Let me preface this review by saying that I’ve been an Indiana Jones fan for as long as I can remember. I was about a year old when Raiders of the Lost Ark came out, and I remember seeing Temple of Doom and Last Crusade in the theatre as a child (both of which scared the crap out of me, and goddamn, did I love it). I spent most of my childhood pretending I was Marion Ravenwood or (during a brief lapse of judgment in terms of characters) Willie What’sherface, running around the back yard with imaginary!Indy.
So, when I heard that Spielberg, Lucas, Ford, et al, were finally making a fourth installment, I was torn between giddy fangirl excitement and complete and utter terror. I mean, I saw the new Star Wars trilogy. I know what George Lucas’s writing is like. In my opinion, he should be allowed to have cool ideas, but he should be forced to then hand over those ideas to someone with more writing talent. And he should be banned from ever again writing any dialogue. Yeesh.
I just got back from seeing Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull for a second time, and… it’s got its ups and downs. Downs would mostly be clunky dialogue and the occasional situation that pushes the boundaries of suspended disbelief. Ups… well, it’s Indiana Jones, for heaven’s sake.
I was pleased as punch to see Marion Ravenwood back in Indy’s life; I always thought it was stupid for Indy to bedhop his way through the movies, and Marion was by far my favorite of Indy’s women. Karen Allen looked like she was having the time of her life in the role, and I had fun watching her. Shia LeBeouf was fantastic as Mutt Williams. The character could have been one-dimensional, but Shia plays it complex; in nearly every scene, we get to see a new side of Mutt.
Harrison Ford… well, he still looks like someone’s grandpa instead of the Indy we’re used to, but he plays the aging archaeologist/adventurer with aplomb and obvious enjoyment. The couple of self-deprecating quips about his age are well-placed and add just the right amount of teasing reference to the nineteen years that have passed since the last installment.
Good GOD, has it really been nineteen years?!
Ahem. Anyway. The best way to watch this movie is to sit back, shrug your shoulders, and say, “What the hell.” After making my inner nitpicker shut up, I had a hell of a lot of fun watching this movie. Mild spoilers after the jump.
The first fifteen minutes or so really tested my suspension of disbelief. Area 51 was pretty cool, though the little nitpicker in my head kept muttering about magnetism being dampened by a damn wooden box, but the atomic bomb… yeeeah.
The more I think about it, though, the more it fits. As an audience, we’re used to the Indy movies taking place during the early days of WWII. By tossing in that awesome shot of Indy standing on a hillside with a mushroom cloud blooming ominously overhead, Spielberg has definitively set this Indy film in a new era, in the Atomic age. I’m not saying it isn’t silly… just that it’s really quite effective. In a silly sort of way.
Which pretty much sums up this film. It’s funny, action-packed, and just plain fun, in a silly sort of way.
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