I saw this film for the first time on the opening night of its theatrical run here in Australia. I was with a group of hardcore Indiana Jones fans, all of whom emerged from the screening bitterly disappointed. I didn't actually hear anyone say 'Lucas/Spielberg raped my childhood', but the sentiment hung in the air like a bad smell as the group dispersed. I couldn't fathom the strength of the emotions on display - I mean, I love Raiders of the Lost Ark as much as the next guy, but it seemed to me that the greatest crime Crystal Skull committed was to have the downright affrontery to be a fun time at the cinema. I was certainly much more entertained than by the first viewing of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I've since found that a good way to easily enrage people at dinner parties is to say that I didn't mind this film - I don't even need to use strong language, like I 'liked' or even 'loved' the film. Professing anything but a profound and burning hatred for Ang Lee's Hulk (a film I actually do love) elicits a similar response.
Last night I rented the film on Blu-ray for a second viewing, and I remain an unrepentant fan. Sure, the film has issues - for every scene (and there are many) that looks like it could have come from one of the old films, there's a scene where cinematographer Janusz Kaminski is obviously uncomfortable shoe-horning his own visual style through an anamorphic lens. And there's something a little off about the way Karen Allen is brought into the film only to be promptly sidelined again and again, as though there's a faint air of embarrassment about the fact that she hasn't kept her physique up, Madonna style. And after the film gets away with a terrific jungle chase sequence by the skin of its teeth, there's a sense of 'we pulled that off, now we can do anything' - the only possible explanation for throwing our heroes over three increasingly gigantic waterfalls and having them emerge shaken but unharmed. And then having John Hurt regain his wits at the last minute, seemingly with the single purpose of having him repeatedly remind the audience that the creatures in the climax are not from outer space, but from another dimension. Not that that little nugget of information makes any difference to most audience members' incredulity.
This last one is popular at dinner parties too - the notion that aliens and flying saucers can pop up in the Indiana Jones universe is the cause of blinding rage in people who never had a problem with a man's beating heart being ripped out, leaving him alarmed but still alive (though not for long), in Temple of Doom. Obviously there are rules about where one draws the line that I am not privy to, as having swallowed one, I have no trouble accepting the other. Sure, the film sometimes coasts along on the enormous amount of goodwill generated from the reunion of Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood, but it offers too many treats for me to be surly about the bum notes and crap bits (Shia LeBeouf swinging from the vines along with the monkeys being a prime example of the crap bits).
ILM and John Williams are working at the top of their game, as is editor Michael Kahn. Shia LeBeouf shows again that he is a genuine movie star. Cate Blanchett (another bona fide movie star) has a ball with her Boris and Natasha Russian accent before being given a send off which resembes nothing so much as the dark flip side of the fate which awaited Richard Dreyfuss at the climax of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Sure, the formidable talents of John Hurt and Ray Winstone are pissed against the wall here, but I refuse to say anything bad about a movie in which Cate Blanchett and Shia LeBeouf engage in a sword fight from the back of two moving vehicles. Now that's movie magic!
The Blu-ray disc, by the way, looks and sounds fantastic.
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