Benraianajones
New member
CrimsonTree said:
Don't they? I have never seen them, they don't really interest me, really.
Question for the people who liked Crystal Skull
- Thread starter CrimsonTree
- Start date
Don't they? I have never seen them, they don't really interest me, really.
agentsands77
New member
Yeah, I'm surprised Spielberg slipped that in there. It wasn't a good moment.James said:
Shortie
New member
Not the ones from the basement scene & the dead one near the end.Peacock's-Eye said:>>it looked too much like the ones from WOTW<<
????
http://www.war-ofthe-worlds.co.uk/images/war_worlds_spielberg_43_x.jpg
http://www.virginmedia.com/images/world_wars.jpg
They don't look anything alike to me
To answer the original question, it's just one of those things you have to learn to let go and enjoy it for what it is. Indiana Jones has always been over the top with situations and events that would never happen in our own everyday lives. It's part of what makes these films fun and it offers an escape from real life for two hours. I went into KotCS with this mentality and came out really enjoying it. Sure, the aliens were a little weird at first, but then you need to remind yourself that this is part of the same series of films that had people getting their hearts ripped out and staying alive and a knight from the crusades still alive and well among other things. It's all following the same idea.
bonoferox
Active member
I saw the alien as what Spalko was seeing since it was from her POV. For all we know, it may have looked nothing like that and could have just been an advanced race of humans who worshipped gods that may or may not have been aliens. Just my opinion.
Then again, it could have been an alien that looked exaclty like that, but who cares since it was only on screen for a moment and didn't speak or dance or condemn humanity.
Then again, it could have been an alien that looked exaclty like that, but who cares since it was only on screen for a moment and didn't speak or dance or condemn humanity.
MaxPhactor23
New member
bonoferox said:
I think the alien in the tent kind of debunks some of this theory. Still, I'm not entirely sure if all the crystal skeletons actually came together to form an in-the-flesh alien or if it was Spalko doing insane. Either way the audience was shown a living alien?and I wanted to gag. Pssh! I dry heaved when I saw the dead alien in the tent to begin with!
Benraianajones
New member
Well, it has been said we see the alien on the frame, when Spalko has perished, so the alien is physically there. The alien I think merged to show Spalko "everything" as she requested - the true alien race behind the skulls in this case. But I think perhaps, they should have had it reveal itself to her, through her mind (her vision) as opposed to a physical entity.
Though, I don't mind the alien - but a darker tone to the movie would have helped. The alien didn't seem the friendliest, it did seem quite sinister, and seemed to enjoy seeing Irina in pain.
Though, I don't mind the alien - but a darker tone to the movie would have helped. The alien didn't seem the friendliest, it did seem quite sinister, and seemed to enjoy seeing Irina in pain.
Filmphoenix
New member
Uki said:For that matter, how can you like Last crusade with those incredibly fake looking giraffes and the phony looking anaconda on the circus train? Why would you enjoy Raiders with the silly GI Joe bodies flying through the sky at the finale?
I love all 4 movies. They all capture a sense of adventure that no one will ever quite experience with a wonderfully thought out protagonist, and deadly villains. Each movie has its share of camp, silliness, and fake-looking props/creatures/whathaveyou, but none of it has ever bothered me. I'm a fan. Skull is here to stay, haters. Get over it!
Enough said. It was a fun adventure movie just like the other 3. I watched the other 3 before going to see this one and I can see why people would think The Temple of Doom was better than this one, but to each his own. Like my father use to say opinions are like a**holes, everyone has one.
OmegaSeamaster
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The film was a "Shark Jump" of monumental proportions.
Michael24
New member
The alien didn't bother me (it's probably actually on screen for barely one minute anyway), and I loved the old-fashion look to the UFO design. Not unsettling at all. Hordes of aliens running around throughout the film, as was apparently the case with the Saucermen From Mars script, would have been worse. But I thought the alien angle to the film was handled much more subtley in a way that it worked. It felt like an Indiana Jones movie, and the new elements were suitable for the new era in which the film was set.CrimsonTree said:
Dust McAlan
New member
I enjoyed the movie on a "big, dumb, fun movie" level, but after seeing it three times now I've discerned what's wrong with the film: the script.
Spielberg directed the hell out of this, Harrison Ford turned in a classic performance, but the script doesn't give them much to do. It's basically a Lego set, in that it takes the characters off screen for a minute, reassembles the pieces, then puts them all back in the scene again. It's got a great idea behind it, but the execution of the script is really poor. People say things, then forget them five minutes later. Examples:
Indy to Mutt at Indy's house: "Orellana disappeared in the jungle, and no one ever found him."
Later, Mutt to Indy at the Nasca Sanitariums: "So what happened [to Orellana]?"
Indy's Response: "He disappeared in the jungle, no one ever found him."
And then also:
Spalko to Indy outside Hangar 51: "My name is Colonel Doctor Irina Spalko. Three times I've been awarded the Badge of Lenin" etc etc "Awards of Socialist Labor" blah blah blah.
Later, Indy in Hangar 51: "Put down your guns, or Colonel Doctor Spalko is dead!"
Later, Indy to FBI after nuke scene: "Who was that woman?"
FBI's Response: "Describe her."
Indy's response: "Short hair, rapier, etc."
General Ross to Indy: "Colonel Doctor Irina Spalko."
Indy to Mac in the tent: "At some point they're going to let me out and I'm going to break your nose."
Later, Indy punches Mac and breaks his nose.
For the rest of the film there's no indication that Mac's nose is broken. Or was punched in the first place.
And then my favorite:
Mutt pulls out knife in restaurant.
Later, Mutt plays with knife in Nasca.
Later, Indy to Mutt in Orellana's Cradle: "You wouldn't happen to have a knife or something, would you?"
The film has great set pieces. The script set them up very well. The fight scenes are great, the action is great, and the special effects are amazing. While I place Temple and Raiders higher than this, I still prefer Kingdom to Crusade. However, the script fails in one very imortant regard: characterization and dialogue.
Nobody calls Indy "Henry." He's supposed to be Indiana Jones. Yet the Dean refers to him as Henry. At the end, possibly symbolic, the name "Professor Henry Jones, Jr" is painted on his office doors. And we repeatedly have Ox calling Indy "Henry." This might be because after his father died, Indy accepted Henry as a given name, with Indiana Jones as his professional name. But from the other pictures, one gets the impression that Indy would never, EVER have himself referred to as Henry. This is the single most important characterization mistake in the film I think, and it completely detracts from Indy himself. And let's not forget the travesty that is Mac. He's...man, he's just a bad character. He doesn't have a personality except a lust for gold, which doesn't make sense as a long standing member of the OSS. If he'd been the main villain instead of Spalko, as a devilishly clever, evil version of James Bond, searching for the Lost City of Gold and the Crystal Skull, forming a pact with the Russians to make his cards right again, I'd have bought that over 2-d Ray Winstone. He only exists to exist, which is bad screenwriting.
The screenplay is bad. Bad, bad bad. But the visuals and the action and the FUN of the whole thing is awesome. And that final, luscious visual of the saucer emerging from the ground...hell, the whole of Akator was the highlight for me. That chamber with the 13 Crystal Skeletons was amazing. The execution of the film raises it above the bad script, but man do you wince at how bad it can be at points.
Let's look at it this way: The Goonies has some bad screenwriting and some over the top moments as well, but today it's a classic. So too may be Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
Spielberg directed the hell out of this, Harrison Ford turned in a classic performance, but the script doesn't give them much to do. It's basically a Lego set, in that it takes the characters off screen for a minute, reassembles the pieces, then puts them all back in the scene again. It's got a great idea behind it, but the execution of the script is really poor. People say things, then forget them five minutes later. Examples:
Indy to Mutt at Indy's house: "Orellana disappeared in the jungle, and no one ever found him."
Later, Mutt to Indy at the Nasca Sanitariums: "So what happened [to Orellana]?"
Indy's Response: "He disappeared in the jungle, no one ever found him."
And then also:
Spalko to Indy outside Hangar 51: "My name is Colonel Doctor Irina Spalko. Three times I've been awarded the Badge of Lenin" etc etc "Awards of Socialist Labor" blah blah blah.
Later, Indy in Hangar 51: "Put down your guns, or Colonel Doctor Spalko is dead!"
Later, Indy to FBI after nuke scene: "Who was that woman?"
FBI's Response: "Describe her."
Indy's response: "Short hair, rapier, etc."
General Ross to Indy: "Colonel Doctor Irina Spalko."
Indy to Mac in the tent: "At some point they're going to let me out and I'm going to break your nose."
Later, Indy punches Mac and breaks his nose.
For the rest of the film there's no indication that Mac's nose is broken. Or was punched in the first place.
And then my favorite:
Mutt pulls out knife in restaurant.
Later, Mutt plays with knife in Nasca.
Later, Indy to Mutt in Orellana's Cradle: "You wouldn't happen to have a knife or something, would you?"
The film has great set pieces. The script set them up very well. The fight scenes are great, the action is great, and the special effects are amazing. While I place Temple and Raiders higher than this, I still prefer Kingdom to Crusade. However, the script fails in one very imortant regard: characterization and dialogue.
Nobody calls Indy "Henry." He's supposed to be Indiana Jones. Yet the Dean refers to him as Henry. At the end, possibly symbolic, the name "Professor Henry Jones, Jr" is painted on his office doors. And we repeatedly have Ox calling Indy "Henry." This might be because after his father died, Indy accepted Henry as a given name, with Indiana Jones as his professional name. But from the other pictures, one gets the impression that Indy would never, EVER have himself referred to as Henry. This is the single most important characterization mistake in the film I think, and it completely detracts from Indy himself. And let's not forget the travesty that is Mac. He's...man, he's just a bad character. He doesn't have a personality except a lust for gold, which doesn't make sense as a long standing member of the OSS. If he'd been the main villain instead of Spalko, as a devilishly clever, evil version of James Bond, searching for the Lost City of Gold and the Crystal Skull, forming a pact with the Russians to make his cards right again, I'd have bought that over 2-d Ray Winstone. He only exists to exist, which is bad screenwriting.
The screenplay is bad. Bad, bad bad. But the visuals and the action and the FUN of the whole thing is awesome. And that final, luscious visual of the saucer emerging from the ground...hell, the whole of Akator was the highlight for me. That chamber with the 13 Crystal Skeletons was amazing. The execution of the film raises it above the bad script, but man do you wince at how bad it can be at points.
Let's look at it this way: The Goonies has some bad screenwriting and some over the top moments as well, but today it's a classic. So too may be Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
Peacock's-Eye
New member
Yeah I disagree about the script. It wasn't "bad bad bad". It's just a hard script to write, and please everyone, including Spielberg, Lucas & Ford. And all the hardcore fans. And general audiences. The reason Raiders is so pristine is that no one had any expectations, no one knew it was coming out.
You can't do that with the 4th movie in a series. It's gonna have faults - it's like juggling on a highwire.
And YOU wouldn't. No screenwriter doing Indy4 could be that stupid.
Screenwriter: "I'll just ignore everyone! Yeah! And then all the fanboys will like me! When Harrison gives me a note that doesn't align with Raiders, I'll just say "**** off Harrison"! When Spielberg comes up with some inane comedy, I'll say, "Screw you! I saw 1942, y'know! You're just like anybody else! You can come up with bad ideas too!" Ha ha! And forget about Lucas. I know what'll keep my career going: I'll keep mocking the Prequels, telling the man he can't direct! Yeah, no ego there! I'll hang out around ILM, cause as screenwriter, I'm now an expert on visual effects. I'll keep them all in line! "Those monkeys look like ****, guys! Ignore the director & producer. Back to the drawing boards!" And then a couple hundred fanboys on the internet will love me! Oh yeah! Cool!!!"
You can't do that with the 4th movie in a series. It's gonna have faults - it's like juggling on a highwire.
And YOU wouldn't. No screenwriter doing Indy4 could be that stupid.
Screenwriter: "I'll just ignore everyone! Yeah! And then all the fanboys will like me! When Harrison gives me a note that doesn't align with Raiders, I'll just say "**** off Harrison"! When Spielberg comes up with some inane comedy, I'll say, "Screw you! I saw 1942, y'know! You're just like anybody else! You can come up with bad ideas too!" Ha ha! And forget about Lucas. I know what'll keep my career going: I'll keep mocking the Prequels, telling the man he can't direct! Yeah, no ego there! I'll hang out around ILM, cause as screenwriter, I'm now an expert on visual effects. I'll keep them all in line! "Those monkeys look like ****, guys! Ignore the director & producer. Back to the drawing boards!" And then a couple hundred fanboys on the internet will love me! Oh yeah! Cool!!!"
Dust McAlan
New member
He might have known her name, but then why didn't he use it when initially talking about her? Like, say, "That woman, Doctor Spalko, who was she?" Then Gen. Ross says "Well, she's Stalin's psychic warfare person." A good screenwriter would have thrown that in. Koepp didn't. It dumbed Indy down.eroc said:
And there's no way that scene with Indy and Mutt about the knife was in jest. The look on his face was serious puzzlement, since he was trying to open the bindings, couldn't do it, and he looked like "Damn, I wish I had a knife. Hey, kid, you don't have a knife on you by any chance, do you?" So maybe that was a problem with acting. But a better screenwriter would have written it differently, less confusingly.
Look, it was a bad script. I loved the movie overall as a viewing experience, but the script was crap. It's very hard to argue otherwise.
Dust McAlan
New member
Well, I'd rather make a pass at a GOOD script rather than pandering and making a piece of crap. If Lucas turns it down, well, he wrote The Prequel Trilogy and he wouldn't know good writing if it wrote the scripts to Empire, Jedi, Raiders, Temple, and Crusade for him.Peacock's-Eye said:
Crusade>Raiders
New member
Yeah, awhile I ago I wrote a big rant about the script being Kingdom's biggest flaws. Spielberg did a great job, the actors all did their thing(Ford is still Indy, Shia was actually fun, it was great seeing Marion and she did her best with what she had to work with, John Hurt is wasted as "crazy old guy", but I love his delivery like 'Henry Jones...Jr.' and 'Help', etc), most of the CGI wasn't that big of a deal(screw that jungle swing scene though), hell even the fridge/aliens didn't cause me to go "ZOMG terrible movie", but its the terrible script that separates this movie from the great ones. Its just a lot of stupid lines for no reason.
"The torches, they're damp." Mutt says it, and then NOTHING COMES OUT OF THE LINE. Its just a random line just thrown out there and no effect later on. And its like that the entire movie. And that to me is the biggest flaw.
And I do think Indy was just joking with Mutt about the knife.
"The torches, they're damp." Mutt says it, and then NOTHING COMES OUT OF THE LINE. Its just a random line just thrown out there and no effect later on. And its like that the entire movie. And that to me is the biggest flaw.
And I do think Indy was just joking with Mutt about the knife.