fuck off Dr. Jones.

Went to the midnight screening of the Indiana Jones film last night. It wasn't pretty.

Good bits: Karen Allen and a fun chase scene about half way through.

Bad bits: everything else. But special mentions for John Hurt, Ray Winstone, Cate Blanchett, CGI monkeys and the painfully dull last 25 minutes.

It felt like a bad imitation of an Indiana Jones film. In fact it felt a lot like The Mummy Returns. That bad.

I think Spielberg may have done so much worthy oscar bait recently that he's completely forgotten how to pace an action film. And how to time visual gags. And how to balance sentimentality with nastiness. And how to be better than Michael cunting Bay.

I liked The Mummy Returns.

I really felt all along that this would suck. Hopefully it is slightly better than my expectations.

I don't want to see this, having had memories of Star Wars upset by the latter day car crashes. I love Raiders; it's in my all-time top 3.

But since Indy came along, the genre is saturated. Tomb Raider, National Treasure, The Da Vinci Code all play on Indy riffs, and basically, there are so many bad Indy clones out there that I can't help but think that this is going to be a bad Indy clone. Hell, I thought Temple of Doom was shite and Last Crusade was way overrated, so I should probably steer well clear here.

i thought national treasure was ok

Me too. Sahara was ok too.

Da Vinci Code is shit, however. If you're going to take yourself that seriously, you have to come up with a vaguely plausible story. The plot line of all of the Indiana Jones films have more historical credibility than Da Vinci Code. Come to think of it, Star Wars was more plausible than the Da Vinci code.


Nothing can compete with Raiders of the Lost Ark. It's an absolute stone-cold classic, not only because it was a great film, but at the time it was released, it was like nothing we'd seen before (we being people who were kids at the time).

But that doesn't mean the later films don't have their charms. The title character is still just as fun to watch.

I'm a little suspicious that this crystal skull (while based on real life artifact) just can't create the gravitas of the Lost Ark of the Covenant or the Holy Grail. And, since this takes place in the 1950s, the Nazis are gone. The Nazis in Raiders of the Lost Ark especially are some of the greatest film villains of all time. Especially the guy in the white suit and panama hat. Nothing says evil like a white suit.

Communists just aren't as good.

Don't get me wrong - I loved National treasure and even liked the follow-up, but that's because I accepted they the nearest I was going to get to Indy-style romping, and accepted it's Indy-liteness and it was cool. I'll be watching the new one with a heavy heart thinking I wish they'd have never made the Temple of Doom, and an error has been compounded by a mistake and now a tragedy.

I'm so going to see this at a cinema now. Feckers.

I really liked Temple of Doom. It might have been a bit self-referential, but the Ford/Connery dynamic added some great comedy to the format.

You mean Last Crusade?

Yeah. The above post is also how I articulated my thoughts as a ten-year-old.

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I remember seeing Raiders when it first came out (in Reading - opposite the Jack of Both Sides - what was that cinema called?). I sat through the whole film gaping in amazement (from the brilliant rolling stone ball scene onwards), while my mate Mark was sat next to me shouting "You're joking!" at every twist. So new, so fresh.

The others were bollix, and I don't hold out much hope for this new one.


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QUOTE:
I'm a little suspicious that this crystal skull (while based on real life artifact)...

Crystal skulls were apparently all knocked up from quartz by some German artisans in the 19th century.

"Here mate, want to buy a magic Aztec skull?"

So Indiana is going to be fighting the communists for the control of some 19th-century artifacts that will raise a fortune on "Cash in the Attic"?

Should be a right roller-coaster this one. I'm going to see it at lunchtime (double student rate discount)!

"Two for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull please"

"You have chosen...poorly"

It's nowhere near as bad as Kid D made out above. It's not Raiders , but it's nowhere near as dumb as Tomb Raider or as boring as The Mummy. I'd say it's better than the Temple of Doom, and would have been better than the Last Crusade if only the ending had been less predictable.

It's well worth a viewing, if you've no better way to kill a couple of hours. However, do NOT go expecting a sensible plot (as if you would). Apparently several writers had scripts for a fourth Indy film turned down over the years while Lucas and Spielberg waited for the "perfect plot". If this is what they were waiting for, I'd sue the fuckers if I was one of the ones they turned down.

***SPOILERS***

Good bit - Ray Winstone being introduced as a character to help explain Indy's life over the last 20 years (they've been spies together for MI6 and the OSS, respectively, which makes kind of sense).

Bad bit - Ray Winstone still being in it at the end. Should have found a way to kill him off half way through (ideally, the KGB should have topped him themselves, as soon as his "part" in the plot was exposed).

Good bit - The KGB taking Indy to the hangar where the Ark was hidden at the end of Raiders .

Bad bit - the first moment you realise, in the hangar, that what the KGB are after is Roswell remains. Oh shit, you think, this is going to be Indiana Jones meets the X-Files.

Good bit - Indy realising he's in the middle of a dummy town in Nevada about to be blown up in a nuclear detonation. And the CGI of the explosion itself.

Bad bit - how he "escapes" the nuke. Come on .

Good bit - Indy linking up with his long-lost son.

Bad bit - When you realise the "tough kid" is the little lad out of "Even Stevens".

Good bit - the plot device of Indy tracking down the crystal skull from the directions sent to him by "Ox".

Bad bit - John Hurt as "Ox" when Indy finally finds him.

Good bit - the tank chase next to the Amazon gorge, and the subsequent drop over the Iguazu Falls.

Bad bit - the punch-up inbetween the two between Indy and the KGB bloke, which went on for ever and reminded me of the two Geordies on the dockside on the Fast Show beating each other up interminably.

Good and bad bit - the whole ending. Spectacular to watch, but a real "what the fuck?". Not least, how did one of the skulls come to be "missing" in the first place, if these things are all so-powerful? Who nicked it to start with?

****SPOILERS*****