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[trinityvixen]

I almost don't want to even comment on Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls. I felt it lacked coherency for the most part--I never knew why one thing led necessarily to another. There's also the weird sense that it wasn't as breathless as the previous films--even though that's usually a compliment, in this case it wasn't. Because having just watched the first three, they really were nothing but chase sequences with a few things happening in between. And while there is one long chase scene (and a shorter one) in Crystal Skulls, a lot of the rest is really sitting down and figuring stuff out with hardly any action as we've come to know it from the series.

A lot of that is Harrison Ford being older, I get it. I still have this sense that Bruce Willis was more spry despite having gotten older in that last Die Hard movie. It's a different sort of hero, though--McClane was a running joke for being down-on-his-luck in every hostile encounter; Indy is the amazingly smart, athletic fighter. He has to be more physical that he looked capable of being in this. I spent a lot of the movie cringing at the lazy delivery and performance from Harrison Ford. Is it just me or did his voice get higher? It sounded...less deep. I can't explain it except that it was off from the low growl of constant vexation Indy usually has (unless he is in his professor guise.

Marion was great, even though Karen Allen wasn't given much to do. They should have had her in earlier. And drinking! Damn it, that was the whole point of Raiders that I didn't get until I was older: Marion's liver could kill a Mormon.

And that's all she wrote. In other news, one of our lab benches was deemed the most photogenic and a bunch of people are now taking pictures of a guy in a lab coat pretending to work at our bench while the post-doc and I do our darnedest to stay out of the photo.

Comments

[droidguy1119.livejournal.com]

I liked watching Harrison figure stuff out because it felt the most like the older movies. The diner scene, ensuing greaser/prep fight and motorcycle chase, even all the way to the point where Indy kills the dart guy, was the best stretch of the movie.

I would have liked it sooo, sooo, sooo much better if ILM wasn't the Antichrist. Everyone who works there really deserves to be fired. I think the thing that made it the worst for me in that aspect is ILM's worst hallmark -- the spaceship taking off and the ants looked great because they were the big setpieces, the important ones. Everything else looked like shit in comparison.

Low points: riding the tree to the water, the fact that Indy survives a nuclear blast in a refrigerator (just the fact that it happens. Given that it does and I can't change it I didn't mind it and was kind of amused but the mere concept is ridiculous).

Lowest point in all of cinema history forever: Shia swinging with the monkeys. Had they cut this, Indy IV, and every other movie in the world, would be better.

[droidguy1119.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, I was also mad that Marion was given nothing to do. Shoulda thrown a few punches instead of just kind of acting nice the whole movie (although perhaps Karen wasn't up for it?).

Also, I would much preferred an implied wedding than an actual wedding (Indy and Marion returning home afterwards, or just Indy and Marion together at home in general).

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Indy's just not meant to get married. Period. That's not the archetype. Also? There's not enough build-up when the love interest isn't even introduced until the movie is half over. Even if we knew her from before. There's far too much stuff to work out, given their past history, that it shouldn't have worked out in just the one movie. It's a death knell for the character because what now?

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Indy figuring things out needs an element of time pressure or suspense to be more than just plodding. Think of him working out the traps in all the movies, especially the opener in Raiders--the point is that he thinks fast, and well, on the fly as he's running from or towards something. Having him and Shia LaBeouf just sit around a ruin without anyone coming after them (after tidily dispatching whoever those people were) is dull. Someone also pointed out to me that Indy wasn't trying to get anywhere someone hadn't been as he's done in previous movies. Instead, he's just trying to figure out how to get where John Hurt's character had already been. Which means Hurt's character is the clever one and Indy's just tagging along. It's the metaphor of his riding on the back of Mutt's bike, only it's the whole movie.

I didn't even really pay attention to the CGI. I was too busy cringing at Harrison Ford's disengagement from the entire thing (except when Karen Allen was onscreen--they still have great chemistry) and the horrible plot. I disagree about the tree thing though--that was a sort of clever escape method a la the classic Indy movie. And Marion's smugness about it was priceless.

But the monkeys...holy fucking shit WTF GEORGE AND STEVE? Seriously, how did that even look like an idea you could do ON PAPER let alone as one that was a good idea for the movie at all? SO BAD. Not even funny bad. Just unwatchably bad.

[droidguy1119.livejournal.com]

Someone on AICN joked, "I'm glad the monkeys from Jumanji are still getting work."

When I was talking about Harrison deciphering things, mainly I refer to the scene where they visit the jail where Hurt's character was, and then also the part when they're knocking the rocks out of the tower thing (the tower thing itself was pretty awesomely designed).

Personally I thought Harrison was fairly engaged. There were moments I thought he seemed off, but he certainly gave more to Jones than he gave to Firewall and Hollywood Homicide. I just think his "game" face these days isn't exactly a raging firestorm of energy.