|
|
Steven Spielberg, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
05/24/2008 I can’t even tell you the last time I went into a movie that had so much excitement built around it. As I stood in a long line for Steven Spielberg’s latest installment in the Indiana Jones franchise, I noticed people smiling, singing the anthem to the films, and just seeming to be altogether thrilled about what lay in store for them. They responded favorably towards all the previews, cheered when the film actually started, and when the movie was over... nothing. No applause, no cheers, no response except for leaving the theatre in silence. There’s a justifiable reason for why the crowd reacted as indifferently as it did: the movie’s a bit of a letdown. On paper, the story probably seems simple enough. A much older Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) finds himself in trouble yet again, this time with the Russians over a prized artifact, the Crystal Skull. Led by Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett), the Russians force Indy to do their bidding, or they’ll exterminate him. As if that wasn’t enough, he finds out that one of his friends, Oxley (John Hurt), has been kidnapped, along with old flame Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen). Teamed with Marion’s son, Mutt (Shia LeBeouf), Indiana Jones sets out on a quest to save the two captives, get rid of the Russians, and return the skull before it finds its way into the wrong hands. Hey, piece of cake. Well, not exactly, at least from a viewer’s perspective. Between the kidnappings, the artifact, the double-crossings, the family ties, and the bit of information about aliens (which isn’t explained very well), there seems to be too much going on here, almost as if the plots and subplots of other possible movies were jammed into this one. That’s not to say that this is all too much to handle in a modest 124-minute run, but it feels like all the information was forced into the story. You take the very opening of the film, the chase scenes in the middle, and the crystal skull sections toward the end, and I’ll bet you’ll feel like you’ve watched three different scenes from three different movies. Aside from the plot points, however, there are other problems with the film that stand out. One obvious problem with the film is how it handles the characters’ avoidance of potentially deadly situations. I know. It’s Indiana Jones. We should know by now that he can do anything and not have anything bad happen to him. But that doesn’t mean there should be no effort put into making him look just a little bit defenseless or, you know, mortal. *POSSIBLE SPOILER AHEAD* For instance, after Indy stows away in a refrigerator to avoid an atomic bomb simulation, he survives. Sure, okay, it may be possible to hide there and not be affected. But after having been shot through the air a great distance from where he originally was, compacted in the tight, presumably cramped space of a refrigerator, Indy is able to walk out, unscathed and without any sort of injury? Another time, Indy seems to be at the mercy of the Soviet agents, faced, with no weapon, against an entire army of soldiers equipped with guns. And yet, he manages, even in his older age, to run atop a stack of boxes without getting hit once after being fired at. Maybe some old guys just know how to keep themselves in shape, or maybe the Russians are just terrible shots. I don’t know. You’re not going to a great answer either way. It’s not just our protagonist who avoids danger in unrealistic ways. While his mom drives through the jungle, Mutt gets into a sword battle with Irina. Now, we see that the kid knows how to use a knife earlier on in the film, but being familiar with a knife and being familiar with a sword, particularly when you’re fighting a veteran swordsman like Irina, are not the same thing. And yet, he fences like a pro. Sure, he tells Indy before that he once took a class on the subject, but he dropped out. And even if he stayed in school like a good boy, how likely is it that he would be able to joust against someone like Irina and not seem like a rookie? When the group travels by boat, they encounter three waterfalls. With the first two, it may have been possible for someone to survive (if they were an experienced rafter, maybe). But the third? Nobody dies or breaks anything? I don’t know about that one. And though it didn’t appear to be as sharp of a drop, I bring up the same point for when the group falls onto a hard surface once sand gives way. You don’t have to fall twenty or thirty feet on a concrete or marble floor for it to hurt. And yet, all seems to be well on the home front. Bear in mind, save LeBeouf’s character, these people are not exactly in the prime of their youth. Another unfortunate error in the film is the visuals. I admit, there are some nice looking effects every once and a while, but for the most part, they don’t seem to serve a purpose other than to show off what you can do with technology. This isn’t something that’s new with executive producer George Lucas. Remember the special edition versions of Star Wars? That singing frog in Return of the Jedi? Did any of that stuff really contribute to your getting the full experience? But I digress. The point is this: Lucas has a history of indulging in excessive visual effects. Spielberg, for the most part, doesn’t (let’s ignore the special edition version of E.T.), but he gives in here. I don’t think a single animal in the film was real. It’s not a problem, necessarily, that they were all computer-generated, but what purpose did some of them serve? The gophers in particular didn’t add anything whatsoever. The monkeys were equally invaluable, except for the fact that they added an unneeded cheese factor to the movie when they swung from vines to help Mutt foil Irina’s plot (and they somehow knew to attack her but not the boy). Now, I know all this makes it seem as if the film is terrible. It’s not. It’s actually a pretty typical, watchable summer movie: lots of stuff blows up and gets hit, and that’s really all you need to know. But this could have and should have been a much better film, and it missed the mark by a mile. The magic and the excitement that made the other three films so memorable clearly are not present here, and Indy’s age has nothing to do with it. Once we get passed the fact that Jones is not the same young man he once was, that little bit of information doesn’t seem to come up again, certainly not when he’s running or punching like he used to. Change in all things is inevitable. Sometimes it touches movie franchises, like the Batman series, and modifies them for the better. Other times, as in the case with Indiana Jones, it hurts more than it helps, and in this particular instance, it may have been better to have ended the series when “last” was a part of the title, and when all the pieces fell into the right places. Comments [post a comment]
Comments are closed |
|
Friday, March 12, 2010
Weather: , °
Weather: , °
Post a Comment
E-mail To A Friend
Join The List
Technorati Tags
Indiana Jones Crystal Skull Harrison Ford Cate Blanchett Shia Labeouf Steven Spielberg George Lucas