Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) (1 Viewer)

[Mikael Soderholm]

Highly recommended thread (and movie ).
I agree about the ending of Minority Report, though.

Re Indy/skulls, I saw it two days ago, and am still thinking about what I liked and not about it. I may need to see it again (can't really wait for the DVD) to make sure. Indy seemed a bit old in the beginning, but he picked up as the movie went on. Cate was fairly cool as the villainess, but not menacing enough. Mac was there for way too long, Karen Allen not enough. Not sure why so many are upset about the particular supernatural things in this movie, as opposed to the others, they have always been about supernatural things, IMHO (and not just mine, even Spielberg himself said so).

 

[Chris Atkins]

Did anyone else think the ADR work was horrible, particularly in the opening scenes? At times it didn't even sound like Harrison Ford.

 

[Don Solosan]

"Well, I can't recall Indy getting in any fisticuffs with Toht either."

Well, there's the big gun battle at Marion's bar. But your point about there being multiple villains for Indy to deal with is well taken.

 

[TravisR]

I'll be the first to admit that there's CG shots that look like CG in this movie (such as Mutt's legs in the jeep chase, the monkeys and the alien) but there are also hundrerds of other CG shots that are phenomenal. When CG works, most people have no clue that they're even seeing a shot that is CG or augmented with CG. I've never seen a movie with hundreds of CG shots where I think every shot looks real and this movie has as good of a success rate with CG as any other.

 

[Kevin Grey]

I know a lot of people think that they filmed the Area 51 stuff early on and maybe Ford was still getting into the role but that's actually not the case- that was all done at least half way into production.

 

[Paul_Scott]

I do remember my thought process seeing Raiders for the first time, when he gets pitched out of the front window of truck and is spread eagle over the front driver side wheel- " OMG! There is NO way he's getting out of this one!"

 

[Brett_M]

I guess not.

 

[Pete-D]

The lightsaber fight in TPM was cool, but not ultimately not enough to save that movie from sinking.

I'd rank Crystal Skull above TPM and AOTC (which I thought was even worse than TPM) just on the Jar-Jar (Ep.1) and romance (Ep.2) alone. Yes, it was *that* bad.

My Indy rankings would be as follows

1. Raiders

2. Last Crusade
3. Doom

4. Crystal Skull

I liked ToD actually probably the most as a kid and it's very close to TLC for me, but watching it again recently and yeah I notice some of the rough patches of that film a bit more. Still fun though.

 

[Mikel_Cooperman]

The Monkey vines scenes had to be the most inane scene ever to grace a Motion Picture screen. Was this George's Idea?

 

[Matthew_Def]

I disagree. First of all those other points boil down to getting away too. But I'd say the point of Skulls is to protect the skull. They have to have the skull after this chase, if they lose it, and it did slip out of their hands, then they were screwed.

None of the CG really bothered me in the film, it was scenes themselves as scripted that were the problem.

 

[MikeRS]

Nostalgia cuts both ways, Chuck. It can also make one harder on this film because like all sequels, it is the same but different. The fact that the different is mixed with the same is what creates violent (emotionally-speaking) reactions. So that's the darkside of nostalgia.


And while nostalgia allows folks to be more forgiving of the "unforgivable sins of "Doom" and "Crusade" in retrospect, this episode get's raked over coals in the here and now.


Cuts both ways.....

 

[MikeRS]

Yeah, on second viewing I noticed. You could tell the ADR whenever Ford sounds like John Wayne. But it doesn't happen too often in the rest of the picture. Just odd few moments.

And I maintain the jungle chase is great fun (Mutt, monkeys, and all), and I foresee it holding up very strongly in the coming years.

It has that sustained velocity that is a Spielberg highlight. Geography and editing are superb. Everyone gets their moment (including the villain). And it's fun, fun, fun

Chuck, to me, although it resembles a the truck chase from Raiders, it plays more (emotionally-speaking) like "the mine cart chase" of the picture. Mine cart chase was just about getting away (the kids were already free). Jungle chase is about getting away from their captors. It signals the end of the middle-exposition stretch, and does it smashingly. At both of my viewings, the audience loved it.

I also had no problem with Indy sharing the spotlight. Indy is still the guy that jumpstarts the chaos. He is the influence even when he is not the specific highlight of a moment.

I also loved this on second viewing.....



"You don't know him....You don't know him....YOU DON'T KNOW HIM...BANG!

 

[Brent M]

Nah, Episode I and II at least had some inventive stuff in them that we'd never seen before. There was nothing in Indy IV that was revolutionary or even semi cutting edge for that matter. The action set pieces were flat as a pancake and regardless of what you think about TPM and AOTC they did have their fair share of "WOW" moments. Overall I find those flicks light years ahead of Crystal Skull.

 

[Michael Allred]

Big thumbs up on that one.

 

[Greg_S_H]

I just saw this yesterday, but I don't remember what this is about.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Greg, that is Mac talking about Indy, trying to warn the Russians how tenacious he is. I liked that as well. It felt Indy.

I thought KotCS did have a wow moment. The nuclear warhead going off, and subsequent chaos was pretty special. This film is almost worth it just for those 5 minutes.

 

[Ray H]

nm.

 

[Pete-D]

The dialogue/acting and even the plot (a trade blockade ... yippie and a "mystery" plot that isn't even resolved properly) for Ep. 1 and 2 is so god awful though I'd say it evens the table considerably.

The only action scene in Ep. 1 or 2 that really blew me away was the Darth Maul fight.

Ep. 2 with all the Jedi running around was kind of lame, like a bunch of action figures come to life rather than an involving, epic battle, it was a bit too CGI-toony.

I think KotCS is kind of the inverse of ToD. Both have serious flaws from the screenplay, but ToD gets a lot of the little details right and makes sure Indy is front and center, while KotCS gets more of the broader details right but fails in getting the smaller details down.

If you've written an Indiana Jones movie that loses track of both Indiana Jones and the main female lead -- you've really done something wrong. As silly and even stupid as Temple of Doom got, it never made that mistake.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Don't get me started on AOTC. KotCS is Last of the Mohicans compared to that

 

[Brent M]

Absolutely wrong, but we've had this debate before so there's no point in beating that dead horse.