If you’re a red-blooded Amurican, chances are you devoted a few hours this weekend to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and chances are that you also emerged from it with a strong opinion. About three-quarters of the people I spoke with felt the movie was disappointing, and everyone else was more in my camp: eh, it was fun.
My thoughts after the jump…
Truth be told, this is one of the weaker installments in the franchise (how it ranks with Temple of Doom is still up in the air for me as it’s been about twenty years since I’ve seen that much-maligned sequel), but even as a lesser entry, Crystal Skull is still quite fun. The action is loopy and engaging, the chases are often thrilling (although occasionally idiotic — monkeys and vines, anyone?), and the story, while overly busy, is compelling enough to keep things moving along at a brisk pace.
However, while the movie successfully provides the sort of exciting escapism that we come to expect of a blockbuster, it does so in a fairly soulless way. The entire endeavor feels forgettable, even if it is satisfying. Part of the blame can come from the script, which spends so much time explaining an increasingly complex backstory to the titular crystal skull that there’s never any room for fun. When Indiana Jones isn’t making a tired old quip about being, well, tired and old, he’s usually helping us play catch-up by babbling away at the significance of anything happening on screen. There’s so much baggage that comes with this crystal skull that it takes nearly the whole movie to get all the facts straight — a problem that’s near absent in Raiders of the Lost Ark or Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Perhaps someone should have informed the filmmakers that we don’t really care too much about the treasure as long as it’s a) cool, b) important, and c) hard to get. That’s why the Ark and the Holy Grail work so well in Raiders and Last Crusade — they simply don’t require very much explanation, and as a result, we can spend more time having fun with the characters and action.
That’s not to say there’s no fun to be had in this latest iteration. There are some truly exciting sequences at hand, with two separate car/boat/motorcyle chases providing the most memorable scenes. A joyfully creepy, crawly ant hoard also threatens to upstage the entire picture and serves as one of the few places where CGI actually enhances the action, rather than distracts from. Sadly, however, George Lucas has his computer-generated fingerprints all over this bad boy, which means that instead of being caught up in an improbable sword fight atop two racing vehicles, we’re instead noticing how obvious it is that this scene was filmed on a green screen. To be fair, there is some excellent CGI work in the film, and an early mushroom cloud is both stunning and evocative, effectively announcing Indiana Jones’s arrival in the atomic age. But too often, especially in the latter portion of the movie, it feels as if Lucasfilm is strutting its mechanical stuff, rather than trying to truly give us a visceral experience. And for the record, the CGI in Iron Man is better.
The good news is that the entire cast seems to be enjoying themselves, especially the smiley Karen Allen, whose triumphant return is both welcomed and fascinatingly jarring — after all, when was the last time we saw an age-appropriate romance in a big Hollywood movie? Nevertheless, as Marion Ravenwood, Allen resurrects her prickly, love-struck heroine from Raiders and reminds why she’s been a fan-favorite since the beginning. Just about the only other person having as much fun as her (if not more) is Cate Blanchett, who chews up the scenery as the Russian villain-cum-psychic expert, Irina Spalko. There’s not much for Blanchett to do beyond barking orders and engaging in the occasional menacing glower, but she still manages to steal every scene she’s in with her over-the-top accent and severe bob.
For all the pluck the actors show, the experience still feels slightly drab. Perhaps that’s the fault of the cinematography, which follows in the style that Spielberg has used in his past several films: washed out colors coupled with bright highlights. It’s not a terribly pleasant look, especially when compared to the vibrant hues of his previous works. It’s a shame that the eye-popping Amazon locales gets such a muted treatment.
Still, as much as I’m harping on the detractions, I must underscore that I did have plenty of fun in this movie. In fact, I had enough fun that some of the more ridiculous sci-fi elements of the story barely fazed me. Some people will argue that the climax was a certifiable jump-the-shark moment for the series, but when previous installments have featured face-melting supernatural powers and voodoo attacks, it’s hard to draw the line between what constitutes plausible and implausible in the Indy world. Ultimately, the action moves briskly, even if it isn’t nearly as creatively staged as Raiders or Crusade. I would have liked more of the story to have taken place in the “real world” as opposed to the cartoony depths of the jungle, but hey, now I’m nitpicking again. The truth is that this is a flawed movie. I was able to enjoy myself enough to look past most of the problems, but they’re still there, and not everyone will be as forgiving. Nevertheless, Crusades rebounded after Temple of Doom; so there’s always hope for the next sequel. There will be another one, won’t there? Hey, this one wasn’t the best, but there’s no reason to give up. There’s plenty of more air in the Indiana Jones tires.
What did you think about the movie? Did you like it? Did you hate it? And what did you think about the controversial climax?