Indy4

[Kothnok]

First off, I'd like to say that Indiana Jones in the Kingdom of the Plastic Crystal Skull is a decent adolescent action flik and worthy of going to see for the eye candy alone (no Arc, not that kind of candy).

PLEASE DO NOT READ THE NEXT POST IF YOU WANT TO AVOID SPOILERS!

[Kothnok]

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ok, this was just buffer space just in case...

[Kothnok]

I thought Indy4 an adolescent movie because while I allow for fantasy and fantastic reasoning in the stories I enjoy, nothing bothers me more than being flagrantly inconsistent with your own dang rules.  If you want to tell me the sky is red in your world, great, then whenever I see the sky, I better see a red one.  Indy4 has more in common with that Godzilla remake where the director changed the scale of the beast willy nilly whenever he felt the camera needed it.

Aside from the opening scene, not a single bullet ever finds its mark.  I find dodging every bullet from dozens upon dozens of machine guns absurdly silly watching GI Joe as a kid and I continue to find it silly.  Yet primitives with bolos easily take down our heroes.  *sigh* Ok, fine, tons of other movies are the same way (*cough* Star Wars *cough*) so not going to knock this one because of it.  I will, however, object to our hero walking away from a nuclear blast without as much as a bruise.

The crystal skull is supposed to be highly magnetic to all kinds of metals, not just iron.  Ok, fine, major plot point accepted as magic or whatever.  Time to run with it.... except the "crystal" skull is tossed about like a plastic inflated beach ball instead of a freaking heavy crystal object.  At least they were consistently treating it as lightweight, I guess.  The magnetism part bugged the crap out of me though.  One scene would show the metal sword being attracted to it from feet away and getting stuck and the next scene would have the same sword stick the bag it was held in and toss it to our heroes with narry a problem with magnetism.  Guns were freely brandished near it without hindrance and none of the flying metal bullets were ever attracted to it.  Even though it was shown to strongly attract metal through mummy wrappings and wooden crates, a simple sack tossed over it seems to render the magnetism inert.

I found the chase scenes too long and often wondered how much longer until they ended.  It seemed almost forced the way they kept going and going and going.  Weak plots I guess dictate unnecessarily long action sequences. 

At the end of the movie, I could tell my nieces loved it and they asked me what my favorite part of the movie was, which my immediate mental response was "the credits" but instead I picked the nuclear blast because it was indeed a great eye candy scene.

Again, despite what I consider sizable plot holes, it is an enjoyable action flik, just don't think to much.

[Drygioni]

I tend to agree with you about most of your points BUT I will say when I go see an Indiana Jones movie I go with the idea of totally dispelling reality. Thats what these movies are all about. I don't believe the "lost arc" can melt faces, the "shankara stones" can save a village, or the holy grail can heal a bullet wound either.

Yes the chase scenes were too long and the magnetic properties of the skull were inconsistent. Perhaps the bag they were carrying it in muffled the effects? 

The nuclear blast scene though was classic Indy. No different than jumping out of a plane with a life raft and floating safely to the mountain below. I don't buy that scene in lets say "Wall Street" but for Indy, its all good.

Considering Spielberg and Lucas have collectively lost their minds (replacing guns with walkies in ET and Jar Jar) I expected a lot worse.

[Kothnok]

So true Dry! LOL!

... and maybe that bag was woven from the silk threads of the rare South American Sock Monkey, famous for it's anti-static cling properties to counteract the magnetic field of it's contents.

[Drygioni]

I'm betting the dvd special features will have a documentary about said South American Sock Monkey! haha

[Shadowwolf]

I had a feeling it would be like the last Star Wars was, more about making money than staying true to the franchise. =/

[Drygioni]

I would have liked to see a feature length "Young Indiana Jones" I loved the TV show. Indy tells Mutt about Pancho Villa in the film, that was a Young Indy TV episode. I think in a round about way they will be going with that concept in INDY5 featuring a Shia Lebouf heavy story line, with Ford in more of a bit or supporting role.

I did like how they establish that Indy was a military officer during WW2 and sort of a Government "consultant" afterwards. They early movies always hinted that Indy is always doing crazy things even if we don't get to see it.  Like in the TV show.