Indiana Jones and The Kingdon of the Crystal Skull – The Rant
I’m not really sure how to start this critique. A part of me wants to simply review Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Another, irritated side of me wants to bring attention to the whiner-boys. I’ll attempt a balance here, but I need to get this off my chest.
I will absolutely grant that Hoolywood, for years now, has been struggling with the concept of originality. Directors, writers, producers and studios are all looking for familiar material because its easier to make money on a ‘comfortable’ film. That means sequels, prequels and remakes. It also means turning the TV shows and cartoons that Gen Xers grew up with into silver screen soirees. Trouble is most of them stink. This is not my complaint however. My complaint falls onto other complainers. Since Transformers came out I’ve been hearing the same statement over and over from people looking to complain for complaining sake. “Stop ruining my childhood” or the more flavorful: “[director’s name here] is raping my childhood”.
Enough. No one is doing anything to your childhood. Face it, 20 years ago when last you saw your favorite cartoon/movie, your mind made it bullet-proof. At this point in your life, no film version (or sequel) could possibly live up to the film you’ve had in your head since 1983. If you didn’t enjoy the film, don’t add it to your DVD library and keep it our of your all-night film-fest line up.
Secondly, and this goes out to the jack-ass that sat next to me at the midnight Indy premiere (not to mention the hundreds of forum trolls and comment-spammers on the net), Crystal Skull has done nothing to ruin your childhood memories or the quality of the original films in any way. It wasn’t great, but it also didn’t invade your very soul to destroy the happy flashbacks of watching Raiders of the Lost Ark with your dad. Are you really relying on Hollywood to validate your grade-school happiness? Well, let me be the first to welcome you to ‘Real life’. Next time you feel tempted to pay 10 bucks to relive pre-pubescence try staying home and going through a photo album.
Well, there goes my balance. Sorry for the negativity. I’m gonna stick to my guns in the next entry and actually review Crystal Skull. Simply put though, I was disappointed but not horrified and walked out overall entertained. Look for specifics in part 2.
