Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: A no-spoiler review of a spoiler
First let me say that I’m not a film critic, but I am a gal who loves sci-fi and adventure flicks. Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, Jurassic Park… Event Horizon, Species (whoops, how did those get in there!). Creative movies like these give me goosebumps. I also have a tendency to memorize movies. Like, I watch a great movie and remember all the lines, and the music, beginning to end.
So this is how I remember all the Indiana Jones movies. I carry lines from each one close to my heart –
Raiders of the Lost Arc:
Beginning – “My medallion!”
Middle – “Snakes, why’d it have to be snakes.”
End – “She’s beautiful!”
The Temple of Doom:
Beginning – “’See you in hell Lao Che!’ ‘Hehehe, Goodbye. Dr. Jones.’”
Middle – “Maybe I step on fortune cookies.” “Gulimah! Gulimahhhh Shuckdeedei!”
End – “Oahahahahe! Ahhheheh!” (that would be Indy turning evil on that hard bed lined with tea candles), “Take the left tunnel.” “You betrayed Shiva!”
The Last Crusade:
Beginning – “You got alotta heart kid, but that belongs to me.”
Middle – “Ah, Venice.” “Dad! What! Dad! What! Dad! WHAT! Head for the fireplace!” “No ticket.”
End – “’You know something, you’re absolutely right.’ – BANG!” “Follow me, I know the way!”
And The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull?
Beginning, middle and end – “STOOOPPP!”
The film mushed itself into one amorphous blob, making it impossible for me to discern a timeline or a plot, much less any fun elements of the script to take home with me. I do know that Jones got older, but I wouldn’t have even thought about it very much had the characters not brought it up so often. Every other line was something about “gramps” or “pops”… I wanted to yell at the screen “Stop it! We know he’s older, but you’re ruining everything!”
This Indy flick should be defined as a period piece, and nothing else. The setting (50’s McCarthy-era) was the only thing that held all the elements of the movie together. Even the (bizarre) finale. So if I think about the movie as a hat-nod to the time in which it’s set as opposed to an installment of th classic Indiana Jones series, the Crystal Skull is almost palatable.
But really, sitting in the theatre just made me nostalgic. I missed the Indiana Jones who needed to study Kate Capshaw’s “nocturnal behaviors.” The “all I have to do is squeeze” Indiana Jones. And so when I got home, the first thing I did was turn on The Temple of Doom to watch Indy and Short Round get nearly smashed with spikes in that weird killing trap room. It was the only thing I could do to establish a sense of normalcy.
Grade: C--
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If you’ve seen the movie, what did you think?
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