Review: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

The fourth and most recent installment of the Indiana Jones series again loses it's way. I don't want to give away too much of the plot, but I do want to point out (and counter) some of the problems I and others seem to have in the movie.

First, many have said that the scene where Indy survives a nuclear blast by hiding in a refrigerator was incredibly unbelievable. I'm willing to buy it, just because that refrigerator was made from 2 inches of solid lead. That will protect you from quite a bit. And it's no less believable than using a self-inflating raft to safely coast down a mountain and off a cliff.

Shia LeBouf plays Mutt. While his acting was hardly high-caliber, his character was still endearing on many levels. As most "bad boys" in the 50s, he was a James Dean wannabe; a Rebel Without a Clue. His obsessive nature over his image was very believable as an adolescent young man that had no direction in his life. So not great, but not so bad as to be irredeemable.

I could even buy the man-eating ants in South America. I'd buy a lot of weird creatures from that region of the world. There is some seriously fucked up shit in the Amazon. Mother Nature was definitely PMSing when she populated that area.

Even the story itself wasn't terribly unbelievable. Both Russia and the US in the 1950s were studying telepathic warfare. Aliens have long been theorized to have had connections to the Mayans, given that their gods were white, and the pyramids they built sprung up in similar forms around the world, at about the same time. But yet, these things just aren't the Indiana Jones kind of stories. El Dorado is rich enough in legend and mystery that we didn't need to bring Science Fiction into the equation.

The legion of monkeys that come to our heroes' aid as Shia LeBouf leads them Tarzan-like through the trees was a little far-fetched. The fact that the skull was shown to be highly magnetic (even to non-magnetic metels like gold) seemed to come and go as it suited the story. Sometimes it effected weapons, wielded by good guys and bad guys alike. Other times, it conveniently didn't.

A lot the dialogue felt forced and unimagined, particularly a useless scene where Indy is arrested by a government agency. The entire scene does nothing but give us some exposition about how Indy was involved in WWII and got all kinds of medals and so on and so forth. This could have been easily covered in other ways and did not need a 5 minute scene.

Finally, the main antagonist, a Russian KGB scientist was two-dimensional, poorly acted, and just altogether thrown in as a villain without any depth or interest.

One thing that I got a huge kick out of, however, was Indy saying "I have a bad feeling about this". Star Wars references always make me feel warm and happy inside.

So, overall, this movie would have been fairly decent if it wasn't an Indiana Jones movie. Enjoyable action, fairly funny, however it was still very much flawed.

But honestly, anyone who says that it was the worst movie ever made, and that it ruined the Indiana Jones series and left it a broken mess should really go back and re-watch Indiana Jones and the Temple of Cheap Plot Devices. For me, I still found far and away better than the second movie, even it trailed the first and third installments by just as much.

Review: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

In the third installment of Indiana Jones, Spielberg comes back to the series to provide an excellent tale. We open up with a flashback to Indy's childhood where we discover what led him to become a swashbuckling archeologist, see the inspiration for his iconic fashion sense (and see why that hat is do damn important to him) and get the first glimpses of a father who's obssession would cause a distant relationship between them.

After we return to Indy's present-day life, we discover that his father (who spent his life chasing the Holy Grail) has gone missing. What ensues is a long mystery, full of secret societies, hidden clues, and a lot of great entertainment and humor.

The acting was well done. Harrison Ford, as always, pulls off his character with complexity and depth, as always, with that trademark humor that makes the Indiana Jones character such an icon. Sean Connery was perfect as Indy's father, a mix of humor, distantness, fatherly love and absent-mindedness. Their interactions were plausible, filled with just the right amount of emotion, and truly gave a new depth to the character of Indiana Jones.

The female lead, Dr Elsa Schneider, provided the first strong female lead of the series. While Marion was not a damsel in distress to be sure, Elsa was a whole level above. She was smart, quick, calm under pressure, and more than able to take care of herself.

I don't want to give away too much for the few people out there that haven't seen this yet. But it brings back what an Action/Adventure movie is supposed to be. Action, good plot, a hint of mystery, and great underlying humor.  A most worthy sequel of a timeless franchise.

Review:Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

This movie was hard to watch, even for a sequel. Spielberg seemed to lose everything that made the first movie great in such a short time.

The movie opens, not with an exciting archeological find, but with Jones negotiating with Chinese mobsters in a Shanghai nightclub. This whole scene, while amusing at parts, seemed more fitting for a James Bond movie than an Indiana Jones.

The other two primary characters, Short Round and Willie, were two-dimensional, shallow, and largely unnecessary. Short Round was a young orphan Jones saved and let tag along and help on his mission to deal with the mob.While perky and relatively funny, he served almost no purpose except for towards the end of the movie. Willie was a night-club singer in the club where Jones was going through his dealings. She was a bimbo, unhelpful, unproductive, uncatalystic to the story outside of providing a love interest. After the better depth and development Marion had, (and it irked me that she wasn't even mentioned, just vanished) it was disappointing to see such an uninspiring female lead.

To escape the Chinese mob, Jones (taking Willie as a hostage) boards a plane that happens to be owned by the mob. It crashes, and how does our trio save themselves? By jumping into a self-inflating raft, falling a good hundred or more feet, landing safely on snow, rocketing down a mountainside without crashing, off a cliff, dropping even farther down, yet still everyone comes out just a little damp. Um.... what? My suspension of disbelief is straining and we aren't even 20 minutes in.

We then end up in a small village who is suffering greatly because they lost their Mystical Stone of Happy Goodness, but Indy is too busy and needs to get back to the States (subtle foreshadowing is subtle....).

The group continues on and stops at a city that is known for bizarre worship and all kinds of nastiness. Oh, but they don't do that anymore....

While staying the night, we discover that they actually do continue to do bizarre sacrifices, and everyone there is evil. Oh, but their mind control can be broken by touching them with fire. Because this is clearly not an issue in a place lit brightly by torches. You seriously want to tell me that no one ever accidently burned themselves and figured this out before now?

But can Indy and Co escape this cult's vile clutches before the worst happens? To find out you'll have to sit through the crap like I did.

The entire movie is cheap special effects, and a loosely threaded storyline. Worth missing altogether unless you are really wanting to watch the entire Indy saga. But if you skip it, you're not missing much.

Review: Raiders of the Lost Ark

It's been a long time since I've seen the Indiana Jones movies. A good 15 years, so it was really great being able to come back and watch the movies again with a fresh pair of eyes.

This movie is one of the best I've ever seen. Everything came together flawlessly. And Spielberg really pushed to bring together every element that makes a film, and gave it meaning.

The characters were believable, in their own way. Indiana Jones was typecast as Harrison Ford (Indiana is truly the Han Solo of archeology). Through the movie we see a complex character. On the one hand we see a college professor, who is passionate, but reasonably mild-mannered. On the other, we see a hardened treasure hunter, how can be quick to anger, calm under pressure, worldly, funny, driven.

His well-known outfit of rugged leather and a fedora is both recognizable, and shows the adventuresome side versus his clean cut suit that he wears as a professor. The image gives such a dichotomy to this character. And of course, Harrison Ford is great no matter what.

His counterpart and primary antagonist in the film is Belloq, a fellow archeologist. Belloq is constantly one step ahead of Jones, and takes a far more mercenary approach to archaeology. Where Jones donates all of his finds to a museum, Belloq works for the highest bidder (private investors). However, he is not inherently evil. While he may have it out for Jones, he shows concern and compassion for others. As he himself says, he is what Jones could have become, and the contrast adds depth not only to Belloq, but to Jones as well.

Major Arnold Toht is the most visible of the villains. A vicious member of the SS, he is cold, cruel, and so undeniably evil. Even the guy's eyeglasses look evil. He provides a real sense of peril and foreboding for the main characters when they fall into his clutches. Reminiscent of Vader himself, he does a great job of making the audience's skin crawl whenever he's around.

Marion Ravenwood is the film's heroine. While not a swachbuckler herself, and one that often finds herself in need of rescue, she's not your typical damsel in distress. She's clever, fiesty, fiery and altogether a strong female lead.

The plot is full mystery, twists, excitement, and intrigue. Ending in a climax of epic proportions, it leaves the viewer satisfied. Loose ends are tied up, and the adventure comes to a satisfying close.

If you are like my husband and have somehow missed seeing this movie, you absolutely have to go out and see it. You won't be disappointed.