Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

[Tinman2040]

Well I cant help liking this film either, my friends liked it and I liked it. This was no Masterpiece and I dont think anyone would agree with that. But I enjoyed this for what it was a good popcorn flick. And those that did should NOT have to defend themselves for it!!

Yeah I really hated the marriage at the end!!

[cartoonshane]

I don't know who wrote this, and while he is probably being facetious it's the first explanation that kind of makes sense:

I finally saw KOTCS last night. Of course, I'd read the reviews etc and knew what to expect. So before the showing, I made sure to lower my expectations as far as they could possibly go. Then I bashed my head repeatedly with a mallet until 90% of my brain cells were dead. And then as the lights dimmedi n the theatre I completely switched off what was left of my brain.
But I still couldn't believe how bad the movie was.
I genuinely couldn't understand how professional filmmakers with years of experience could concoct such a shambolic mess that systematically destroys everything that was good about the franchise. I mean, if they had INTENDED to kill off the franchise, they couldnt have done a better job.
And then it occured to me.
They DID intend to kill the Indy franchise.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull has been DELIBERATELY designed to be abysmal. Just think about it:
Gophers; Nuking the fridge; promising there'll be no CGI and then drowning the movie in CGI; the fan-baiting Shia Leboeuf; interminable meaningless exposition; carrying around an unimpressive "crystal" skull made of tin foil and cling film that lazily gets them out of tight spots; falling off THREE waterfalls; Mutt swinging with the monkeys; bad ideas borrowed from the Mummy Returns; the flying saucer; bringing back Karen Allen but NOT bringing back marion Ravenwood; ending with a cheesy wedding; that final "passing the hat" scene.....
Guys, Indy 4 is THE BIGGEST PRACTICAL JOKE EVER PLAYED ON THE MOVIE-GOING PUBLIC.
Every last detail of KOTCS has been DELIBERATELY designed for MAXIMUM annoyance to the fans. It's blindingly obvious. This is George Lucas' revenge for the reception we've given the Star Wars prequels and the constant hatred directed at him. I guarantee, I GUARANTEE that Lucas bet Spielberg that the he could make the shittiest possible movie and that it would STILL be a huge box office smash. He set out to prove that we would swallow anything, no matter how stupid - and he's been proven right.
So there you have it, folks. The biggest practical joke ever pulled -and the joke's on us. You've just gotta laugh.

[AgentHelix]

Has anyone read the Darabont script? It has a lot of the same problems as the finished film, but it also has a lot of strengths that could've saved it some, particularly where Marion is concerned.

[Elliotanimated]

Strangely enough, the gophers never bothered me.
I think that starting the film on the gopher was actually a brilliant metaphor for the rest of the movie - small and a pest to many.
They sure did make a mountain out of a mole hill (ha ha).

The second I knew this film was trouble was at the begining when the main Russian bloke squatted down to reveal his cronies neatly lined up behind him.

[cartoonshane]

And those that did should NOT have to defend themselves for it!!

Few seem to even try. Many people are saying they liked the movie, but their reasons are almost always vague, like "I had a smile on my face the whole time!" or "Yay, Indy's back!" but hardly anyone actually reviews the movie itself. I and others have gone into specifics about what we feel is so wrong with it, so I'd love to hear what specifically people are enjoying about it. What is a favorite scene or character or piece of dialogue? What is your favorite stunt or set piece? If it wasn't Indiana Jones, would you praise the writing, acting, directing, or cinematography?

S.

[Captain Genius]

I haven't gone through every post on this thread, but I'm sure this was said.
When that gopher popped up, Kenny Loggins began playing in my head.

[cartoonshane]

Captain Poet.
S.

[Scripe]

I and others have gone into specifics about what we feel is so wrong with it, so I'd love to hear what specifically people are enjoying about it.

Okay okay how about this? It's pop entertainment and it entertained me. Do I need further justification for my opinion than that?

I guess I really don't try to break things down to figure out why I like something. If some bubblegum pop hit makes my fucking toe tap, I listen to it. If a performance makes me laugh I call it funny and if I think your art is awesome I show it to my friends.

I know this is a discussion board and the above reason probably isn't good enough so I'll start making a list of the things I liked about it, but I certainly have no ideas of changing people's minds since people have already stated that they hated soome of the things I liked.

EDIT: I sounded a little angry for the first response, I certainly didn't mean to.

[Lester Toil]

I'm the king of the nit-picky, and by that I'm referring to the lack of plausibility of certainly occurances tthat are supposedly caused by nature. In this Indiana Jones offering (which I enjoyed), I was greatly bothered by the tornado at the end of the film that was caused by the launching of a certain vessel of travel. The tornado itself was friggin' magnificent. A true fortified jaw-dropper. It was Indiana Jones' ability to stand a few feet from the tornado and not even have his farking hat fly off. I mean, his shirt wasn't even blowing! You mean to tell me not one of the 300 members of the CGI team said, "Ya know, this is a vortex that could probably demolish a small city. Shouldn't we have Jones holding his hat and clinging to a tree trunk??". In all actuality all four survivors would have been blown away like an office memo. The last time I saw something this implausible was the movie Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow where these skyscraper-tall robots are clomping past Gwenyth Paltrow as they stomp down the street. They're inches from her and not one hair on her head shakes from the vibration. In actuality, not only would she have bounced to the next county with each step taken by these 400 ton alien behemoths, but so would every car within a mile radius. Another example is the first Superman movie where never in the entire film did they consider having Chris Reeves hair blowing as he flies. His friggin' curl doesn't even quivver!

Again, it boggles my mind that these mega-money movies don't have one schmuck on the set to say "Hey boss, do we want to turn on the fan so it looks as if Harrison Ford is actually near that powerful vortex?".



Again, I very much enjoyed the movie (although I agree the malt shop scene had waaaaay too much going on in the background while the most important information in the film was being conveyed. What was Speilberg thinking??).

[Lester Toil]

Quadruple post! I suck!

[Lester Toil]

Ack! Triple post. Sorry!

[Lester Toil]

The focker refused to post so I kept pressing "Send"! Now look what happened!

[Lester Toil]

Bump. Double post.

[Lester Toil]

#@@!&&! Can the moderator just remove these accidental repeats?? Sorry!

[drugmassacre]

WOW, Les, we rarely get THAT many repeats!

As for Shane's comment...I think i enjoyed it because it was Indy and I allowed myself to ignore the bad stuff because I was having such a good time with everything. So much happened that i felt was fun and entertained and I was rarely bored, so i didn't have a loit of time to dwell on bad things...which is funny, because there are other movies this summer, like HULK, where I thought it was fantastic but could nitpick the hell out of, or IRONMAN, which I can't really say anything negative about but simply didn't enjoy it nearly as much as others did

There were many specific scenes in INDY 4 that I enjoyed immensely, many of which i sure are ones which a lot of other people specifically hate

-The opening scene of the kids driving the car on the highway alongside the army trucks

-the fight inside ther soda shop and the impending motorcyle chase

-the entire jeep chase, INCLUDING the sword fight and Marion's critiques of Mutt's fencing skills

-The snake scene, with Mutt's constant "grab the snake" and Indy's retort "STOP CALLING IT A SNAKE!" made me laugh my ass off

-I also fell hook line and sinker for the water fall gag

-the fist fight amongst the killer ants, especially the gags: guys climbing up and a tree and ants literally gcreating an arm to reach after him, ants devouring a man and crawling into a face, ants pulling a man down an ant hole

-The immensely stupid yet still made me laugh line "so does this make you a TRIPLE agent?!?!"

It's not an Oscar winner, and it's not Raiders of The Lost Ark, but it's a big dumb fun movie and I like those

I'm also Michael bay's biggest fan, so what the fuck do I know?

Curiously though, as much as I enjoyed this, I haaaaated the Star Wars prequels, and especially "Revenge of The Sith," which to me was one of the most UNfun movies I've ever seen in my life