General Indiana Jones Thread

Problem is, everybody hated the character they tried to pass the torch to in Crystal Skull. If they want to use this opportunity to pass the torch, they'll have their work cut out to make people accept Mutt, or they'll just have to introduce a different character.

Still, I have some faith that this movie will be better than the last one, if only because Spielberg recently has been in his groove much more than he was in 2008. And Lucas might not be writing the script.

So this pretty much means Disney will have to move movies around again because they have a MCU film as close as a week to IJ 5.

As long as they don't push the Captain Marvel movie back AGAIN, then I'm not too concerned about "reshuffling."

I never had the impression that they were trying to pass the torch to Mutt. In fact, it seems like the last scene was outright defying the idea.

Oh it absolutely was doing that. Having the hat blow off of Indy's head, over to Mutt, him go and try to pick it up (passing the torch and all that) only for Indy to pick it up himself and growl "get your own." Yeah there was clearly a subversion going on there.

Why was La Beouf hated so much in Crystal Skull, exactly?

Lucas was briefly toying with the idea of a spin-off about Mutt, I think.

Honestly, I think the he just became a scapegoat for all the various things people didn't like about the movie, and got harmed by ill will towards his actor. The character as written and acted is okay for my money; or at least no worse than other supporting characters in Indy movies.

edited 16th Mar '16 3:46:15 PM by DrDougsh

Crystal Skull is almost a sad film for me, because they have three potentially interesting elements (Indy's son, aliens, Soviet villains) that they do nothing with.

The Russians are Nazis with a fresh coat of paint, the Alien stuff feels half assed, and Mutt is completely wasted because they only reveal he's Indy's son in the last third, and it still doesn't really change the dynamic between the two. Mac is completely useless as a character both thematically as well as in the plot, and John Hurt, a man who can do amazing things with spoken dialogue is reduced to playing a spaced out old professor for 90% of the film.

It honestly feels like a movie where they put stuff in because an Indiana Jones film just has them without understanding why. Its not even a bad movie as much as it is a hollow one.

Mac was a big waste in the film, yeah. I really wish they would have put Sallah in there, because Lord knows his presence could probably have lifted it up slightly.

Then there's all the damn CGI. The CGI monkeys, the CGI ants, and the CGI prairie dogs, all of them suck.

You know what would have been interesting? A grown-up Short Round, betraying Indy to communists.

Complete with Cerberus Echo of his previous line:

Indy: I loved you like a son, kid.

Short Round: [Struggling to keep his composure] No time for love, Doctor Jones.

edited 16th Mar '16 4:40:43 PM by BorneAgain

I agree, in fact I place it on the same level as Temple that lately I have seen a ton of people praising as being good as the other two films.

OK then, can someone try and give me some positive things about Crystal Skull?

Other than, of course, Marion returning.

edited 16th Mar '16 8:43:20 PM by AdricDePsycho

Those ants freaked the fuck out of me when I was younger, let me tell you.

Honestly, I don't think Crystal Skull was that bad a film. Yeah, it wasn't perfect, but Ford's acting works, Marion's good if a bit underused as a character, and the action is generally solid. It's not the greatest film ever, but it really isn't the defilement so often screamed by fans. By my money, Temple of Doom had a lot more problems, especially with character (Willie specifically is not the most engaging of characters, and her romance with Indy isn't exactly the best). Last Crusade largely gets by on Indy and his father's chemistry, but that's almost enough for the film on its own, really.

edited 16th Mar '16 9:16:34 PM by Lavaeolus

Willie is the absolute worst in my opinion with Short Round being just as annoying as Mutt ever was.

I think a lot of the backlash came from audiences not quite understanding the types of movies they were emulating. They are seen as the quintessential adventure movies, but they were paying homage to the B-movies of the 30's, which were filled with daring globetrotters raiding ancient pyramids (which is why the first film is Raiders of the Lost Ark, no Indiana Jones prefix). In the mind of the filmmakers, updating Indiana Jones to paying homage to the B-movies of the 50's (which included supernatural, horror and creature attacks) seemed natural, while audiences were expecting more of the 30's B-movie stories.

I actually liked Short Round, to be honest.

I didn't dislike KOTCS either. Actually, I prefer it to Temple of Doom (the praise that that movie gets baffles me honestly, it the worst one I think). And yeah, as stated above, the original three films were homages to 30's adventure films, which had lots of globetrotting tomb-robbing, etc). That's why they're set in the 30's. KOTCS was a homage to 50's sci-fi features, which makes sense actually. But I think that some people were expecting more 30's-esque stuff, which doesn't make sense in either the context of what the films are meant to be, or timeline-wise. Ford was clearly too old for Indy to still be living in the 30's, so either you recast of you HAVE to move it forward in the timeline.

And yeah there's dumb stuff in that film (overuse of dodgy CGI, the Mutt Tarzan sequence, nuking the fridge, etc). But I personally didn't find it to be a BAD movie, it was decent and I enjoyed watching it (also LOVED seeing them bring Marion back). As for Mutt, I didn't find him to be a bad character. It seems like a lot of people know about Shia's offscreen "issues" and they let their personal dislike/annoyance with him bleed onto the characters that he plays. Because he ain't bad in that movie for me, I actually liked him there acting-wise.

I liked Short Round to BTW, but LORD could I not stand Willie. Like I kept thinking to myself "you know Indy, if you got there JUST too late to save her from the creepy cult, no one would blame you, just saying."

Part of the praise for Temple of Doom seems to be how it's really dark and brutal. I mean, it invented the PG-13 rating with how dark it was.

Interesting, because that's one of my major problems with it. It feels really tonally out of place with the other three (and not in a good way). Plus Willie is insufferably annoying and I don't buy her romance with Indy whatsoever.

Of all of the films this one plays to the unfortunate "great White savior" trope the most blatantly.

There's other "problematic" racial and cultural stuff in it (it was so bad that they were apparently banned from filming in India itself), having the "good" British soldiers come to save the day from the EEVVVIILLL Hindu's was, not great, the portrayal of Hinduism itself is, decidedly not great, etc.

I seem to recall Spielberg himself even saying that he doesn't care much for it these days (and Kate Capshaw has also bashed it as well).

On the other hand, you could argue that that makes it even closer to old school serials, but yeah that's kind of problematic. I guess I mostly prefer it because its stunts feel a bit better than Crystal Skull's.

It's funny. I just looked up the quote from Spielberg and he said that the best thing about the movie for him personally, was that it introduced him to Kate Capshaw (who later became his wife, and I believe that they're still married today actually).

From what I understand, both him and Lucas were going through some heavy emotional problems. Lucas was recently divorced, I believe. Their personal business kinda bleeded into the film.

x3

The action/stunts in Doom are pretty great though many of them are as far fetched as some of more despised scenes in Skull.

The Indiana Jones stunts are always far fetched. I prefer Temple of Doom's because they don't resort to bad CGI.