Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
By Joe Kreil
| A few years ago, George Lucas came back to the film-making world and blew the dust off of his Star Wars trilogy. First, he redid many portions of the trilogy and then, he put out three new movies. Each one was eagerly awaited by fans but it soon became obvious that George Lucas had single handedly destroyed his own trilogy with his “improvements” and that the prequel movies could not hold a candle to the original trilogy. Most of this was due to a shoddy storyline, wooden dialogue and a new reliance on cheap laughs.
When news came out that a fourth Indiana Jones movie was finally being made, a lot of fans felt a small amount of fear. Would George Lucas destroy yet another trilogy that had made him so famous? Would Lucas be writing the script? While the script is nowhere near as bad as the prequel Star Wars movies, Lucas has yet again created another movie that does not live up to the original trilogy. Once more, he has come back to something that was fine where it was. First of all, the enthusiasm of Harrison Ford can not be ignored. He has kept fit and eagerly awaited a chance to play Indiana Jones again, possibly Ford’s favorite character to play in a film. Many wondered if Ford would still be agile and strong enough to perform and do his own stunts. He was indeed. While age is definitely starting to show on Harrison Ford and Indy moves a lot slower then we remembered, he still manages to pull off his own stunts and bring experience into the role. The plot revolves around Indiana Jones attempting to beat the Russians to El Dorado (the Lost City of Gold). Complicating things are a greaser sidekick (his name gives away his and Indy’s connection if you remember Last Crusade, see after the review if you really want to know) named Mutt Williams (Shia LaBeouf) , the return of Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) and a strange crystal skull that looks inhuman. Now, the basic problem with the movie itself is…the plot. Things are all over the place. While we have some of the old Indy charm and humor, we have a movie that mostly consists of one long 20 minute car chase and Indiana being captured every 5 seconds. George Lucas’ writing doesn’t help, as he practically beats us over the head just in case we don’t get the ‘surprise’ ending (since it's mentioned every few seconds, it's not too surprising when the ending comes up…it just becomes a slow torturous wait as you pray that you are wrong). A lot of the sub plots are sort of glossed over, Indy just doesn’t seem to put up much of a fight against the Russians and we are introduced to yet another new character (Mac played by Ray Winstone) who, for some reason, we are suppose to care about and yet don’t, as we only see one side of a two dimensional character throughout the entire film. We also run into a lot of elements that were very obviously thrown in just to try and fulfill the entire Indiana Jones needs. A snake, random savages and one or two booby traps are just tossed in with very little thought or even set up. Compared to the other three Indy movies, this one is a mess. While Indy has always been known for daring acrobatics, thrilling chases and brushes with the supernatural, this entire movie will leave you staring up at the screen with a ‘what the hell?!’ expression frozen on your face. Without spoiling the ending, it is so outside the realm of Indy, that you almost feel your watching a whole nother movie. Overall, I can not recommend this movie. It is, without a doubt, the weakest and worst of the Jones trilogy (I happened to really like Temple of Doom). The ending feels horribly tacked on, the plot is shoddy, the story is mostly two really big chases and no where as clear and concise as the other three films. I didn’t feel that I was watching an Indiana Jones movie at all and I was not as immersed into Jones’ world like I was in the other three movies. If you really must see this to complete your watching of all the Indiana Jones movies then I recommend you save your ten bucks and wait for this to come out on Netflixes. SPOILER YOU’VE BEEN WARNED! SPOILER
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