting around listing all the great things about "remember when...?" and then settling back into the mediocre present where they can poke fun at how unrealistic they are. I love Indiana Jones, and Marion was my idol (still couldn't beat her at a drinking game) and for chrissakes, it's a movie... make me some magic.
It's true that in previous installments they had objects and plots that were just as ludicrous. But at the end of Raiders, God and Moses didn't leap out of the ark and make an angry face before the faces melted. The mysterious things retained their mystery at the end. Crystal Skull could have pulled aliens off if they did it in a way that showed aliens had been there and done stuff, but didn't explicitly show aliens and stuff. Their approach to aliens should have been more like Raiders approach to god than MIB
judging from the "hat hint" at the end of the most recent Indiana Jones, it seems pretty obvious that Shia LaBeouf will be the next Indy
Okay - they zoom out in the warehouse to a wide shot and you get this 'holy shit' moment when you realize exactly which warehouse they're in...
Then they fucking ruin it by showing an obvious ark shot when Indy busts out.
It's as if they had respect for the audience for a few moments and then chickened out and had to hit us over the head with it.
This thing had Lucas' stench all over it.
The thing with the snakes - you're right about Raiders. But Temple of Doom and Last Crusade had numerous examples of Indy freaking out over snakes, including the genesis of those fears in the circus train.
May 25, 2008 12:36 PM