Be careful for spoilers—they’re everywhere!As a kid, I was in love with the Indiana Jones films. Unlike most Lucas fans, I actually preferred the Jones trilogy over the Star Wars trilogy, and rather than viewing Sean Connery as James Bond, I always saw him as Dr. Henry Jones.
Like most 20-something guys, I was certainly excited to experience the new chapter in Indy’s story with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. After viewing it, the closest way to express my opinion is through the words of my friend Steve:
“Watching the movie, I felt like Indiana in the refrigerator. The entire franchise was being nuked, and I was helplessly stuck in the fridge, rolling down a steep hill.”
You’re probably thinking, “Well, like many people, your expectations were obviously too high going into the film.” My expectations were NOT too high. I wasn’t expecting a masterpiece, but the almost 20-year gap left the filmmakers with enough time to develop a great story, and I was at least anticipating some fun, adventure, comedy, and entertaining action sequences. What George Lucas and Steven Spielberg left us with was a technically-flawed film, a weak story, tedious action sequences, flat acting, horrible CGI effects, and too many plotholes. Let’s examine each one of these categories and allow me to explain myself before you quickly disregard my harsh opinion.
The Technical Aspects
Technical blunders occur throughout the original three Indiana Jones films. Continuity mistakes can be brushed aside in the first three, so I’ll completely skip these in order to concentrate on some of the larger issues, firstly the cinematography.
Cinematographer Janusz Kaminski shot the film. Now Mr. Kaminski has shot such films as Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan, and Minority Report, so there’s no arguing that this two-time Oscar winner knows what he’s doing. With
that said, why is this film so horribly lit? I’m certainly not a cinematographer, but I know bad lighting when I see it, and one simply has to watch the entire first scene of dialogue to notice that the “outside scene” was filmed on a soundstage under tons of lights. There’s nothing wrong with shooting on a soundstage, but the audience shouldn’t be able to realize this fact. With the original films, the viewer follows Indy from a distance through his adventures. We’re with him every step of the way, and camera focuses on the actual action taking place instead of trying to over-complicate things. This film’s distracting camera movements during action sequences completely delude the franchise’s look--they resembled the action sequences from Minority Report than anything. If I wanted to see crazy camera movements, I’d go see Speed Racer instead.
Not only does Spielberg continuously work with a great cinematographer, but he also employs perhaps the greatest living film composer on the planet: Mr. John Williams. His scores are constantly engaging and flawless, yet The Crystal Skull felt like random, boring musical snippets from the older films. Even the Temple of Doom score employs new themes and interesting middle eastern/Indian influences—in this one he more or less just goes through the motions and employs no creativity whatsoever.
The CGI Effects
Steven Spielberg promised us that he would only use CGI when absolutely necessary. He lied.
Was it “absolutely necessary" to create CGI gophers at the beginning of the film? First of all, there was no reason to show these animals in the first place! Secondly, they couldn’t find real animals? Almost 100 years of filmmaking relied on using actual animals onscreen until this ungodly “everything has to be CGI age.” They looked like computer-generated Star Wars monsters.
While we’re talking about animals, let’s talk about ants. While I understand it’s difficult to obtain millions of ants and have them attack a stunt double, why did the CGI ants look so terrible? Part of the appeal of using snakes, bugs, and rats in the original trilogy was that they were REAL! It loc
ked viewers in because it was authentic, and we were able to picture ourselves in a dire situation like that—it also helped that the camera tended to focus on the actors’ reactions more than anything. The horribly computer-generated ants were embarrassing and had no emotional effect on the audience. This also applies to the scorpions and the gophers. The use of green screen during the action scenes (the jungle car chase scene, Mac’s death), the giant explosion at the end, Cate Blanchett’s death scene, the already-mentioned ant scene, the generic-looking UFO, and many other shots solely relied on computer effects. If you don’t believe me, Spielberg estimated a total of 450 computer-generated effects shots for this film. In another Spielberg film, Jurassic Park, the audience went along with it because the dinosaurs looked and felt incredibly real. Spielberg utilized models, robots, and the developing computer effects to create these beasts, and by doing this, created one of the visually greatest films I personally have ever seen. Why not do the same thing with this movie? Miniature and life-size models, makeup effects, stunts, and other movie tricks could have been implemented at any point to improve the look of these scenes AND help to enhance the look of the overall film. This leads us to the action scenes.
The long, tedious action scenes relied more on computer effects and camera tricks than it did on actual stunt work and original ideas. Enough said.
The Acting
Let’s face it, it’s not THAT difficult to play Indiana Jones if you’re Harrison Ford—it doesn’t matter how old you are, because you possess the enthusiasm to play the part. It seemed like halfway through he didn’t even want to be in front of the camera anymore. The only actor who truly delivered was Cate Blanchett. Even though her character was one-dimensional (more on that later), she did the best she could with the script. Hell, she could’ve played Indiana Jones, and Marion, and the ants and done a better job.
The Story/Plot
The mystery, discovery, humor, and adventuresome feel of the original movies were sadly absent through this entire film. The attempts at humor didn't work. Not only that, but the movie lacks the human emotion that made Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade my favorite Indy movie (when Indy’s dad tells “Indiana” to let the Holy Grail go and the music rises to the foreground, it’s truly a beautiful moment). The weak story and lack of interesting, emotional characters is my biggest complaint about this movie.
Firstly, there was no real motivation for Indiana to complete the mission. In Raiders, Indy HAD to find the Ark before the Nazis or else this world would be forced to bow down to Hitler’s brutal army, so there was a lot at stake. The missing children was a good enough reason to discover the temple in the second film. The Last Crusade dealt with preventing the Nazis from a) obtaining his father’s dairy and b) killing his father. These are strong, yet simple plots that worked---the new movie’s jumbled plot doesn’t work whatsoever. Why does Indy HAVE to return the crystal skull to it’s rightful place, and when he does and the UFO flies away, is the world really a better place than it was before? You might say, “Rick, he has to keep the Soviets from obtaining it,” but I disagree. Without Indy, the Soviets wouldn’t succeed in their mission—they needed him to do EVERYTHING it seems. If Indy just left with his friends 2/3 through the movie, everybody would have been fine.
Now to the The UFO/alien plot: I’m speechless! Not only are aliens now in the Indiana Jones world (same world as Star Wars possibly?), but they’re the run of the mill aliens we’ve seen in 121098 other movies. They could have gone in SO many different directions, but they chose the UFO route…how unfortunate. Actually, a friend of mine had an interesting theory.
In the 1980s (when the other Indy movies were released), Reagan was president, and there was a huge upsurge in the Conservative Christian movement. Televangelists and Evangelicals were gaining popularity, and the Indiana Jones films tended to focus on Judeo-Christian artifacts (the Ark, the Holy Grail), but now what is the new popular “religion” in Hollywood? That’s right, Scientology! And who’s running that show? That’s right, Spielberg’s good friend Tom Cruise. So I don’t know…maybe Spielberg’s gone off the deep end too.
Another shame is how they had to spell EVERYTHING out to the audience. When Indy’s friend foresees them going down three waterfalls (suspending one’s disbelief to the MAX is essential in this film), Marion needs Indy to spell it out, as if the audience doesn’t understand. Also, showing us the whole UFO at the very end, besides being incredibly unnecessary, stole all the mystery surrounding the movie’s plot.
What was the point of having Indiana Jones survive a nuclear explosion? Remember that every scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark enhanced the plot in some way or another (including the opening sequence, because it introduces the villain and introduces Indy himself). Trapped in a refrigerator as it flew through the air (the only refrigerator in the whole neighborhood to do so by the way) and bounce down a hill, I felt like the filmmakers were merely mocking the character and style of the original films.
Even though I love Cate Blanchett, her villainous character (along with all of the other “bad guys” in the movie) was incredibly flat and not quite as evil as she could have been. In a cheesy, unnecessary green-screened sword fight sequence with Shia LeBeouf, she can’t even hold up her dueling skills to a Greaser! Also, her character went nowhere with that mind reading skill. All of the other villains/Russians served absolutely no point except to get shot, run over, or killed randomly. The Mayan-looking temple people were in about two minutes of the movie, then were miraculously killed by only three or four of Cate Blanchett’s people. They served no plot purpose whatsoever.
Speaking of Shia, watching him swing like a monkey through the jungle actually made me laugh out loud. Maybe Marion was secretly infected by that monkey in Raiders of the Lost Ark and gave birth to a half-man, half-monkey son, because he was alittle TOO good at the swinging. It was painful, though not as painful as hearing Marion tell Indy that Mutt’s his son (a plot element that was painfully obvious from the beginning when he said his mother’s name was Marion).
It was difficult for me to personally roll with the “love story” element of this one, mainly for the reason that these two people chose to not talk to each other for 20 years or so. She seems to fall instantly in love with him again, but if she really loved him, then why did she get married and not tell him about their son? If he REALLY loved her, then he would have simply tried harder to make their relationship work in the past.
The fam goes for a nice drive in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of CGI--err, Crystal SkullThere were plot holes aplenty throughout the entire film. For example, how Indiana suddenly become the Assistant Dean of the college at the very end? What did he do to deserve this honor through the two hour film? The school wouldn't care about the Crystal Skull or the lost city. It makes no sense! There are many more plot holes throughout the movie, but I’ve already written enough.
Perhaps I’m being too harsh, and yes, I know I’m looking into it too closely, but it’s an Indiana Jones movie!
I can somewhat safely say that there are a few (very few) positive elements of this film. The diner scene and the scene with the snake in the jungle both reminded me of classic Indiana Jones moments, and the opening fight sequence in the warehouse where Raiders ended was at least enjoyable (though it was odd that such an important place was guarded by only four or five guards at the gate). They did a halfway decent job at establishing the 1950s tone right from the beginning, but that tone also seemed to vanish during the second half of the film.
It’s just such a shame, because there were extremely talented people involved with this venture, so leaving the theater unsatisfied and frankly somewhat pissed off was not in the night’s plan. Unfortunately though, the ending moments of this film could never surpass four men riding into the sunset at the end of the trilogy. To me, that’s where Indiana Jones’ story will always end.
It’s just such a shame, because there were extremely talented people involved with this venture, so leaving the theater unsatisfied and frankly somewhat pissed off was not in the night’s plan. Unfortunately though, the ending moments of this film could never surpass four men riding into the sunset at the end of the trilogy. To me, that’s where Indiana Jones’ story will always end.
