The Rabbit Hole

It's wrong to be really super-psyched about this, right?

I know I am, so no.

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If they manage to toe the line between having Indy be graciously aware of his limitations and yet still kick-ass awesome, they'll do well. They just have to be careful.

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"It's not as easy as it used to be." See, they acknowledge the age thing! But he still kicks ass!

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Oh, and I noticed one of the crates has "Roswell, New Mexico" on it. Hmmm.

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Yes, see, I like that. You can't ridicule him for being older because that would be mean, and at the end of the day the movie succeeds on people going, "YAY INDY!"

That, and his side-story with the kid not sucking. However, Shia LaBeouf isn't a half-bad actor, Marion is back (presumably as his mom), and I think having him be older will soothe some of the SON-OF-itis.

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equustel.livejournal.com

This is the point where I say, screw skepticism. It's Harrison Ford and Steven Spielberg and George Lucas and I don't care what they've done recently apart from each other that might've been lackluster, they're one of my favorite cinematic teams in history and they're bringing back a style of filmmaking that I miss so much and and and my fangirl is showing, isn't it?

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It's okay, mine is too. I really love the sense of adventure and sarcasm to the Indiana Jones series (surprise), and there's something so fun about it that you can't say no. The language isn't vulgar, but the people aren't perfect, you know what I mean? It's that kind of innocence with consequences fun.

And it goes without saying that I wait with baited breath for LEGO Indiana Jones!

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ecmyers.livejournal.com

I guess that's better quality than the link I just e-mailed you :)

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bigscary.livejournal.com

Must. Get. Home. To. Watch. Trailer!

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Hurry! So good!

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Oh, check out this old Slate article on the Lucas-Spielberg relationship. Originally (according to the piece) Lucas envisioned Indiana Jones as a James Bond-style playboy. Spielberg turned him into a "rumpled bum" based on Humphrey Bogart in Treasure of the Sierra Madre. (Great movie, by the way.)

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I think it's the same place, actually.

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It's a fascinating reveal on Spielberg, though, as a Star Wars fan, I've heard as much about Lucas already. Lucas is not an artist. He's a technician and a businessman, arguably brilliant wearing both hats. He belongs helming ILM and not behind a camera.

Spielberg, I feel, is overrated at times, and I can spot a Spielberg plot a mile back, but for the most part he infuses a sense of people into all his movies. So, while he has heroes, he also has heroes with flaws and quirks of character (which the article said). As opposed to the Heroes With Flaws that Lucas churns out where you can hear the moniker after their names--Anakin is a Hero With Flaws; Indiana Jones is a hero, but he is flawed.

For my money, you can't get better than Jaws for the kinds of scenes the article talks about. Spielberg has a genius scene in there where Chief Brody realizes his son is copying his gestures and they go back and forth--no dialogue--for about three minutes while his wife watches. It's this priceless scene of real life that grounds what is otherwise a sensationalist movie. I love Star Wars but nowhere in the whole of that film do you find a scene like that, not until The Empire Strikes Back (when Lucas is where he should be, i.e. farther away from the story).

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droidguy1119.livejournal.com

My problem with Spielberg is that he has trouble resisting cutesyness, like the scene where the jetpack fries cooks the hamburgers in Minority Report.

I still think his most underrated movie, and perhaps best movie (a perfect blend of his dramatic and comedic talents and his ability to have depth while being commercial) is Catch Me If You Can. It is an effortless caper film, but the characters are developed so well and there are great quiet moments like the scene where Hanks tells DiCaprio about his father on the airplane.

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Catch Me If You Can is a brilliant work that manages to reinvent the tired theme that Spielberg drags into all his movies, which is the Problems With Daddies. Seriously, it's a thing with this guy. Catch Me If You Can makes sense of this theme in that the protagonist is a kid who idolizes his father and has to watch the man eat and choke on his pride.

I won't hear a bad thing about Catch Me If You Can, which I would say is a just about perfect film--no wasted moments or performances (best I'd seen out of Christopher Walken EVER), clever pacing, witty but not self-conscious dialogue, and a spirit of fun. Incidentally, Minority Report seems to me a forgotten piece of greatness, too. Again, for the reasons of good characters. Sure, the hero is a tad cookie-cutter (it is Tom Cruise), but the supporting characters, especially Colin Farrell, are just heartbreaking people in the whole and not just caricatures. Love that one, too.

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Are you serious? I *hated* that movie.

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That's in response to Catch Me If You Can, not Minority Report (which I actually really enjoy).

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Ok, I am super-psyched about this too. BUT I am a little worried by the presence of ethnic barbarian types (where *is* the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, anyway, Ethnikistan??) and the cliched evil woman villain (you know she's evil because her hair is cut at sharp angles). Sigh...

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You didn't like Catch Me If You Can? Really? I thought it was dead clever and dry-humor hilarity, wall-to-wall. My heart broke for Leo DiCaprio, which is something I never thought possible after I had to sit through Titanic. And Christopher Walken, like I said, was fabulous.

Plus, from what I hear, the movie is almost entirely accurate to the real story. It was based off a memoir, but the memoir was ghost-written and the man on whom it was all based said the movie did a better job at capturing his life.

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I *hated* it. It was so incredibly dull and cliche and one-note. I still can't believe I suffered through all two and a half hours of it (I saw it in theaters when it first came out). I do remember really liking the clever title sequence, though!

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