Cinemascope

AKA: “Indiana Jones and the Temple of BOOM”

“See that, kid? That’s a plot hole right there”

Part I -

Reviewing “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” in shorthand:
A. Better then “Temple of Doom”. Worse than the other two.
B. Fantastic first 30 minutes, almost perfect in every way. But then loses steam. Lots of steam.

Part II -

And now in longhand:

Thank heavens for Steven Spielberg. He is truly one gifted craftsman. It’s pleasing to be reminded of it. Spielberg’s craftsmanship is at the front of the often-too-silly “KOTCS”, after years of him piloting his career in “Artiste” mode. It’s not since “Jurassic Park 2″ that Spielberg is at the helm of a pure popcorn movie, done mostly for the fun of it, and perhaps as a way of cashing checks owed to olden colleagues. In fact, “KOTCS” is one of the most heartless of Spielberg’s films ever, but it is still so packed with cinematic bravura - the man is an ace action/adventure/VFX director - that one wishes Spielberg would more often take on mercenary studio missions, just to prove to those Jon Favreaus and the Michael Bays of the world who’s the real hotshot in town . Am I stating the obvious? Probably. But for years it seems that the effects were just tools to express Spielberg lofty - and quite dark - ideas about humankind, that we forgot what a wiz kid he still is, even at 61.

The deal is such: everything good in Indy 4 is Spielberg, everything bad is Lucas. From the word go Spielberg does a whammy job at brisk filmmaking. But it was Lucas, who’s credited with writing the story (after he chucked out what was rumored to be a brilliant screenplay by Frank Darabont), that serves him with one bad idea after the other (David Koepp tied up all of Lucas’ ideas pretty neatly in a mostly snappy screenplay, although even he couldn’t figure out how to survive the third act, which all but ruins the entire Indiana Jones franchise and turns Indy into Fox Mulder).
Come on: Indy and aliens? That’s bad idea number 1. Indiana Jones is an excavator of ancient cultures and his previous movie plots were fantasy films about the supernatural in the world of religion and faith: The Holy Ark, The Holy Grail, voodoo, Hindu. And now, skipping over Islam, Lucas takes us straight into outer space. Oh wait: is this the Sceintologist Indiana Jones?
Bad idea number 2: revisiting people and places from previous movies. This is Lucas at his lamest. This is the guy - and I say this with great sorrow because I once truly admired his vision - that ruined the myth of Boba Fett and gave him a back story in Episode 2. And an awful back story at that. And now he has us going back to the warehouse where the holy ark was stored and re-teaming with Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) both from “Raiders”. Instead of making each adventure separate, he’s trying to tie everything up. Something the Saturday morning serials of Lucas’ childhood wouldn’t do.
But Spielberg, letting Lucas call the shots here, is left to devise fantastic set pieces, of declining force. It starts with a great bang, and fizzles on from there (although apart from the final act the rest is goofy trippy fun).
Indy 4 is the first of the Indianas for the digital age. Indy 3 was made in 1989, when CGI was in it’s infancy, and most optical effects still had to be done in-camera. Now, with all those CGI vistas, insects and hurling debris, one wonders what does Indiana Jones have to offer the world that was not previously seen in Peter Jackson’s “King Kong” and those Indiana Jones wannabes: the fine “The Mummy” and the horrible “Tomb Raider”.
Indy 5? No need really, unless you break up that bad influence comradeship between Lucas and Spielberg. Let Lucas keep the franchise and get Stephen Sommers to direct. It’ll turn out just fine. But we just won’t expect it to be wonderful. Spielberg is still one who owes us a masterpiece every couple of years. The mind-blowing “Munich” - a film I adore - was such. We’re due.