Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (Blu-ray)

Written by El Fangorio

This film sucks. I hate it. I gave it three chances: once in the theater on opening day, once at a drive-in, and this last time on Blu-ray. Each and every time, I hated it (with the drive-in being the most painless). And let me state for the record that I love the franchise almost as much as I love the Star Wars trilogy. I love them in the order that they were made (yes, Temple of Doom over Last Crusade; I am willing to fight over it) and find them pretty much flawless. Granted I was the perfect age for them but then so was everyone (parents included) and you would think that if Lucas and Spielberg decided that after 20 years, it was worth bringing Indy back, that it must have been for a hell of a good reason. Why did I think the man that used to be “George Lucas” (seriously, who is this hack imposter?) would be capable of pulling this off? He sucks. He takes great pleasure in taking something beloved and making it totally asinine. Did I mention yet how much this film sucks?

Let’s start with the mandatory-to-the-series opening shot where, in all three prior films, the opening Paramount logo (the mountain) dissolves into the opening shot of the film, matching it perfectly. In Raiders, it segues into a mountain in South America; in Temple of Doom, it’s a gong in the Club Obi-Wan; and in The Last Crusade, it becomes a cliff in some landscape from Indy’s past. This one opens up on a fucking CGI groundhog hill (you know because it costs so much to build a real one these days) and out pops a fucking CGI prairie dog (because apparently they’re extinct now) to let us know that from here on out, this film is going to blow.

Still, this apparent crossover from Over the Hedge is only the tip of the digitally manipulated iceberg. There are CGI monkeys (because real ones are invisible to the camera eye and cannot be filmed) and CGI giant ants (because real ones don’t exist because God knew how damn stupid they would look). There’s a big CGI triple-decker waterfall and everyone goes “whoooaaaaa” every time they go over a level, each time surfacing from the 500-story foot drops onto the jagged rocks below, unscathed and laughing. There’s also a CGI warehouse, a CGI Russian camp, a CGI jungle, a CGI plane, a CGI Classroom, a CGI Library, a CGI Mountain, a CGI temple with a big CGI entrance…the only thing that isn’t CGI are the actors which would have all been better off computer generated.

Starting with Harrison Ford. Did he have a stroke and not tell anyone? Throughout the entire film, he acts like a retarded old man that doesn’t understand what’s going on. The film could just as easily been called Regarding Henry Jones. As for the eagerly awaited return of Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen)? Her performance is totally ruined, likely by an intake of anti-depressants from being out of work for so long. Seriously. She doesn’t stop smiling for the entire duration of the film and looks insane. As for their son Mutt, I have to admit, I was shocked to find that the one thing I thought could sink the film (I was so naïve) was actually the only thing that didn’t. Shia LaBeouf (“not quite a nerd, not quite a hunk”) is actually decent. His lines are all tailor-made for his already patented delivery so it’s kind of hard to fail on his part. Wait a minute, he totally sat back and let George and Steven run this idea by him and said “I’ll do it”: We want you to swing on CGI vines with CGI monkeys through a CGI jungle. So forget what I said. Shia LaBeouf, you’re an asshole! Oh yeah, Cate Blanchett is in it and believe it or not, she sucks. She does. Watch it and tell me how scary she is compared to Raiders’ Toht, Doom’s Mola Ram, and Last Crusade’s…well, just compare her to those first two. She sucked! And oh my god….John Hurt. I’ll say he did, too. What an awful, awful role.

And what an awful, awful film (for lack of a better transition). Still, George and Steven have a pretty good excuse: they’re almost 70 years old. Swear to god. How many films does your grandpa direct? Whatever. Lucas has been rolling out the stinkrockets for a loooong time now. He is no longer “George Lucas”. He is one of the lizards from V (that’s a guinea pig lodged in his throat) that plans on making the whole world CGI. As for Spielberg, he made Jaws (and about 15 other total masterpieces), but that doesn’t excuse his going along with this script. To think he actually sat there and listened to George suggest that Indy should survive an atomic fucking blast by hiding in a refrigerator (“we’ll show a close-up of the label on the door indicating that it’s made of lead so we should be fine”)? Next time, just keep it to yourselves. You are obviously too out of touch with today’s film audience, which is pretty much the same one you entertained the first three times out of the park.

Indian Jones and the Crystal of the Kingdom Skulls of Tinytown (or whatever the hell it’s called) is on Blu-ray. Hoo-ray. And like my dear old grandmother used to say, “You can’t polish a turd.” It’s still the same film so who cares? And truth be told, I wasn’t that impressed with the picture quality. Yes, you can see detail down to the individual hairs on their heads, the tiny threads of their costumes, the deep cavernous wrinkles of the skin on almost all of the actors but everything else around them is fake and now really looks like it. And director of photography Janusz Kaminski’s typical unrestrained lighting schemes do not help. The promise Spielberg made early on in production that he and Kaminski were going to try their best to make this film look like the originals? All lies. Yes, they shot on film (instead of digital) but they still ran it through a computer and manipulated the hell out of it. Check out the subtle lighting in just the classroom scene. Those students are literally glowing like something from the afterlife. It’s this kind of photography (hyper-overexposure) that is the proverbial smoke and mirrors as it helps to blend what is real and what is digital but it’s as if the format is working against it, revealing all its digital trickery.

As for the audio, you really can’t go wrong here. Granted the skin-crawling banter between Ford and Allen is there in all it’s TrueHD 5.1 glory but then so are the action sequences that at least sound real even if they do look like a video game. The score by regular collaborator John Williams isn’t as memorable as you’d like (okay, you hum the new theme then) but it sounds great and is never incidental. So if you’re into purchasing Blu-rays based solely on sound design, or if you’re blind, then I would definitely recommend this purchase. But only you guys.

As for the special features available, all are taken over from the standard DVD release except they are all shown in HD which is always nice even if it like putting a silk scarf on a pig in this case. There’s a Pre-Production Featurette (11:00) and a plain old featurette titled “The Return of a Legend” (17:34) along with a longer production diary titled “Making Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” which clocks in at a healthy 80 minutes. There is absolutely no mention of Harrison Ford’s stroke, Karen Allen’s addiction to goofballs, or Lucas and Spielberg’s playing an enormous joke on the fans so I wouldn’t trust anything this “special” feature has to say. Also, divided into six parts (to make it look longer) are various clips about various crap (most of it CGI). There are also three pre-vis sequences that prove how difficult it is to film actual animals and locations and why everything from now on should be CGI. There are two art galleries and one of these is easily the only worthwhile thing on the release: Stan Winston Studio. Okay, I have to go cry now ‘cause he’s dead. It was this film that did it I tell you. Last but not least, there are some production photos showing everyone having a good time at the expense of the fans. There are also portraits and behind-the-scenes photographs, which apparently aren’t the same as production photos.

So what are you running for? Sit, don’t stand and reconsider watching this film lest you risk tarnishing the admiration you have for this franchise and its creators. It’s a serious mess with flaws of such a ridiculous level. Seriously, the kind you only see in poorly made films (how in the fuck did Indy and Mutt go from that holding room where Hurt’s character was supposed to be to the top of that mountain where all the idiots hop in and out of holes?). Here’s to hoping that Lucas holes himself up at the Skywalker Assisted Living Ranch and that Spielberg’s hearing aide is turned off the next time his buddy has a great idea for a movie.

The Adventures Of Young Indiana Jones, Volume Two - The War Years

Written by Musgo Del Jefe

It's hard to know how to classify the latest release in the Indiana Jones universe. The Adventures Of Young Indiana Jones, Volume Two - The War Years is a mouthful to say and even harder to label. When you've got 12 hours of "adventures" and over 13 hours of historical documentaries, which one is the "mother" and which one the "son"?

The Adventures Of Young Indiana Jones series has taken a long, interesting road to DVD. The 1989 film, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade featured River Phoenix as a 12-year-old Indiana Jones in 1912 as part of the back-story. The possibility of telling these earlier stories of Indiana Jones led George Lucas to outline the treatments for roughly 70 episodes of a show that would take place between 1905 and the start of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. As conceptualized, the series was practical and adaptable. The series would not tell its stories in chronological order. Instead, the stories would primarily take place with Sean Patrick Flanery as Indiana Jones between ages 16 and 20 and with Corey Carrier as Indy between the ages of 8 and 10. Each episode would be book-ended with narration by a 93-year-old Indy played by George Hall. Every two episodes would be filmed in such a way that they could be aired as two one-hour episodes or as one two-hour TV-movie. This allowed for multiple directors to be filming episodes at the same time and for multiple episodes to be completed in just over the time to complete one. The series was shot in stages between 1991 and 1994, with footage shot in 1996 to seamlessly edit the episodes all into feature-film length. In all, roughly 30 of the 70 episodes were filmed.

This latest release, The War Years, includes Chapters 8 through 15 on the series. The remaining episodes will probably be released to coincide with the release of the latest Indiana Jones movie this spring - Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. There are eight discs in the set that contain one of the films and at least three documentaries that relate to the subject of the episode. With anywhere from 90-120 minutes of special features for each movie, we start to get to the heart of the series. Each film strives to serve as a mini-history lesson. Young Indiana Jones either encounters famous historical figures or is involved in famous historical events in each episode. The special features on each disc expand upon the history behind the fictional story. So, do the "adventures" become education or entertainment? A quick look at two episodes may give better insight.

"Trenches Of Hell" takes place in September of 1916. The episode was meant to have a lead-in episode where we see Indy and his Belgian troops fighting in Flanders. That unfilmed episode leaves the viewer feeling like you've been dropped into the middle episode of a mini-series. There are references to previous battles and questions about how the Company's officer came to be killed in battle. The first half of this movie plays out like an alternate version of All Quiet On The Western Front. To save money, the series was filmed in 16mm instead of 35mm. The dullness of the colors doesn't work so well in smaller settings later in the series, but here it fits the mood of the battle for The Somme.

Although there is no blood or flying body parts, the horror of war is brilliantly illustrated. The futility of Indy's company taking the same trench two or three times over the course of a few days is exasperating. The scenes are set up well, with the goal (a house on the hill) always seeming close and yet never really attainable as we move from trench to trench. The illustration of the gassing by the Germans and their appearance, like fire-breathing monsters, through the clouds with flamethrowers is terrifying.

The second half of the episode becomes The Great Escape. Indy ends up in two different prisoner-of-war camps. The first half of the movie feels more like an exposition on the horrors of war and Indy plays merely a supporting role. This half is more of the Indiana Jones that we've come to know in the Indy mythology. His pride and sarcasm in the face of danger are present. Indy eventually teams up with historical figure, Charles de Gaulle. Their escape is fun but not on par with any feature film type of budget. It's nicely constructed but the 16mm film here betrays the beauty of the German countryside. We leave Indy at the end of the episode as a free man but deep in the heart of Germany.

The disc has four features. There's a documentary "The Somme - Storm Of Steel" that puts the battle we just saw into perspective and illuminates an important part of WWI. There are two features on poets that Indy met while on leave - "Siegfried Sassoon - A War Poet's Journey" and "Robert Graves and the White Goddess." Lastly, there's an informative piece called "I Am France - The Myth of Charles de Gaulle." The level of detail of these documentaries is so precise that I feel they would've been best watched before the main feature. Knowing more details of the characters and setting would've informed what was going on much more. That's the core problem here. In an effort to meld together historical events and characters with the adventures of our non-historical character, Indiana Jones, the writers have a dilemma of how much back-story to include.

The next film, "Demons Of Deception" starts in Verdun. There is a missing episode that was never filmed that bridges the gap between Indy's escape and appearance with the army in Verdun. Once again, it feels like I've missed a night of the mini-series and that I'm playing catch up the first half hour of the show.

The episode looks better than "Trenches of Hell," but that could be because Nicolas Roeg directed the second half of the episode that was written by Carrie Fisher. The first half again addresses the horrors of trench warfare. This time instead of the horror of the new warfare (gas, flame throwers, etc), we see it from the futility of the officers who are willing to sacrifice their troops when little is to be gained.

The second half takes place back in Paris. Here we get some good clues into the future Indy through his heated love affair with the famous Mata Hari. Our young hero finds that love is another form of warfare without civilized rules. Having his heart broken opens his eyes as much as the war and it's an interesting juxtaposition to the first half of the episode. Loss of innocence is a wonderful theme for the small screen; it doesn't have to take place on the same grand scale as a WWI battle to make its impact.

This disc also has four features including "Into The Furnace - The Battle Of Verdun," "Marshal Petain's Fall From Grace," "Flirting With Danger - The Fantasy of Mata Hari," and "Reading The Enemy's Mind- Espionage in World War I." Once again, these documentaries add a level of depth to the stories that can't be conveyed in just 90 minutes.

So, what's the verdict when the Special Features and the actual Features are so closely intertwined? The series does not hold up well as presented alone. The narration, the book-ending, of the original series is gone and that's what gave the viewer their moral compass. The older Indy had a reason to tell each story; there was a lesson we knew we were to take from each story. Without that voice, we only have the story to lead us. Often we are dropped in the middle of a story and leave before it feels finished (like in "Trenches From Hell").

That's where the special features make the difference. They are all well done and informative. The in-depth knowledge of the historical importance of the settings and the rich backgrounds and futures of the characters that Indy interacts with make for better stories. Knowing that the Germans envisioned the Battle Of Verdun as a battle of attrition, a battle to create deaths, not to gain any strategic ground, is an important turning point in the history of warfare and it informs the futility that Indy feels in the episode.

So, this vision of Lucas' of edu-tainment has come to fruition. One needs to be more informed to enjoy his entertainment and while enjoying his entertainment you can't help but become more educated. It's not for everyone. You have to want to make the effort to learn in order to enjoy. Watch the documentaries first (I know, it feels like eating dessert first to me too) and you'll find the episodes much richer for your effort.