[Movie Review] INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL
First and foremost, you have my sincere apologies for being MIA lately. School is being a royal bitch right now, and finding time to sit down and bust out a full-length review has been pretty rough. I’m gonna have to make time on the weekends to do reviews so you guys don’t think I”m neglecting you. The prodigal Queen of StalePopcorn has returned!
Secondly, this review has to come with some caveats. This thing is gonna be spoiler HEAVY, so if you want to go in clean, turn away NOW.
I’m not an Indy fanatic like most folks, but I think that they are entertaining flicks. My father, on the other hand, is a really big Indy fan. If you visit the CHUD forums, you may have seen my post in the Indy thread as HarleyQuinn22. I told the story of how my father and his dad went to see every Indy movie in the theater together. The Indy movies are THEIR movies. Unfortunately, my grandfather passed four years ago, and did not get the opportunity to see this film. When I broke the new to my dad that Indy 4 was a go, my father cried, knowing he’d have to see this without his dad, but he was very happy to have the chance to take me and my little sister to see this. Call it his way of continuing the Indy tradition. We were supposed to go on Saturday, but he just couldn’t wait and decided to update our tickets to today and take us. I got home from college this morning to find my father in full Indy costume, grinning like a teenager. He drove us to the theater, bought us a massive tub of popcorn, and settled in the back of the theater for Indy 4. So, after all of the hype, all of the talk, what did I think?
Like I said, I’m not a HUGE Indy disciple, but I know a good movie when I see it. Indy 4, unfortunately, is not a good movie, in my opinion. I am not a “hater” or “troll”, so let’s get that out of the way before the hate begins in the comments. It is not the worst film I’ve ever seen. It did not rape my childhood. It just did not do it for me. Sorry.
Let’s start with what worked first. Namely, the first hour. The first hour of this movie moves rather briskly, and has a pretty entertaining setpiece(the motorcycle chase) that gets the blood pumping. I liked Harrison Ford at times. Karen Allen has a pretty smile. That’s about all that I can think of that works. It’s time for the bad news.
If you are looking for a good Indy movie, this is not it. Honestly, and I know this is going to sound strange, but I don’t think Indy 4 felt like an Indy movie. Those movies have a certain look and feel to them that this movie does not share with the others. It was so incredibly odd to me, and it’s an odd nitpick, but if you’re going to make an Indy movie, MAKE AN INDY MOVIE. Yes, we live in a CGI age, but for Pete’s sake, the other movies have such a realistic feel to them that this one will stand out like a sore thumb during eventual marathons. The sets feel like sets. The backgrounds feel like a product of a computer rather than a product of an imagination. The CG is painful to watch at points. Just watch those monkeys and tell me with a straight face that it looks good. I dare you.
The story is very muddled at points, and there are many issues that are glossed over or left unresolved. From the beginning of the movie, a plot thread is introduced involving Indy being suspected of being a Commie sympathizer, leading him to lose his teaching job. Now, you’d think a major event like this which shakes up Indy’s life would be addressed and cleared up, with Indy’s good name restored by film’s end. Uhh, no. We do find out that he’s gotten his job back, but the way that the story introduces this idea without really carrying it through to fruition was just plain lazy in my book. The entire mess involving the crystal skulls was a bore. I didn’t care about the skulls or whatever powers they had. I also found problems with every single character in this film.
Let’s start with Indiana Jones. He starts out beautifully. Beautifully, I tell ya! When he starts swinging around in that warehouse, I was pumped. Things were on track. I found a real melancholy to him in this movie which I was starting to like. We get a really sad moment where he just stares at pictures of his recently deceased father and his BFF Marcus, and it got me. However, Spielberg and Lucas forgot that the appeal of Indy is that he is an Everyman, a guy who gets his ass kicked on numerous occasions, but manages to come out on top. Note that I said on top, not unscathed. Indy is not a young man anymore, yet he takes more punishment in this movie without spilling a single drop of blood. I literally do not remember seeing any blood on Indy at any time, and he takes even more punishment in this movie than in the others combined. This movie is the proud owner of the most ridiculous scene of the year: Indy hides in a fridge as a nuclear bomb goes off. The frige is thrown for miles but Indy survives the blast due to the fridge’s lead lining. He emerges from the fridge, perfectly fine, and gazes up at the MUSHROOM CLOUD. How he doesn’t get any radiation or any aftereffects after soaking up those nuclear rays is beyond me, but I digress. Remember when I said how I liked that Indy was a bit sadder this time? The guy has some friends for sure, but essentially he is alone in the world. He lives in that house by himself. He has no family. What a sad existence that must be, going off on adventures and having no one to really share them with. Well, Georgie and Stevie decide to solve that problem! Problem is, they do it piss-poorly.
Yes, the rumors are true. TheBeef is Henry Jones III. Joy. Problem is, this, like the Indy/Commie thing, is glossed over so much that you barely register the enormity of what this revelation means. Marion just comes right out and says, “Yup, that’s your kid” without any buildup or anything. I don’t mind this. What I do mind is the fact that no one seems to want to address the fact that Marion has kept this man from his son for however long the kid’s been alive. You would think that Indy, whose relationship with his own dad was well-documented in Last Crusade, would be a bit more upset and stunned over the fact that he is sudenly a father to a child he never knew existed. You’d think he’d be, I dunno, PISSED at Marion for lying to him and knowingly keeping Indy away from his own child. You’d think the kid would be a bit more shocked by this news and angry at his mother for lying to him his entire life (quick aside: the kid is called Mutt Williams in this movie, but Marion reveals his name is actually Henry Jones III. Mutt is unaware that Indy is his dad, and has been under the assumption that his stepdad was his real dad. Uh, does this kid not know his real name? Who signed the birth certificate, his stepdad, who is clumsily mentioned in yet another scene of blatant exposition? WTF?). You’d think he wouldn’t be arguing with Marion over the child one minute, then making goo-goo eyes at her thirty seconds later. It made no sense to me at all. You would think there would at least be a moment where Indy pulls the kid aside and says, “Hey, sorry for not being around, but your mom’s a scandalous ho”. They had a great opportunity to do…SOMETHING, but they didn’t. It was like watching Superman Returns all over again!
That brings me to Marion and Beefy. Karen Allen is a lovely lady with a killer smile, but if you aren’t going to give Marion Ravenwood something to do, leave her out of the movie. She is nothing but a device to get Indy and Mutt together. Bummer, since Marion was a badass in Raiders. She does nothing but smile at Indy and make goo-goo eyes at him. She’s still got an acid tongue, but after a couple of scenes, she goes silent. Beefy does well with what he has to do, but his greaser character is horribly out of place here. His entrance in this film had me rolling my eyes, as well as his Tarzan impersonation later on. He’s not nearly as bad as people were trying to say he would be, but the character was just off. Once he gets rid of the whole hair-combing, quick-temepered punk routine, he improves greatly. He’s got good chemistry with Harrison, too.
Blanchett sucks. Flat out sucks. She’s bland, boring, dull, zzzzzzzzzzin this movie. She’s less than a standard-issue villain here. I never feared her, I never felt anything towards her. She can do a mean accent, but I found her very forgettable. Sorry Cate. Ray Winstone is abysmal. As for John Hurt…hope the check cleared.
This was a one-and-done flick for me. Once was enough. It was not an absolute crapfest like Southland Tales, but after the great first hour, the rest of it devolves into a lazy, rather dull movie. If you’re a diehard Indy fan, I guess you’ll see this no matter what, but just temper your expectations a bit. My dad enjoyed the experience of seeing an Indy film with his kids, but he sure as shit did not enjoy this movie very much, lemme tell you. I had a choice as to whether to give him advance warning of this movie’s potential shittiness, or to just let him have his experience. I let him have it, for better or for worse. Steve and George, you two should be embarrassed by your laziness. Really. You two can do better.
6 Responses to “[Movie Review] INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL”
It’s alright, it ranks as thew worst Indy movie but there was enough to enjoy about. Though it have the lamest villain death out of all the movies. To think we came close to having a Frank Darabont written Indiana Jones movie, such a missed opportunity.
I wholeheartedly agree with every word of your review. It broke my heart. It could have been amazing. Instead, it was embarrassing.
It really is a shame. After all the time they had to put the thing together, THIS is the best they could do?
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