Well I guess we may as well start a thread for reviews of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull since it will open this Friday.

It premiered last night at the Cannes Film Festival and initial reports are not promising. It received luke warm reviews and a couple went so far as saying that they should have just left the series alone.

Now I don't know that early reports are ever worth much, especially from film festivals, but I will say that Cannes was right about the DaVinci Code when it bombed there a couple of years ago. That movie still made a lot of money worldwide, but it was badly cast and pretty senseless in the end. (My opinion, no offense to anyone who enjoyed it.)

Anyway, here's hoping they are wrong on Indy. I would really like to see a good one with Karen Allen back as Marion. I am a bit worried that Shia will be a distraction as the younger hero. Time will tell. I intend to see it in any case.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Raven,

I've learned long ago to pay very little attention to what the critics say. Most of them look at a film to see if it's worth of some type of Academy Award. Clearly, movies like this one aren't made with Academy Awards in mind. It's supposed to be a fun, family, adventure film.

You don't ride roller coasters and think about the engineering principles involved in the ride. You just get on, scream your lungs out and enjoy the ride. Personally, I'm looking forward to another fun ride with Dr. Jones and company.

quote:

Originally posted by Kennywood:
I've learned long ago to pay very little attention to what the critics say. Most of them look at a film to see if it's worth of some type of Academy Award. Clearly, movies like this one aren't made with Academy Awards in mind. It's supposed to be a fun, family, adventure film.

You don't ride roller coasters and think about the engineering principles involved in the ride. You just get on, scream your lungs out and enjoy the ride. Personally, I'm looking forward to another fun ride with Dr. Jones and company.

Well-said! I'll be strapping on my lap belt for sure!

My local newspaper gave it 3 out of 4 stars.

Iron man also got 3 out of 4 stars.

I have a feeling this movie will rock.

I will let you know on Wednesday evening after I have seen it. Yes, for once, France gets a movie before the USA. As for critics, don't read them, most of the time they spoil the story of the movie.

Harrison Ford's response to the critics at Cannes.

For Ford, the cinema-goer, not the critic, matters most.

"It's the people who pay to get in, and whether they are getting satisfaction for their dollars spent," he said.

2 friends at work saw it last nite.
They werent overly impressed. They thought that if you liked the first 3 movies, you'll like this 1.
I had no idea the direction that Spielburg was taking this movie until they told me details.
I'll tell you this. If you're a fan of other Steven Spielburg movies, you'll see some similar looking characters.

Well I got my hands on the card set and, although there are sequences left out, its pretty obvious that the storyline runs fairly parallel to the first one.

That's a bad thing if it seems like we've already seen it before. It could also be a good thing if they do it better than the first time.

The New York press is predicting $175M over the Labor Day weekend. That would be something. I wonder if it pulled in $165M would they call it a flop?

I will be going to the Midnight show in Redwood City. I already got me tickets!!! I cant wait.

We just got back from the movie and it was good, but not great. Some of the scenes and dialogue seemed forced and, at least for me, the time frame of the setting didn't work too well.

The thing that made the original three movies so much fun was the time period and the villains. While it was good to see Harrison Ford again, I can only wonder how truly great it would have been to see him in action on the fourth Indy movie way back in the late 80's-early 90's, instead of waiting so, so long to make this one...

Ok, some more thoughts. had a chance to really digest what i just saw...

1. I dont care what its lined with, refridgerators arent gonna save ya from that (plus, when he fell out of it when it landed, and he would have been in so many thousands of gooey pieces its not even funny. That he somehow survived ALL that, in that way, was so impossibley stupid that it just made me feel dumb watching it. Im all for suspending disbelife, and having some amazing stuff happen...but that was so implausible and impossible on every level. Like, they might as well have had Megatron and My little Pony fly down and carry him to saftey , it would have make as much sense as being saved by the miracle Frigidare)

2. when you have a line in your script, and it reads "The monkeys swing in and ATTACK!"....your script is very very bad...and it cant possibley get any better when it gets played out on screen, cgi or not.

3. Gophers who act like people, are only funny in Golf Slapstick Parodies. If you feel your action/adventure/sci-fi flick needs to reset "caddy shack"...then just throw that one in the can, and just do a cgi butchering of the first 3 movies like you did with starwars, the fans will hate you less in the long run for it.

4. This movie , through its entire run, felt like it was starting/stoping the whole way through. it felt disjointed and unconnected. the scenes could have been cut together in different orders, and it wouldnt have changed the story. The dialogue in this one was super stilted and bad...it was so bad it made George Lucas' Ham fisted writing in the new trilogy seem like David Mamet.

5. The "climax" of the movie, was confusingly vague in some parts, and super hamfistedly overexplained at others...It was like 9 people wrote 9 differnt scripts, and they just cut and pasted them together.

6. Who were the guys in ruins? ANY of them! couldnt you have spent more then (literally) ONE SENTENCE explaining who they were? or how they could do some of thoes things? i mean, come on!

God, the more that movie spins around in my head, and the more i get away from my "yay indy" geeky fandom...the more i realize that movie sorta sucked...I mean, it really hurts to say this, but that was NOT an indy movie...that was 9 different scripts, from 9 differnt genres, they stitched together like some horrible cash-cow frankensteins monster, and slaped the label "indiana jones and kingdom of the cheap-cash-grab" on it.

This movie was a 4.5/10...and considering how much i wanted this movie to be something amazing, it hurts to say that.

quote:

Originally posted by zhamlau:
This movie , through its entire run, felt like it was starting/stoping the whole way through. it felt disjointed and unconnected. the scenes could have been cut together in different orders, and it wouldnt have changed the story. The dialogue in this one was super stilted and bad...it was so bad it made George Lucas' Ham fisted writing in the new trilogy seem like David Mamet.

This movie was a 4.5/10...and considering how much i wanted this movie to be something amazing, it hurts to say that.

So I guess that's one thumb down then.

I'll be catching this one anyway because its the holiday weekend and its a good way to kill a night, but I fear your observations are dead on. Even the 3 star reviews alluded to less than great action and a shoddy script.

It seems like Lucas and Spielberg often get passes for things that other filmmakers would be critized for. Its like, these guys are such geniuses that everything they put out is a masterpiece. I think its starting to become a case of "the Emperior's new clothes".

Anyhow I'll post my thoughts after I see it.

I saw it this afternoon. I'd have to give it **1/2 out of ****

While it was good to see Indy again, and it had some nice touches, the plot was weak. In my opinion, this film was the least memorable of the four movies

It just seemed to me, at least, that we've seen it all before. None of the stunts were really spectacular. What was fresh in the 1980s was not so today. I really, really expected alot more. But I guess it's tough to top the classics. We've seen so many action movies since 1989, that it's hard to outdo what has appeared since the last one.

I just got back from seeing it, and I'm glad I had lowered my expectations (because of press, comments here, etc.) before going to see it. That made it a much more enjoyable movie.

It did keep all 3 of us interested and entertained all the way through, and that is what movie seeing is about, at least in my view.
It might be a different Indiana Jones movie than we had hoped for, but I for one am happy there was a 4th movie!

Mike.

Watched it over the weekend and have to say that I was a bit disappointed with it. The whole idea behind the crystal skull seems a bit too far fetched for me even when compared to the Ark, Sankara stones and the Holy Grail. Indy riding into the sunset in the last crusade would have been a fitting finale but alas, it was not to be.

I saw Indy 4 on Sat. with my wife, son, 2 other friends of my son and their parents.
All of us left a bit disappointed.
I think I liked SPEED RACER better.

My biggest problem is that while in the previous three films when things seemed impossible they were not so far fetched that Indy could not get out of them. I liked the feeling of "how is he going to get out of this one!" This film made it seem that Indy AND HIS FRIENDS have superhero qualities.

The general feeling after the movie.
Best
Raiders
Second
Last Crusade
Third/fourth tie
Kingdom of Crystal Skull /Temple of Doom

Still it was fun to see Indy again. 2 out of 4 stars.

We saw the movie this afternoon and I thought it was a LOT of fun. Yes, there were plenty of implausible things that happened, but it's Indiana Jones! I thoroughly enjoyed the ride.

Saw it last night and didn't think it was a terrible waste of a Sunday night. Having already lowered my expectations I was able to take it for what it was, but those who are disappointed have valid points.

Basically this is kind of a send up of Indiana Jones, the story is nonsense, the action is ridiculous, the villians are cardboard. Cate Blanchette vamped her way through and was not convincing at all. Karen Allen did not have enough time on screen. I liked Shia better in Transformers. It supposedly took Lucas and Spielberg 10 years to find a script they liked. If this is what they picked I would have hated to see the other ones.

But Harrison Ford looked good, and there were a couple of nice scenes between Indy and Marion. It all made me want to see Raiders again. I guess that really sums it up.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" chased down $311.1 million from moviegoers around the world, as nostalgic fans brought along their children to watch Harrison Ford's latest escapades, distributor Paramount Pictures said on Monday.

The tally included $151.1 million from the United States and Canada -- the second-highest U.S. Memorial Day holiday weekend opening in history -- and $160 million from No. 1 launches in 61 other countries, the studio said.

Foreign highlights included $24 million in Britain and $14 million in France. Sales in France were boosted by the hype surrounding its glitzy world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival on the French Riviera last Sunday.

Overall business was "driven by people in their 30s and 40s, and that audience was excited to see the movie and excited to bring their kids with them," said Rob Moore, Paramount's president of worldwide marketing, distribution and operations.

The worldwide tally set a record for both the Viacom Inc-owned studio and for the film's director, Steven Spielberg. For both, the old mark was held by "War of the Worlds," which opened to $202 million in a similar number of territories during the U.S. July 4 holiday weekend in 2005. Higher ticket prices and the slide of the U.S. dollar, which benefits exporters such as Hollywood studios, helped the new film's cause.

In North America, where Paramount said two-thirds of the audience was aged 25 and older, the $151.1 million tally was bested only by the $153 million debut of "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" among Memorial Day openings.

"Crystal Skull," which Paramount said cost $185 million to make, is the fourth movie in the lucrative "Indiana Jones" franchise, and the first to hit theaters in 19 years. Reviews were mixed, but evidently did not dissuade the franchise's aficionados.

Ford, 65, reprises his role as the eponymous archeologist. He is joined by Australian actress Cate Blanchett and Spielberg's hot new discovery, Shia LaBeouf. George Lucas, who created the franchise in 1981 with "Raiders of the Lost Ark," returned as executive producer.

My wife an I saw this movie on Saturday. Her parents wanted to see it, so we saw it again with them on Sunday. All of us enjoyed the movie. It was not as good as Raiders or Last Crusade, but was better than Temple of Doom.

You sometimes wonder what became of your favorite movie heroes, and in this case it was fun to see Indy in action again. There were some scenes that required suspension of belief, but you have these in any modern action/adventure movie.

I agree that this movie's villians were not as good as previous villians. The Soviets were bad, but the Nazis were pure evil. Kate Blanchett with a Russian accent does not compare to Indy coming face to face with Adolph Hitler in Last Crusade.

My biggest complaint was the overall look of the movie. Since the film was set in the 1950's. Lucas and Spielberg wanted it to look like a 1950's Sci-Fi "B" movie. This is why some of the outdoor scenes that were filmed on an indoor set looked like they were on a set, and why many scenes had a grainey or blurred look. This "B" movie look is a neat gimick, but it is more of a distraction than a benefit.

Some have asked why it took almost 20 years for this movie to be made. Last Crusade was released in 1989. Lucas and Spielberg wanted to do a fourth movie at the time, but couldn't agree on a story. By the mid-1990's Lucas was working on the Star Wars prequels which kept him busy until 2005.