Blu-ray Review HTF Blu-Ray Review: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (1 Viewer)

[Chris Atkins]

I saw it thrice in the theaters, was quite disappointed on first viewing, but enjoyed it much better the second time around.

 

[Brent M]

Honestly, I don't know how you can even compare those two situations. I never would have made that correlation in a thousand years as they are entirely different scenarios as far as I'm concerned.

 

[cafink]

Actually, when watching Iron Man, the first thing I thought of when that scene came up was the "fridge" scene from Indiana Jones. I don't think it's nearly as bad as the fridge scene, but it did stand out as wildly implausible in an otherwise great movie. Of course, I also enjoyed Indiana Jones in spite of the fridge scene. To be honest, Indy's mispronunciation of "nuclear" bothered me more. Indy would know better!

 

[EnricoE]

didn't you guys know that indy has midicloriens in him

 

[Seppo]

Same here, and I think I enjoyed even more on my third viewing. After the first viewing I was so freaking disappointed. "Crystal Skull" is pretty much the only movie I've ever truly waited to see. I'm so glad I decided to see it again and it proved to be a fairly enjoyable experience. The movie is not what I wanted nor expected and the flaws are all over the place and it's my least favourite Indiana Jones film, but I still like it - to a certain degree, at least.

The Blu-ray release is absolutely top-notch in every aspect.

 

[TonyD]

I am loving every minute of this blu-ray.
It looks terrific.

No one has mentioned the THX logo before the film starts.
just spectacular.

This is right a the top of my favorite blu's so far.
the lighting and the film like look is perfect.

there is an HD tease of the other Indiana Jones in oe of the docs on disc 1.

 

[Paul_Warren]

Amazed people choose to pick holes in the this film and focus on the negative.

In previous movies Indy has survived the following:

Getting dragged under a truck for ages without getting crushed.
Getting burned alive by the wrath of god when the ark is opened. He had his eyes closed but the heat burnt the rope so it must have been hot and neither of them got any skin burns.

Falling out a plane onto an inflatable raft which then happens to land on a snowy mountain and lands the right way up after plunging a long way into a river which quickly turns to the tropics in the blink of an eye so that mountain slope must have been pretty high.

Getting thrown overboard from an exploding ship in a heavy storm then the next shot being a long way away in a stormy ocean and about to put the lifebelt on so how did he swim so far in such a short space of time.

Being overtaken in a small tunnel by a burning plane which then happens to explode just in front of them but neither Indy or his dad take any shrapnel damage.

Same car journey Indy & his Dad again avoid shrapnel injuries when a bomb large enough to cause a 6ft deep crater in the road directly ahead explodes less than 10ft away.

I think the fridge was no more inplausable than any of those as they all defy the known laws of physics which is why the Indy movies are not meant to be taken too seriously having their roots in the pulp cinema serials of the 1930/40s!!

 

[Clinton McClure]

Indy and Marion didn't get burned by the wrath of God because they were not attempting to use the Ark's powers and were in league to prevent evil from attempting just that, nor did they open their eyes because doing so would be casting their eyes on God, a feat which a mere human cannot survive. In doing this, they were spared and released from their bonds, hence the burned ropes but uninjured heroes.

At least that's my take on it.

 

[Brad M]

I think the monkey scene was far worse than the fridge. Of course I'm pretty warped in my thinking. Still, I'm really looking forward to owning this release and do not believe they'll make me rebuy it in the future in order to own the others on Blu.

 

[Paul D Snyder]

I definitely won't be buying this Blu Ray, sadly. I so wanted to enjoy this movie but the poor dialogue and plot ruined it. I was truly disappointed that after so many years this is the best they could do for Harrison Ford and the once great character of Indy.

No matter how good it looks on Blu Ray and regardless of the number of extra features the disc offers you just can't polish this one enough...

 

[Edwin-S]

Those are good examples. In my case, I know in reality every one of those situations would kill or maim a person. I can accept the situations because the scenes, in reality, are impossible but are still within the limits of my ability to suspend disbelief. The "Nuke fridge" sequence just went too far. It just exceeded my ability to stretch the limits of reality. There was no way that I could accept that even Indy would survive the heat, concussive force, and radiation of a nuclear blast by hiding in a fridge, even one lined with lead. In my mind, it was too ridiculous.

Also some of your examples took place in a framework of tongue-in-cheek humour. The fridge incident doesn't. There is nothing inherently funny in Indy's desperate attempt to survive the blast. To me, the humour only occurred when I saw the fridge flying out of the blast zone at high speed. I couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity of the whole scene. The stuff with the plane, the bomb crater, etc. was intended to be funny. The nuke fridge incident in Crystal Skull wasn't meant to be funny but became so merely because it broke the camel's back when it came to absurdity.

 

[Edwin-S]

I should have asked. Is it out in the BD wild yet? I'll probably rent it and see if it grows on me. I only saw it in the theatre once and I was vaguely disappointed. I found that it wasn't horribly bad, but it wasn't smashingly good either.

 

[Jeff Jacobson]

The South Park episode can be viewed online (legally) at the official website.

 

[Jefferson Morris]

I'm going to rent this one, with more dread than anticipation, I'm afraid. I skipped it in the theater, based primarily on my best friend's pan of the film ("F*ckin' brutal," was his assessment.)

I just think Spielberg has moved on from this kind of popcorn entertainment. It's just not where his heart is anymore, and it shows. But he's still capable of brilliance (i.e., Munich) when the material inspires him. He just needs to stay the hell away from David Koepp. For the love of God.

As for George Lucas, he should be enjoined from touching any of his intellectual property from now on. Hate to say that, as he is perhaps the seminal artist of my childhood. But there it is.

Regarding South Park, I would say it peaked with its magisterial eighth season, but on occasion it still manages to make me laugh harder than any other show on TV. Lucas' "O-face" during the show's twisted homage to The Accused was an example. I couldn't breathe.

--Jefferson Morris

 

[Christopher_S]

Count me as looking forward to picking up the BD tomorrow.

I saw the movie just once in the theater. I have many of the same problems as others seem to when it comes to the specifics of the plot, but I still left the theater pretty happy. I feel like I won't really be able to judge the film fairly against the original three until I've seen it a similar number of times - and that's going to take a few years.

 

[Adam Sanchez]

I couldn't of said it better myself. Indy has been though countless implausable situations but for whatever reason, the most recent ones get nitpicked.

I will happily state Crystal Skull IS a good movie. To me. No offense to anyone here, but I am glad I can simply go to a movie and enjoy it. There are SO many movies I love that I've discovered are really hated or at least disliked on the forums and I guess the general population. But I like them.

Maybe I just have a knack for going into a movie and knowing what to expect, and by that count I'm usually satisfied. I can't wait to get this Blu-Ray after work!

 

[Brent M]

I can simply go to a movie and enjoy it as well. That was definitely the case with flicks like Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk and The Dark Knight(3 times) this summer. However, I did not find Indy IV to be the least bit enjoyable during my theatrical viewing and when I walked out of the theater I swore I'd never suffer through it again. I'm going to give it another shot as a rental(a FREE rental from Blockbuster), but I certainly don't think the problems I had with it the first time around will just magically disappear on a second viewing.

 

[Chris Atkins]

Picked up the BR at Wally World this morning. Paid $27. That's certainly better than $30, but would like to see new release pricing to come down even mroe than that. I won't pay more than $25 for a new blu-ray unless it's a special title like Indy.

 

[Nathan Eddy]

All the preposterous stunts are valid points (and they are true to an extent with the previous movies, too), but I think these criticisms miss the main point. The main problem with this movie wasn't ridiculous stunts, it was a plot that violated some very basic rules of story-telling.

For one thing, Indy's motivation was unclear, ambiguous, which drives a wedge between character and audience. In all the previous Indy films, he really wanted the "McGuffin," for reasons that went straight to the heart of his character: his love and respect for archeology, as an enterprise which revealed and celebrated not only cultures of the past, but reminded us what we treasure about cultures and people around us today (hence his struggle against Nazis, and his quest to get the stones back to the starving tribe). These items *meant* something, and gave his quest a focus and gravitas. Who can forget the quiet sense of awe as he depicted the Staff of Ra on the chalkboard, explaining the importance of the Ark? This low-key explanation cemented his authenticity as a passionate scholar, which made his "ridiculous" super-humans struggles seem justified, even when those struggles changed their focus from a treasure to rescuing people he loved.

And that personal motivation translates directly into audience interest. But in Crystal Skull, Indy undermines that connection by repeatedly stating that he doesn't believe in the stories, and doesn't care about the skull. His motivation for going on this adventure is that some guy and girl have gone missing--characters we don't care about, and Jones doesn't seem to care much about them either. In fact, one of the characters could have given him very powerful motivation to go find her, but they purposely keep her identity hidden for a cheap surprise reveal (which isn't a surprise because we all knew going into this that she was in the movie). But the filmmakers skip over this chance for increasing the stakes via giving Jones a powerful personal motivation, in favor of the cheap surprise reveal that's not a surprise.


It wouldn't matter how realistic the stunts were, or how great an adventure story it could have been, it wouldn't be a compelling Indiana Jones story when you treat the main character as a mere vehicle for action pieces.

But the problems go beyond the main character to other crucial areas of the plot. There were so many lost chances for suspense and tension. The central conflict of the movie--the struggle between the "good guys" and the "bad guys"--was entirely superfluous. Indy was *willingly* doing what the bad guys wanted him to do! if the good guys and the bad guys wanted the same thing, why were they fighting over the skull?!? The evil Russian woman apparently wanted to return it just like Jones did! All their fighting and conflict was completely pointless. Someone should have said, "Hey, you know what? If we stopped all these car chases and sword fights, we could just take the skull together, since we both want the same thing." It didn't matter if *Jones* returned the skull, or if *she* did. Nothing catastrophic happened after the villains got their way! When there is no difference between success and failure, how can it possibly matter?

Coupled with a weak villain, and the fact that Indy had nothing to do in the last 30 minutes, of the movie, there's no way you can make a compelling story out of these core narrative failures. You could Mythbust each and every stunt, prove them to be plausible, and in the end you'd still have a story that makes no sense, and a character who indifferently floats from scene to scene until he ultimately just stands around. That's not a story, folks.

 

[TravisR]

I just got done watching the movie again and I still love it. The disc looks great too.