![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ivyficWhat. The fuck. Was that.
About five minutes into the film, I turned to the person next to me and said, "This is really awful, right? It's not just me?" To be fair, it improved in the middle, but Harrison Ford's delivery of his lines in the first scene felt wooden. It was like watching a bad parody of Indiana Jones. And then they set off an A-bomb.
I understand why they chose the direction they did for this film. Indiana Jones has always been a pulp serial. The original three were set in the late thirties, so they were the pulp action adventure of the thirties—all ancient booby traps and religious mysticism. Now, twenty years later, with the film set in the fifties, they made it the pulp fiction of the fifties—A-bombs and aliens. And I get that. I get why they decided to really bring it into the fifties with a lot of the elements, and I would have had a hard time if they tried to play it as just like the thirties with Russians instead of Nazis. But just. No. They changed genres on me. It used to action/adventure fantasy and now it's sci fi, and I'll wink at all sorts of fantastic things in Indiana Jones, but I won't buy that there are suddenly aliens in this any more than I would have bought River becoming the ship in Firefly.
That's the thing a lot of people who don't read genre often misunderstand—they think, well, it's all unrealistic, so it really doesn't matter what new elements they add because it wasn't real in the first place, right? But when I'm introduced to a made-up world, I'm introduced to its rules, and I expect it to stick to them. You can't just throw random other shit at me and expect me to swallow it.
So Indy surviving a nuclear blast in a refrigerator and not dying of radiation poisoning (hey—it's Indiana Jones and K:19 the Widowmaker)? Just. No fucking way. The movie completely lost its credibility with me right there. And maybe it's just me, but watching a nuclear holocaust is not fun Saturday morning cartoon action for me. It's post-apocalyptic horror.
And it wasn't even internally consistent. The alien skull is magnetic. Except when it's not. Oh, wait, it's only magnetic when it's not covered with magical magnetism-blocking burlap—except that it's still magnetic when it's in a crate. I did at one point turn to my companion and say, "Wait a sec—gold isn't magnetic." So at least the movie acknowledged that.
I loved all the stuff with Marion—she and Indy are my OTP. The stuff with Mutt ("We named the dog Indy") was predictable as hell but still fun. And Shia getting all choked up over his father figure going insane was a nice emotional touch. Yay Shia! There was one moment at the end, though, where Mutt says, in a very hurt, peevish way, "You left me!" And Indy just laughs. I was like—what? Not a laughing moment! You abandoned my pregnant mother and I never had a father is not a time to go "Ahaha. Kids!" That was just bizarre.
I recognize that I saw the last Indiana Jones film in theaters when I was eight. And there's a big difference between my sophistication as a viewer as an eight-year-old and as a twenty-six-year-old. So I'm criticising it for a following through with the exact same campy dedication that it always has. I did enjoy some of that camp. The car chase in the middle with the sword fight and the Tarzan swinging and the waterfalls, that was all good fun. But every time they started showing Indy the most psychic guy ever, I was rolling my eyes.
I also can't help looking at it now in the framework of all the Indy knock-offs that have been made over the years. The end reminded me of Mummy Returns which I liked better. You heard me. And where have I seen a movie about archaeologists and space aliens before? Oh, right. That's Stargate. In fact there's a Crystal Skull episode of Stargate. On the scale of sequels, this is definitely above the Star Wars prequels. Those were flawed at every level. This, I think, was flawed in design but pretty well executed. It's certainly not as good as Last Crusade; I'm not sure where it stands next to Temple of Doom. I've always disliked Temple of Doom because if it's nightmare-inducingness as a child, but I think I'd have to rate it higher since it, at least, stayed true to the ethos of Indiana Jones.
The movie opened with a reference to Raiders. But instead of a mountain this time, it was a gopher hill. That they then ran over with a truck. And that's sort of what this movie did—took a mountain, turned into into a molehill, then ran over it.
About five minutes into the film, I turned to the person next to me and said, "This is really awful, right? It's not just me?" To be fair, it improved in the middle, but Harrison Ford's delivery of his lines in the first scene felt wooden. It was like watching a bad parody of Indiana Jones. And then they set off an A-bomb.
I understand why they chose the direction they did for this film. Indiana Jones has always been a pulp serial. The original three were set in the late thirties, so they were the pulp action adventure of the thirties—all ancient booby traps and religious mysticism. Now, twenty years later, with the film set in the fifties, they made it the pulp fiction of the fifties—A-bombs and aliens. And I get that. I get why they decided to really bring it into the fifties with a lot of the elements, and I would have had a hard time if they tried to play it as just like the thirties with Russians instead of Nazis. But just. No. They changed genres on me. It used to action/adventure fantasy and now it's sci fi, and I'll wink at all sorts of fantastic things in Indiana Jones, but I won't buy that there are suddenly aliens in this any more than I would have bought River becoming the ship in Firefly.
That's the thing a lot of people who don't read genre often misunderstand—they think, well, it's all unrealistic, so it really doesn't matter what new elements they add because it wasn't real in the first place, right? But when I'm introduced to a made-up world, I'm introduced to its rules, and I expect it to stick to them. You can't just throw random other shit at me and expect me to swallow it.
So Indy surviving a nuclear blast in a refrigerator and not dying of radiation poisoning (hey—it's Indiana Jones and K:19 the Widowmaker)? Just. No fucking way. The movie completely lost its credibility with me right there. And maybe it's just me, but watching a nuclear holocaust is not fun Saturday morning cartoon action for me. It's post-apocalyptic horror.
And it wasn't even internally consistent. The alien skull is magnetic. Except when it's not. Oh, wait, it's only magnetic when it's not covered with magical magnetism-blocking burlap—except that it's still magnetic when it's in a crate. I did at one point turn to my companion and say, "Wait a sec—gold isn't magnetic." So at least the movie acknowledged that.
I loved all the stuff with Marion—she and Indy are my OTP. The stuff with Mutt ("We named the dog Indy") was predictable as hell but still fun. And Shia getting all choked up over his father figure going insane was a nice emotional touch. Yay Shia! There was one moment at the end, though, where Mutt says, in a very hurt, peevish way, "You left me!" And Indy just laughs. I was like—what? Not a laughing moment! You abandoned my pregnant mother and I never had a father is not a time to go "Ahaha. Kids!" That was just bizarre.
I recognize that I saw the last Indiana Jones film in theaters when I was eight. And there's a big difference between my sophistication as a viewer as an eight-year-old and as a twenty-six-year-old. So I'm criticising it for a following through with the exact same campy dedication that it always has. I did enjoy some of that camp. The car chase in the middle with the sword fight and the Tarzan swinging and the waterfalls, that was all good fun. But every time they started showing Indy the most psychic guy ever, I was rolling my eyes.
I also can't help looking at it now in the framework of all the Indy knock-offs that have been made over the years. The end reminded me of Mummy Returns which I liked better. You heard me. And where have I seen a movie about archaeologists and space aliens before? Oh, right. That's Stargate. In fact there's a Crystal Skull episode of Stargate. On the scale of sequels, this is definitely above the Star Wars prequels. Those were flawed at every level. This, I think, was flawed in design but pretty well executed. It's certainly not as good as Last Crusade; I'm not sure where it stands next to Temple of Doom. I've always disliked Temple of Doom because if it's nightmare-inducingness as a child, but I think I'd have to rate it higher since it, at least, stayed true to the ethos of Indiana Jones.
The movie opened with a reference to Raiders. But instead of a mountain this time, it was a gopher hill. That they then ran over with a truck. And that's sort of what this movie did—took a mountain, turned into into a molehill, then ran over it.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 02:43 pm (UTC)Re: Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 03:38 pm (UTC)I just get annoyed at all these "what did you expect?" comments. It's as if people can't tell the difference between good genre films and bad genre films and there is a difference. Really really. I had the same argument after Pirates 2 came out when I kept pointing that the first Pirates was genre and also awesome and delivering non-sensical action sequences to me, no matter how cool looking, just isn't enough.
Re: Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 05:35 pm (UTC)Re: Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 07:25 pm (UTC)Re: Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 10:34 pm (UTC)I <3 him.
However I don't always agree with him, particularly with this movie.
This movie was CRAP. Nothing worked. Nothing. Not the romance, not the plot, not the action scenes, not the character relationships. It was a mish-mash of things that might be cool independent of one another but add up to an incomprehensible plot with completely wooden characters who Do What They're Supposed To without really feeling it.
Are the old Indy movies cliche? DUH. They're pulp! But they all really feel and believe everything they're doing, and it makes the journey so much more exciting. Everything about this was half-hearted. The best friend-turned-evil? The villain? They didn't have it in their HEARTS. It was just... god.
You know what else annoyed me? No booby-traps. Every scene there was all this tension and build-up as I waited for something terrifying to happen, and then instead of something terrifying happening the chick gets her men to point guns at Indy. NOTHING unsurprising happened.
Re: Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 05:38 pm (UTC)With Indy, there's always more world to explore, more things buried to uncover, etc. so there should be an excuse to revisit this character. However, we haven't been able to see how he's gotten where he has over time so getting back to the character we knew is made impossible by the new time frame and the changed character isn't the one we knew. It screws fans coming and going.
Re: Guess who agrees with you--right down to Stargate?
Date: 2008-05-23 07:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-23 05:34 pm (UTC)(One of the great things about my flist is that I always know what i'm getting into re films :)
That's the thing a lot of people who don't read genre often misunderstand—they think, well, it's all unrealistic, so it really doesn't matter what new elements they add because it wasn't real in the first place, right? But when I'm introduced to a made-up world, I'm introduced to its rules, and I expect it to stick to them. You can't just throw random other shit at me and expect me to swallow it. Wonderful observation@!!! Internal consistency FTW!
no subject
Date: 2008-05-23 07:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-23 07:57 pm (UTC)"And that's sort of what this movie did—took a mountain, turned into into a molehill, then ran over it."
I couldn't agree more.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-26 02:16 am (UTC)And the few people I've talked to/read their comments about this film basically sum it up correctly. Aliens do NOT go with Indiana Jones. It just doesn't work. As one of my friends said, all of the articles in the other films work because they are objects that Indy as an Archeologist would be passionate about. Anyone could have found that skull.
Ah well. I was 11 when the first one came out, and my father and brother and I really bonded over it. So I guess I really had high expectations - especially seeing as how much I love the third one too. You call this archaelogy?
*sigh*