Implausible Indy: Ike-Era Ford Fights Russians, Aliens
Raiders of the lost story arc! Atomic weapons, silly skulls, Karen Allen—it’s 1989 all over again ... except for a bulging action star’s constantly changing coif
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Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
Running Time 124 minutes
Written by David Koepp
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Starring Harrison Ford, Cate Blanchett, Shia LaBeouf
As summer time-wasters go, the latest Indiana Jones will go in record time, if you ask me. Steven Spielberg’s Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the first chapter in the series since 1989, is a four-star yawn. Harrison Ford started this fairy-tale franchise 27 years ago. At 65, he looks pretty darn trim, but why doesn’t he stop dyeing his hair? Sometimes it’s a rugged, manly silver. In the next scene it looks like he’s wearing a champagne rinse from Elizabeth Arden. Finally it turns orange as a Sunkist popsicle. Whatever else we expect from Indiana Jones, we don’t want him to look like Lucille Ball.
The movie itself makes no sense, but what escapist summer movie does? It’s now 1957 in a secret military base in either Nevada or New Mexico (the movie is not too clear on the subject of details), closed for atomic weapons testing. An Air Force hangar is captured by Communist agents, led by Cate Blanchett as Stalin’s favorite Russian scientist in Buster Brown bangs. Out of a trunk in a deserted warehouse comes Indy, who stages a noisy, knuckle-cracking fight that sets off a nuclear reactor and blows up everything except his trademark brown fedora. It’s one close call too many, so Indy retires from cracking whips and battling pits of hissing cobras, and goes to work as a college professor teaching a course in archaeology. Now called Colonel Jones by the dean (Jim Broadbent), he learns that his recent activities exterminating Russians have led the U.S. government to suspect him of treason (aiding K.G.B. agents on American soil, or something like that), and the college is forced to fire him. Falsely accused, hopping mad and heading out of town, the disgraced Indy runs into a brash young hotshot in motorcycle leather named Mutt (Shia LaBeouf, who looks alarmingly like Bobby Darin). Mutt’s got a proposition: Hire me and I’ll lead you to a mythical lost city in the Amazon built entirely of gold, with scientific architecture that will not be discovered for 5,000 years! There’s a secret, see, about 13 crystal skulls protected by the living dead, one of which was stolen around the time Moses either parted the Red Sea or Charlton Heston made his screen debut, whichever came first. The kid’s mother, who disappeared in the jungle, has sent him a letter written in an ancient alphabet only Indy can decode. Find the temple and he’ll find his missing Mom! Find the missing skull and Indy will make archaeological history! Of course, Ms. Blanchett, the archfiend with the bad accent, who miraculously survived the nuclear blast in Nevada (which is now referred to as New Mexico), wants Indy to translate for the Soviets, so she can discover the power of spiritual energy and control the universe. Huh? Best not to ask questions.
To make a long and very boring story short, the trail leads from a campus malt shop all the way to Peru and the burial place of the conquistador who escaped with the crystal skull—a place that may have been built by aliens that look exactly like E.T. Mr. Spielberg is smart. Never throws away his old props, puppets, or storyboards. Never know when he might need them again.
Of course, Mutt’s mother turns out to be—are you sitting down?—Indy’s long-lost girlfriend Marion (welcome back, Karen Allen). Incredulously, Mutt himself turns out to be—are you lying down?—but never mind. The script isn’t very careful about logic or coherence. The important thing is the stunts, which are a long time arriving, and all seem to have been recycled from previous (and better) Indiana Jones movies. There’s a sword fight on two separate vehicles speeding through the jungle, an attack by natives with poison darts, three death-defying crashes over waterfalls in a Jeep, a plague of man-eating red ants and a rescue by monkeys who teach Mutt to swing on vines like Bomba the Jungle Boy. Nobody suffers any wound more serious than a razor burn, and Indy always finds his fedora. It’s as contrived and convoluted as all the other Indiana Jones movies, but not as much fun.
I finally left when E.T., Ms. Blanchett in her Buster Brown bangs, and the 13 crystal skulls disappeared not only into space, but “the space between spaces.” Even when he’s dishing up corn, the director of directors usually spreads it coherently. Not this time. George Lucas’ story line is impossible to follow, and I don’t know what to make of the abysmal script by David Koepp, who once wrote dazzling, original and imaginative screenplays (Apartment Zero remains one of my favorite movies of all time) before he discovered Jurassic Park, Spider-Man, Mission: Impossible and money. This movie appears to have been written in hieroglyphics. Long on rhetoric and short on thrills, it’s an Indiana Jones adventure they all seemed to be making up as they went along.
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Move out of your parent's basement. Its a summer movie and a 10 ticket to be 8 years old again. Obviously you don't own a fedora or an imagination!
Interestingly, your poor review makes me want to see the film! I'm looking forward to a fun summer flick over the long holiday weekend. If "a bad hair day" for the cast is the only issue with this movie, I'm buying my ticket now!
I'm tempted to give you the middle finger.
Do not pay this man any attention. The so-called "critic" actually liked Untraceable (more like Unwatchable). This is an excerpt from his review of Untraceable..."This cat-and-mouse team is so hypnotic that all you do is sit there waiting while they deliver one big shock after another." -- New York Observer
FYI - Untraceable only received 15% on the tomatometer...so obviously good ole Sexy Rexy is out of touch with reality.
"Rex Reed, Retiree"...hmmm, has a nice ring to it!
Indy 4 ROCKS!!
Thou art an imbecile at a nigh on cosmic level. Indiana Jones will reign supreme again...and not just in the temporal sense.
Hey, I think I'll have fun slagging every pompous, high-handed review this fool writes! I've finally found someone I can hate more than fanboys on message boards! My sad, meaningless little existence now has purpose!!!
How on earth did this idiot get named "top critic" by RT anyways?
I agree 100% with the reviewer. I'm sorry to you die-hards who would eat anything Spielberg/Lucas gave you. This time it was a no-plot, terrible-script piece of Hollywood garbage that will only make foreigners smile at our loss of the monopoly on creative film making.
I guess I remember Last Crusade so fondly that I'm kind of insulted that this film will gross so much $$$.
Sadly, the reviewer's right. This was yet another case of Lucas giving us the middle finger.
Rex Reed isnt dead yet? I didnt know a corpse could write reviews.
Too you Rexxy you got something that starts with "A" and ends with "S". Also there is a vowel in the middle.
I agree with your review 100%
I loved the original trilogy (well, not Temple of Doom so much)
and I was eagerly anticipating this installment. I am 32 and couldn't wait to be taken back to 10 years old again. Boy, was I disappointed. Much like the Star Wars trilogy, some things are better left a childhood memory.
I imagine that I would have the same feeling if I went to my local shopping mall this Christmas season and sat on Santa's lap.....the magic is gone.
In honor of the new "Indiana Jones" movie that opened today, I made a fun little film.
It ain't Hollywood, but I think you'll enjoy it.
It's 5 minutes long. Here is the link to watch it!
http://www.atomfilms.com/film/louisiana_smith_bastard.jsp
Enjoy, and have a happy memorial day!
Best,
Dan
Rex, you are one of the best critics around. I always enjoy reading your reviews. In fact, they are often better entertainment than the subject. Thanks.
I actually walked out, too. (And I went to an advance screening invited by the filmmakers.) After an hour and a half, and nothing had really happened (they were in the quicksand), I thought: I could be here all night.
Shai LeBuff is light, light, light. Karen Allen is terrific, great to have her back.
And great to watch Spielberg's direction but oh, the script...
for some reason i keep thinking Cate Blanchett is going to speak English with a German accent in the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull though she's supposed to be Russian
"so Indy retires ... and goes to work as a college professor teaching a course in archaeology"
wat
That's what he's always done. Your review is pretty much right on, but the college professor thing has been there since the first movie.
Even after all these many years, I'd still really like to screw Karen Allen's stinky, smelly tushy!!!
I agree with this review. The movie was very disappointing. The Last Crusade should have indeed been the LAST...
Complete Garbage. . .
A horrible movie. . .only lemmingesque fans could like this departure from the original three movies. . .
Okay, yeah. And well, maybe, maybe, and maybe. But this movie is what movies are supposed to be and too often aren't. A ton of fun, and just plain entertaining. Buy your tickets, go relax, and enjoy.
Rex - I agree - this was not a good film, although it did recapture the 50's. It reminded us that it was the era of Joseph McCarthy, looking for a Commie anywhere someone smelled criticism of the government so...yeah, it's good to be reminded. But a triple trip down Niagra Falls preceded by Marion driving the jeep over the cliff with a convenient tree serving as a sling shot? Beyond ridiculous. Thought Shia very good, but Karen was not believable for even one second. I liked Cate's villian but her final scenes were not good. Best actor in this film was Jim Broadbent. Physically, yes Harrison is Indy, but his acting was 2nd worse in the film.
Lets not forget that Mr. Reed gave us his rather tepid performance in Myra Breckenridge and his directorial debut in a Valley of the Dolls sequel so any opinion of his can as quickly discarded as his dreck-ridden history in the entertainment industry. Seriously I can't believe he has a job as a writer no less!
What could any of us expect from a gay republican with rancid skin?
I disagree with some of the people who have disliked this film, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I believe that this film is just as good as the previous Indiana Jones films.
I also believe these films were never any good to begin with. And, in that, I have seen every piece of Critic Rex Reed's information happen in real time two nights ago when I viewed this installation. I not only dislike this sequel, but all the sequels and the original as well.
I get tired of Nazis (or Reds in this case) interfering with the one thing that the first film did right in only its first ten minutes: present the mystery and intrigue in penetrating the caverns of a lost treasure room. It was only that first grave-robbing scene that penetrated the pulp of genre films like King Kong, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and The First Men in the Moon. As soon as the Nazis showed up, Indiana Jones turned into a Hollywood action movie that had lost something of its own: its dimensionality. I get tired of watching the hoard of nameless bad guys show up just to give our protagonist a way to tear off his shirt and show his muscles--not that there haven't been several good films that did this, Indiana Jones has no poetry.
There are few films to act as proud of the lack of dimensionality as Spielberg's pre-Schindler's List films, and this new one is ushered back to those years of Spielberg's career when he was making a lot of money on the absence of not only intellectual thought, but any psychological examination of the social, human being. In that sense, this Indiana Jones film is also like the earlier ones. And, those people who remember the original Jones trilogy who only criticize this fourth film around twenty years later should try immediately watching the original trilogy after seeing this one, because then maybe they would realize how similar this fourth one really is in those aspects that caused them to dislike this one.
And how many films has Spielberg done about aliens? The only one in memory that deserved its time was Artificial Intelligence; and, it was the alien sequences that most people objected to, without even trying to comprehend what it meant in its relationship to the human species--the ending of A.I. said something about us. This film has no intention of drawing any such connections or asking any such questions, not because it can't, but rather because it's an Indiana Jones movie and Indiana Jones movies are made for people who don't want to think or feel.
I am as eager to be entertained as anyone, and can suspend my disbelief as much as anyone... well, anyone with some degree of discernment, anyway. This movie entertains at the beginning and that's it. Then, when the main story unfolds, it just drags without any of the awe, mystery, mystycism or urgency that made the first one so good and the other ones so passable. The reviewer hits the bull's eye, this time. This is forgettable, mediocre fare... What is perhaps the best cast any Indy movie ever had is completely wasted here. Not even Karen Allen or the great John Hurt saves this. It's closer to Michael Bay than to any of the better Spielberg popcorn movies... And that is without even bothering to question such gems as the Quechua-speaking Pancho Villa...
Stupid, Freaking, Aliens. Indiana Jones is not Fox Mulder. He's FREAKING INDIANA JONES. Indiana Jones goes looking for lost gods and stuff, *mystic*. Not this BS about Aliens.
I agree with this review wholeheartedly. I can not believe the positive reviews this movie has got. Have not been this disappointed since The Phantom Menace.
Stop destroying our big-screen icons please!
I always enjoy Rex Reed's relentless honesty & sparkling wit. I think I'll just stay home tonight and read several dozen of his reviews. That way, I know I'll be highly entertained.
Thanks for the fun, Rex!
Coffee :)
Thank heavens for Rex Reed. Keep calling them like it is, Mr. Reed. I saw the movie for free at an advance screening and I asked myself one question before going in: Was there a reason to make a fourth Indiana Jones adventure? After 2 hours of infantile acting and action, I had my answer. A resounding no. There's not much that's different in #4 from what we saw in Numbers 1, 2, and 3. The only things truly different are the new characters. But they are still cardboard villains and turncoat friends. George Lucas keeps making the same movie again and again and again. One day, he might get it right. Steven Spielberg should just be ashamed of himself.
While I do agree with many of your points regarding the convoluted and contrived plot, I cannot put much faith in the opinions of a reviewer who, quite obviously, did not pay much attention to the movie. There are too many inaccuracies in this review to take it seriously.
Clever as always though. So, after reading through a full paragraph about Ford's hair, I can fairly say that this was as convoluted and contrived as the movie, but not as fun.
Thanks anyways
Rex Reed is absolutely correct -- it is just not a good movie and it makes NO sense. As a father of a 10 year old boy, I really found it tedious to the extreme. As for my son, he loved it. Moral of the story: take your kid to the film, and you can enjoy a nice nap!
BINGO, Rex. Right on the money. (Wish I'd saved mine.) Critics have not jumped off a cliff for a movie that plays like an Ed Wood film with a giant FX budget since the deplorable Revenge of the Sith. Just a shameless vanity project with zero testerone left in its veins. How SAD!!