So, yeah, it was pretty stupid

But why? I've been trying to put my finger on it for days and haven't been able to exactly articulate what was wrong with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. My brother, Dan, said the movie felt like it was made "just because they could" and I agree with that. It has a sense of careless, self-indulgent excess that the worst of Spielberg's movies have had (see: Hook). And I know a lot of people complained about the science fiction aspect of it -- but I wonder what their problem is. In the last three Indiana Jones movies, we had the Ark of the Covenant, ghosts, people melting, people having their hearts plucked from their chests, a thousand year old knight, a face-to-face meeting with Hitler, etc. Why not aliens?

I've decided the biggest thing working against the film was the gap between film #3 and film #4. If this one had come out two or three years after The Las Crusade, it still wouldn't have gotten great reviews but the sense of let-down wouldn't have been nearly as profound. Remember that Raiders of the Lost Ark did huge business and got great reviews and then Temple of Doom came out. The second film was kind of lame comparatively -- it was unnecessarily gross and lacked the gravitas of the first. A few years later came The Last Crusade which Spielberg said he made in order to "make up for" Temple of Doom.

Now that we have this fourth movie, it's apparent Spielberg can only make a decent Indiana Jones film every other time. If there were to be a fifth film, it would probably be awesome. Since Harrison Ford is nearing seventy, it's unlikely we'll be getting any more make up films, however. So basically, they should have left well enough alone instead of going of this late career stab at old glory. It smells a lot like Michael Jordan's time with the Washington Wizards.

A film that does not suck is Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox. The voice work is terrific and Anderson's still, mannered quirkiness makes it far more than just a kid's movie. I didn't laugh as much as I did watching, say, Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, but I enjoyed it on more levels. It's worth watching for sure.