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Let’s be honest: Bringing back one of the most
iconic figures in cinematic history after a 19-year absence is an act
fueled by hubris or foolhardiness. Watching Indiana
Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,
though, I got the sense that director Steven Spielberg, producer George
Lucas, and star Harrison Ford just wanted to have fun and are eager for the
audience to come along for the ride. That’s all well and good, but,
amid all of the slickly produced derring-do, more than a few opportunities
for putting a more complex and satisfying spin on the character and his
times were missed.
Area 51, the fabled city of El Dorado, space aliens,
Mayan culture, and the Red Scare all play a part in this far-reaching
adventure, which finds Indy searching for a former colleague, Professor
Oxley (John Hurt). The delivery of a cryptic letter from Mutt Williams
(Shia La Beouf) gives Jones the first clue to his associate’s
whereabouts. Seems he’s uncovered the location of a mysterious
crystal skull that he has set out to return to El Dorado, deep in the
Amazon — an act that will give him fantastic power. The only problem
is that Oxley’s gone missing and a detail of Russian soldiers, led by
Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett), is hot on his trail. The film captures the spirit of the series’
best moments in the first 20 minutes and then fails to build on them. With
the exception of a slickly executed chase sequence that finds Indy on the
back of a motorcycle being navigated by Mutt through heavy traffic, the
film’s first hour is bogged down in seemingly endless and repetitious
exposition that, in the end, means nothing. Really, the plots in all of the
Indiana Jones films
have been disposable, serving as nothing but clotheslines on which to hang
elaborate action sequences, but in this one the line begins to sag and the
film flirts with tedium as Indy and Mutt go to Peru in search of Oxley,
explaining in far too much detail the meaning of every archaeological clue
they uncover. Equally frustrating is the most visually striking
moment in the film, which is treated as a throwaway moment. Early on, Indy
stumbles into a fake neighborhood that’s been constructed on a
hydrogen bomb test site to measure the amount of damage the device will
cause. Watching Jones running through suburbia is amusing, but the sight of
him minutes later, looking up in wonder up at a blossoming mushroom cloud,
brilliantly underscores the idea that Indy is a man out of time with ideals
that are a thing of the past in the face of this sort of technology. The
film would have been much richer had it delved further into the
character’s thoughts about being so out of step with the times. Inexplicably, the film doesn’t give us
Indy’s old flame Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) until its second
hour, and it suffers for the delay; the pair’s antagonistic chemistry
gives the proceedings a much-needed spark. Once the setting shifts to the
Amazon, the movie finds its footing; there, Spielberg and his crew revive
the go-for-broke cliffhanger spirit that made the original films such
favorites. A breakneck chase through the jungle, imaginative fights,
gruesome deaths, and a wonderfully ridiculous, over-the-top conclusion
justify the viewer’s patience.
In the end, Skull proves a mixed bag. It’s a shame that Spielberg and
Ford did not return to the series earlier, perhaps exploring Indy’s
World War II adventures while Ford was of an appropriate age to do so.
(Though there’s a hint of further entries, the actor will likely not
take center stage in them.) This fourth film is better than none at all,
and though Skull may disappoint some, true fans looking for nothing more than a piece of
old-fashioned entertainment will be glad to see the man in the hat once
again.
This article appears in May 15-21, 2008.
