Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull [spoilers]

[mmu1]

That response, to me, just serves to further reinforce that you are in denial about the prior movies.

Sorry, but you strike me as the one in denial here, not Starman.

The original Indy movies, while filled with impossible action movie moments, were at no point as over the top as Crystal Skull.

It's a matter of scale and degree - jumping out of an airplane in a life raft, surviving a trip on the deck of a submarine, riding around in mine carts or fighting on top of a tank just aren't quite in the same league (either in terms of outlandishness or outright silliness) as surviving a nuclear explosion, the jeep/tree/three waterfalls bit, or Mutt and his monkey army.

On top of that, the movie is full of lesser moments that make you cringe, because they'd have left 35 year old Indy gasping in pain and holding on for dear life, but his 50-something alter ego seems to be able to shrug them off. They're out of character, and they add up.

It's similar in a way to what happend with the Pirates of the Caribbean movies - in the first (and best) one you have tons of crazy and impossible stunts, but it's not until the 2nd and 3rd one when they decide to turn things up to 11, and you don't just get zombie pirates and insane swashbuckling, but 10-minute rides on waterwheels, teleporting halfway around the world to Singapore, a goddess of the sea, and sword fights on the yardarm of a ship going in circles around a giant whirlpool.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

I demand everyone stop denying that they are in denial about whether or not they are denying to be in denial.

Ow.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

I demand everyone stop denying that they are in denial about whether or not they are denying to be in denial.

Ow.

You did not just say that.

 

[D.Shaffer]

In general, I liked the movie. It was fun, and while I dont think it topped the list of Indie movies, I think it does deserve to be listed with the others.

That said...I absolutely HATE ancient astronaut theories. For the most part, I find them as a way to demean other cultures (No way THOSE people could have done that, must have had someone teaching them).

 

[Krug]

Time for Indy's bikini wax: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r87wJ1QmyYw

 

[Fast Learner]

That said...I absolutely HATE ancient astronaut theories. For the most part, I find them as a way to demean other cultures (No way THOSE people could have done that, must have had someone teaching them).

Agreed, that massively culturalist (and racist) thing pushed so heavily by von Däniken in the 60s and 70s is perhaps a "fun" idea, but the reality is that ancient peoples created truly amazing things, again and again. We should indeed be in awe, not because aliens built the Egyptian pyramids, but because ancient peoples with comparatively primitive tools did, just as they did the figures on the plains of Nazca and many other wonders. Props to our ancestors, people!

 

[RangerWickett]

Eh, I'm okay with the premise that some ancient people worshiped, say, a single alien who came to earth and decided to live it up. The humans built all the stuff; it's just that the secret is that the alien had awesome psychic powers and by reuniting its skull and its body you can claim that power for yourself.

But if you have a dozen aliens in South America, then you've got to explain why there aren't any aliens anywhere else. The theory falls apart, unless, say, they used the Ark of the Covenant to annihilate the aliens and drive them off our planet.

How would I have done the movie?

Well, it's the 50s, so you have Roswell and fears of aliens. You have Communists and lots of paranoid fears. However, the one thing you cannot possibly do is have a living alien on screen. The aliens are gone, but their power lingers. I mean, God doesn't make a personal appearance at the end of Raiders, Shiva doesn't wave her many hands and say hi at the end of Temple, and Jesus doesn't give Indy the thumbs up after he picks the right Holy Grail. This is mythic archaeology; it's about things from the past, long lost, whose power cannot be safely grasped by modern men.

So our premise is this:

The Russians, doing research into parapsychology, want to steal the corpse of a Roswell alien for study. They get it, and discover that its skull is crystalline, but is shattered from the crash, useless. However, this cues them into the search for another, historical crystal skull, one that was revered and kept preserved for thousands of years.

We ultimately find El Dorado, the City of Gold (yes, actual gold, dammit! none of this 'their treasure was knowledge' b.s.). It's okay, we're going to destroy the whole place.

Now our theme that we're going for is that paranoia will destroy you. There is no room in this theme for another father-son story like we had with Last Crusade, so we ditch Shia LeBeouf, but we keep Marion in. See, we need friends of Indy's so that he can become paranoid of them, and then overcome that paranoia in order to save the day.

I'm not quite sure how the story plays out in total, though. These things don't write themselves.

 

[John Crichton]

Eh, I'm okay with the premise that some ancient people worshiped, say, a single alien who came to earth and decided to live it up. The humans built all the stuff; it's just that the secret is that the alien had awesome psychic powers and by reuniting its skull and its body you can claim that power for yourself.

That's not how it worked. One cannot claim the power as was shown the movie.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Na... I think the least spoiler ever award goes to any movie based on biblical event.

Actually, no. That would be Titanic.

[sblock]The ship sinks.[/sblock]

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Actually, no. That would be Titanic.

[sblock]The ship sinks.[/sblock]

LIES