Thursday, 22 May 2008
Possibly the last truly great blockbuster ever made.
So we meet again, Dr Jones.
Firstly, this is the best Indiana Jones film since 1981.
Secondly, this is probably the best summer blockbuster film you will see this year.
Thirdly, this is classic Indiana Jones.
Finally, this is Spielberg showing the imitators how a master does his work.
Strong words there. But true. “Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull” is the film we thought we would never see - and thankfully not the film we feared we might see. In one way, it’s Spielberg’s coming-of-old-age/redemption film. Like “Rocky Balboa”, it’s the final attempt at reclaiming an icon and exhibiting the march of time. Unlike those other films though, Spielberg never made a shit moronic sequel in the Jones canon. (Sure, there was “Jurassic Park II”, but history should erase that piece of silly crap from memory). “The Last Crusade” was a fabulous, perfect finale. There never needed to be another inch of Jones celluloid.
Thankfully, this isn’t Spielberg’s “Phantom Menace”. What it is, is a brilliant piece of movie history that shows that sequels, even those made after a 20 year gap, need not suck, need not be full of false, plastic CGI, need not awful injokes, need not dumb down to the lowest common denominator for the mouth breathers. They have their shit films - their “Fast And Furious”, their “Superhero Movies” : leave them to that. Don’t let them infect quality cinema and despoil the legacy like “Die Hard 4.0“. This isn‘t “Indiana Jones Fights The Superjets With A CanOpener“. It’s a great film that shows, reflects and respects it age. It’s the best summer blockbuster I have seen in at least a decade.
And to be blunt, “The Crystal Skull” is… better than I or anyone ever expected. There’s very little to hate in this. There are the odd gratuitous impossible CGI shots (Shia LeBouf straddling two speeding cars, for example) that break and despoil the look and feel of the rest of the canon. There are the occasional moments that feel totally unrealistic even within the rather fantastic Jones universe (a brief line of dialogue in the library). There are the odd moments that stretch the set pieces and action sequences slightly too far. There’s a pisspoor Tarzan moment and a slight excess of invincible, cute desert voles. All these moments are few and far between.
The worst thing about the film is Shia LeBouf. His character feels, narratively, a little forced and unnecessary. My worst fears that it would be “Blues Brothers 2000” with the token kid for the yoof vote and my fears were squashed within five minutes. His character is nowhere near as superfluous as Short Round, and about 1% as irritating. You cheat Dr Jones! My arse. LeBouf is far better than he was in ‘Transformers’, and a suitable foil for Harrison Ford. He could’ve been an insanely irritating little prick, and thank the maker he wasn’t. Sometimes he’s an irritating prick, but show me any character his age who isn’t and I’ll show you a liar.
Talking of “Star Wars”, there’s a brilliant line uttered by a central character near the end that will make any fan of Lucas’ film grin from ear-to-ear.
And the rest? Oh, the rest is glorious. You can say that they don’t make like this anymore, and you’d be both wrong, and right. One of the many things that makes the film work is that the vast majority of the stunts and the set pieces are done in real time, on real sets. I’m tired of watching animated Spider-Men and impossible geography. CGI - when done right - can be an incredibly powerful and effective tool. But these days, too many film-makers think that because you can, you should. Too much CGI makes me feel as if I am watching someone else play a computer game with expensive actors acting in plot-driven Cut Scenes racing to the next CGI Setpiece. Cartoons are for kids. The fact is, watching this film, because 90% of the work isn’t CGI, I’m watching real people do real things, acting in real ways. And CGI has yet to convince me because I know when I’m in Uncanny Valley. The set pieces are huge and the set design, the dressing, the costumes - all are completely in keeping with the established canon. There’s no need to ‘reboot’ Indiana Jones. You can’t improve on perfection.
There’s almost too much to talk about. John Hurt plays Oxley as an absolute enigma, chewing the scenery with fantastic joy and yet his character is utterly unreadable and a complete mystery in motive and ideology until the final minutes. His part is - and will always be - severely under-rated. And whilst the part is, fairly obviously, written with Sean Connery in mind, Hurt makes it his own. Other high points - in a film of high points - is Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood : there are little moments and shots that show that she is still, underneath it all, the same lovestruck teenager she was when she met and loved Indiana Jones. And also, at the same time, a hard-as-nails, determined brook-no-shit woman. Possibly the only woman who was ever a true and equal match of Jones himself. There’s a brief line in a truck that speaks to me in a way no one but I and one other person will ever understand - and a response that is simple cinematic genius. It’s a moment of great cinema unseen since the forties.
"Yes... there other women. The problem with them was - they weren't you"
Ultimately, “The Crystal Skull” is about many things. It’s about growing old - and being comfortable with that. It’s about the years and the mileage. It’s about Communism, it’s about right now, it’s about everything and nothing. There are some references in the film to events that were never filmed - that time in Berlin with a luger in the back of your head, for starters - that make me sad for all the Jones films that we will never see and that Spielberg never made in those 19 wilderness years and that he never will make. Ford plays the role in what is one of his best ever performances (remember, this man was Han Solo, Rick Deckard, AND Indiana Jones) that is both an utter joy to watch. He’s having the time of his life after a decade of cinematic slumming for a huge pay check, and it’s a great shame he always chose the high paying braindead blockbuster instead of the smaller Indie film. Ford’s sold himself short in his choices, and I think on the basis of this performance - he damn well knows he was always capable of greatness but often chose well-paying nonsense. Imagine Ford in a Tarantino movie. Imagine him in something like “Michael Clayton” or “The Insider”. Those type of films could’ve given him Oscars, but he chose the money instead.
And the way Ford plays Indiana is perfect : as a academic who despite himself, can’t help but get into trouble. In a way he’s the kind of academic who invented the nuclear bomb. Pavlov’s archeaologist if you will. All you have to do is dangle an interesting idea in front of him, and he’s off chasing possibilities irrespective of the consequence. He never says he won’t help, all you need do is show him some hieroglyphics and his mind is racing off trying to solve the problem. Doesn’t matter if the Nazis or the Russkies are there, Indy’s on the case, a bloodhound chasing the scent. In psychology, he’d be an enabler.
What else is there to love? The dialogue is effortlessly quotable. These days, the dialogue in most films is so insipid, so lacking in wit and charm and insight. Here, it’s a gem every time. Jim Broadbent only has about three lines, and one of those is more meaningful than all of Ford’s schlock movies put together.
Maybe this is the final, truly great blockbuster Spielberg will ever make. The cinematic grand finale, if you will, from the master of such things. And, if so, it’s a perfect ending. It takes the promise of the golden sunset from the end of “Last Crusade”, and shows that what happened next was just as interesting.
But Wait! There’s More! I haven’t even mentioned the plot. Ray Winstone is a fabulously broken character we will never see enough of. Cate Blanchett offers a gleefully evil, genius stroke as a determined, half-crazed KGB Agent. She’s easily the most memorable Jones villian since Ronald Toht, and absolutely bristling with character. Lesser film-makers would take her character and build an entire franchise around her. Her character Spalko is a fabulous invention and should go in the history of cinemas Top Bad Guys of all time.
And what else? The plot is contemporary, updated - and noticeably post 9/11, being set in the age of mass destruction and McCarthyism. It’s fascinating to see Jones remain unchanged in a changing world and how he responds to the shifting sands of time with a stoic acceptance. Yes, the plot involves Roswell, and aliens, and in some respects changes the basis of the canon from the ‘merely’ supernatural to the extra-terristrial. But as Arthur C Clarke said, any technology sufficiently advanced looks like magic - and if, from another point of view, Jesus and God were aliens, then this is utterly in keeping with the supernatural basis of the work. There’s a brilliant chase scene set in the jungle that makes clear that the Tomb Raiders and National Treasures and all those films were mere ersatz Jones movies, pale imitations and photocopies, films we went to see because they reminded us of great films instead of being any good in their own right.
And the opening 20 minutes are, very probably the best opening to any Indiana Jones movie. Better even than Raiders. It simultaneously offers evocative nostalgia for the fifties, a brilliant homage to the original film with a shameless and necessary cameo, and single-handedly revisit’s the age of the impending apocalypse that has been reborn in every moment since 9/11 : the fear that something enormous is coming that we cannot stop and cannot avoid that may destroy life as we know it forever. Jones is a relic in this modern age, and yet he endures as a modern day Mona Lisa because some things are timeless, unchanging. The ending can be seen by some as a cop-out, a deus ex machina, much like Raiders were Indy was all but defeated, the bad guys got their wish, and it is that very wish that destroyed them. The final few moments are, like all Jones films, about Indy running away and watching things fall apart without his intervention.
There’s more of course. So much more. There’s set pieces that are enormous, brilliant and instantly unforgettable. There’s lines of dialogue that we’ll be quoting as geeks until we die. There’s so much to love in this film. I only hope that they end the series here so they can avoid the increasing temptation to despoil the legacy with crappy sequels.. Which, if Lucas has any involvement is far too possible. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of The Crystal Skull is a fucking great film, and I am so fucking glad they made it. If it is goodbye, Dr Jones, then there is little way they can improve upon this as a farewell.Only registered users can write comments.
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