By Steven Lolli
It’s been 19 years since Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and 27 years since Steven Spielberg introduced us to the intrepid, quick-with-a-quip archaeologist, Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones. In Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, he’s grizzled and lined and he knows it, and he knows we know it — at 65, Harrison Ford is old enough to pay the senior citizen price for a ticket to his own summer blockbuster.
Instead of the breathless action of previous Jones films, though, this one gets draggy and repetitive in the middle, with Indy and Co. traipsing through various tombs, searching by torchlight for clues to the origin of the mysterious and powerful Crystal Skull of Akator. (What the thing is, or what it does, doesn’t really matter. It is the MacGuffin, as they say. But it does look eerily like Larry King.)
It seems that the fear that fanboys have long held was justified: that technology unavailable during the first three Indy movies would make this one look slick and fake. That’s especially true during the protracted, messy climax. But even before that, everything feels so glossy and detached that there’s never reason to believe the peril is real — it all lacks the tactile feel of, say, a giant ball bearing down, a wobbly rope bridge groaning over a chasm or a horseback chase through a dusty canyon.
Spielberg fashioned Raiders of the Lost Ark as a fun and funny, rough-and-tumble homage to action-adventure pictures of the 1930s and 40s. It’s still a classic that holds up beautifully today, and is far and away the best of the franchise. Meanwhile, Crystal Skull feels like an homage to Spielberg himself: a serving ofClose Encounters of the Third Kind with a dash of Duel and a heaping portion of the daddy issues that have permeated most of his films. (Spielberg directs from a script by David Koepp and a story by Jeff Nathanson and old friend George Lucas, who’s also an executive producer.)
Crystal Skull begins in 1957 Nevada, with Indy and his partner Mac (Ray Winstone) trying to escape from the Soviets who’ve kidnapped them. Cate Blanchett’s fearsome Irina Spalko wants them to locate the crystal skull within Area 51 for some kind of nefarious mind-control plan involving alien intelligence (a long-standing Spielberg subject). We also learn that a former colleague of Indy’s, Professor Oxley (John Hurt), also was after the skull — and disappeared in its pursuit. Shia LaBeouf’s young tough Mutt Williams tracks Indy down and pleads with him to help find their mutual friend, which sends the two on a quest to determine the purpose behind the mystical artifact and keep it out of the wrong hands.
Mutt’s larger significance to the story, though, becomes obvious (to everyone but Indy), when Karen Allen shows up as sharp-tongued old flame Marion Ravenwood from Raiders. LaBeouf, a Spielberg favorite, does just fine opposite Ford in a physically demanding role and is clearly being groomed for great things; Meanwhile, seasoned actors like Blanchett, Hurt and Winstone go to waste in one-note parts.
The film’s interpersonal relationships and revelations should matter more — they should give the film heart and weight as they did with Sean Connery’s lovably goofy presence as Indy’s father in Last Crusade. Here, they feel like speed bumps sprinkled between spectacular set pieces involving waterfalls or machine-gun fire or giant ants in the Peruvian jungle.
And if there’s not much in the way of emotional investment, there’s even less humor. The cheekiness that made Indy so charming — the swagger and the sarcasm — are long since gone. Much of what made his character so compelling, beyond the adventures he took us on, was his consistently unpredictable personality. Now, even his students don’t have crushes on him anymore. Perhaps it’s time to hang up the fedora.
I feared this all along. Sad to hear that yet another childhood classic has been spoiled.
I’ll go see it Thursday anyway.
How could heeb write an article about this movie without mentioning that the male leads are both (well, partially) M.O.T’s. The adorably half-Jewish grandson of a Borschbelter LeBeouf even had a Hebrew first name.
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