Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Indiana Jones was originally conceived by George Lucas and Steven Spielberg as a throwback to the pulp heroes of the 1950s that boomers grew up watching in serials and on early television. Funnily enough, Raiders of the Lost Ark became such a cultural touchstone of the 1980s that Harrison Ford's bullwhip and fedora are more likely nowadays to put people in mind of Cabbage Patch Kids and crispy bangs, rather than hula hoops and duck's asses. It's fitting, then, that the new Indiana Jones film Kingdom of the Crystal Skull create a theme park version of fifties America that feels like its been lifted from another 80s staple: Back to the Future.

Familiarity is the name of the game in the new Indy movie, and that's by design. Lucas and company are betting on a rich iconography and 27 years of audience good will to sell this thing to the public. It just wouldn't do not to trot out the series' greatest hits. This approach pays off in some moments: the first time Indy cracks his whip or throws one of those patented wild haymakers of his, it delivers old school Indiana Jones thrills. More often, though, it fails miserably. The dreariest attempt at bringing back the spirit of the original films is Karen Allen's return as Marion Ravenwood, Indy's on-again, off-again girlfriend from Raiders. Allen does what she can with the meager role she's stuck with, but the sparkling interplay and lively chemistry that marked Marion's relationship with Indy in Raiders is here rendered shrill, flat and overdetermined by the script. In George Lucas terms, the dynamic in the two films is the difference between the Princess Leia/Han Solo relationship in the original Star Wars trilogy, and the Queen Amidala/Anakin Skywalker relationship in the new one. The lameness of the two characters scenes together can partially be explained by their awkward brevity. Indy's reunion with Marion is one underdeveloped element in a plot stuffed beyond the breaking point with new characters. You've got a Russian dominatrix (Cate Blanchett), a British treasure hunter (Ray Winstone), a mad professor (John Hurt), and a central casting, Wild Ones rebel (Shia Labeouf). It's a classic case of too much not being nearly enough. None of these new characters (including a classic Indy gal pal) get enough screen time to register as more than fonts of expository dialogue.

Of course, none of the character shenanigans carry much weight if Kingdom delivers the bravura action setpieces for which the series is known. Here again, familiarity breeds contempt. Some of the action scenes have bits of the old crispness, ingenious complexity and deft blend of suspense and humor. Even in the most cracking scenes, though, the ghost of ass-kickings past haunt the proceedings. In particular, a truck chase through the Amazon rain forest between Indy and his pals and a half track full of Soviet troops is genuinely rousing, but it recalls the tanks and horses chase from Last Crusade so strongly that it just ends up making you wish you were watching that movie instead (that was a good one, it had Sean Connery!)

One theme that has been featured in all the Indiana Jones films is a sense of awe at the mysteries of the world. Kids growing up in 80s, an era of closed frontiers, were given a glimpse of inconcievable wonders waiting to be discovered in ancient temples and even government warehouses. This spirit of adventure is tempered by a stern warning that there are mysteries and powers too vast and terrible for human understanding. Attempts to master them will always come to face-melting grief. In this respect, Kingdom fits comfortably in the Indy pantheon. The film is bracketed by two similar and similarly jaw-dropping shots of Indiana Jones, miniscule in the foreground, beholding a tremendous cataclysm. The first shot is of an A-bomb test in Nevada. The second, which takes place in the Peruvian jungle, is...something else entirely. These great and terrible displays of power, coupled with Harrion Ford's increasingly weathered, rickety countenance and a plot that sees Indy coerced into service by both sides of the Cold War, suggest a poignant subtext to the movie. They point towards a hero whose time has passed, who is vulnerable in ways he's never been before, tossed about by new, inscrutable forces beyond his ability to control or understand. With a bit of development, it might have made for a commentary on post-war American life, reminiscent of another 50s genre beloved of boomers: film noir. Unfortunately, Spielberg and Lucas take no time to flesh these ideas out in their headlong gallup from chase scene to musty, repurposed chase scene.

Score: 6.0