141-143: Indiana Jones Trilogy

Recently I had the good fortune to watch the Indiana Jones Trilogy on the big screen. AMC was hosting a nationwide event in honor of the blu-ray release of the Indiana Jones movies. This was an opportunity I could not pass up. I have seen each of these movies numerous times on vhs and dvd, but I had never seen Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom on the big screen. The Last Crusade I did, however, see in the theater when it came out, but only once. Now, with updated visual and sound quality I must admit that these movies have stood the test of time perfectly.

Raiders of the Lost Ark

I absolutely adore Raiders of the Lost Ark. It is one of those movies that I can pop into my player and just having running in the background while seeing the images in my head. I am just about as familiar with the visuals of the Indiana Jones movies as I am with the visuals of Star Wars. Spielberg made a movie that is unrelenting in its pace and a constant rollercoaster of fun. Raiders was based on the serial films that were the norm around the second world war. Films that George Lucas and Spielberg obviously hold very dear. Logic wasn’t always paramount in these films as long as the action and suspense were good all other bets were off. The same goes for Raiders. There are numerous moments that I can point at that would drag this movie down into a quagmire of nitpicking, but that is not what this movie is about. Raiders just wants you to have a good time at the movies and if you get something deeper from it than that is nice for you, but certainly not the intention. Raiders is made with such competence and confidence that any detractors just don’t matter much anymore. This is a timeless classic.

Temple of Doom

I have always liked Temple of Doom more than most people. My first introduction with the movie was actually in a video store when I saw the iconic poster of Indiana Jones standing in that backlit doorway with the machete in his hand. I was immediately intrigued. By that time I had not seen Raiders of the Lost Ark yet. Temple of Doom was my introduction into the world of Indiana Jones and I loved every minute of it. The fun opening sequence, the disturbing dinner scene, the bug-filled corridor, the horrifying sacrificial ceremony (trying to find an uncensored copy back then was pretty hard), and ultimately the spectacular mining cart race to top things off. This movie was filled to the brim with breathtaking sequences that I couldn’t get enough of. I wore out my pirated VHS copy several times (this was before there was a retail version).

With this screening of Temple of Doom I started to read up on the history of this installment and I was amazed at how much sense that made. Temple of Doom is much more dark than its two counterparts because both George Lucas and Steven Spielberg were going through some difficult patches in their lives when it came to their women. They used Temple of Doom to vent some of their frustrations. This explains the unrelenting misogynistic tone of the movie. In contrast to Marion Ravenwood in Raiders, who was a strong female character, Kate Capshaw’s Willie Scott is nothing but a dumb whining mess who is useful for nothing more than humiliation and well… human sacrifice. Her constant screaming and whining also makes Willie the most annoying character.

What struck me as remarkable was the state of the visual effects in Temple of Doom and then mainly the compositing of the matte paintings that were used to enhance real environments. Before this screening I had only seen Temple of Doom on the small screen and on that format this isn’t as noticeable (I checked my dvd copy, but the quality wasn’t good enough to prove my point). Now, with a pristine copy blown up on a huge screen, the mistakes were clear to see. Just about every matte painting shot shifted and showed clearly the line between real and painting. It was jarring to witness. It shows the haste with which Temple of Doom was made at Industrial Light and Magic. They were up to their necks in other projects and I believe Temple of Doom suffered for it. But I must say that Temple of Doom was a lot of fun to watch on the big screen.

The Last Crusade

The Last Crusade is certainly the most heartfelt of the trilogy. The inclusion of Sean Connery as Henry Jones was a stroke of genius. He has the same swashbuckling charm as Indiana and he can handle himself, in his own manner, in tough situations. Combine that with the return of the über-evil Nazis, the actual Holy Grail, fantastic chase sequences and you have a brilliant combination of action, adventure and drama. The only thing that didn’t hold up so well for me was the comedy. This is often a bit on the nose and cheap. I understand that this is part of the genre, but it just didn’t strike me as funny as I used to experience it. The comedy seemed to be must better handled in Raiders than in The Last Crusade. It felt like Spielberg and Lucas weren’t as sure about what they had here as they did with Raiders, so they added more comedy of a lower common denominator.

With that said, the rest of The Last Crusade is fantastic. The relationship between Indiana and his dad is great and feels like a real father-son relationship. They bicker constantly, but in the end they come through for each other in a very heartwarming way. Elsa, played by Allison Doody, may not be the most dynamic of the three Indiana-ladies, but at least she is a step up from that whiny brat Willie. The villains are great as well. On the one hand there is Julian Glover as Donovan, the conniving self-centered rich man, who wants nothing more than eternal life. He is fantastic and deliciously evil. The other bad guy is everything one wants in an evil Nazi in the form of General Vogel, played by Michael Byrne, complete with whip.

But, as in Temple of Doom, I must add that I found the visual effects to not hold up at all on the big screen. The dogfight sequence looked terrible, as did several other composited shots throughout the movie. The best sequences were still the practical ones, like the train chase and the tank battle. Great stuff. When looking at the state of visual effects in these last two Indiana Jones movies, I must say that I am surprised that the Star Wars have held up so well over the years. That is something we have to thanks George Lucas for, because in addition to tinkering with the visual effects, he also went back to fix a lot of errors in the visual effects department. If only they would have done this with the Indy movies. But, hey, who knows with these guys.

Ultimately, it is really hard to pick a favorite among these three masterful action adventures. Raiders of the Lost Ark‘s sheer kinetic force, Temple of Doom‘s unrelenting darkness and The Last Crusade‘s character development make these movies each their own, while simultaneously very much belonging to the same universe. If I had to choose I would go with Raiders, but I’ll watch any of the other two any time of the day. All in all I had a great time watching these movies on the big screen and experiencing it with so many other enthusiastic fans of the trilogy.

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For those of you wondering where Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is in all this, I did not stay for that sorry excuse for an Indiana Jones movie. I was not going let the great experience of watching the trilogy be soiled by that flick. I was however surprised to see how many people did stay to watch that fourth movie. I’ve seen it once and it was bad, really bad. For me there are only three Indiana Jones movies and nothing is going to change that, maybe the next installment can convince me, but until then there is only the trilogy.

> IMDb – Raiders of the Lost Ark
> IMDb – Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
> IMDb – Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

087: Jurassic Park

I can’t believe it has already been nearly twenty years since I sat in the theater waiting for Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park to start. I had heard some things about this supposedly brilliant adventure. Back then it still took some time for movies to reach Europe, so it had been three months since it had been released in the United States. But nothing could have prepared me for the intense spectacle that was Jurassic Park.

I vividly remember the visual effects, which pushed the boundary of everything we knew about movies. I didn’t know where to look. This rich world was inhabited by these magnificent creatures that we had only seen in documentaries and old movies where they were still big evil lizards. When Spielberg revealed the Brontosaurus for the first time and we look up from the perspective of the characters we truly get the sense that these creatures are enormous, heavy and to a certain extent benign.

After that we are introduced to the Gallimimus dino’s running across a field and almost running us over in the process. We get into close proximity to the terrifying Tyrannosaurus Rex, whose bad breath we almost can smell through the screen. And last but not least the evil, but very smart Velociraptors, who can solve problems and, much to our amazement, can open a door. It took quite some effort to figure out which dino’s were practical and which were digital. It wasn’t until the release of the dvd that we got the full extent of all the trickery Spielberg displayed here.

The sound was also revolutionary, because it was one of the first movies to fully utilize the entire spectrum of the Dolby sound system. It was stunning. Now every movie uses surround sound, but I have never had the same experience since those screenings of Jurassic Park. The emotional impact of hearing birds and other creatures behind you, while somebody is being stalked in front of you was astonishing. Hearing those Gallimimus dino’s running past you over the sound system made that scene even more frightening. The rest of the sound design was brilliant as well. The sound of the T-Rex is deafening. Upon later viewings I tended to focus my attention to other people in the theater just to see their reaction to the T-Rex roar. And the constant drone in the background of the John Williams score made the movie move forward at a lightning pace. There were not a lot of moments to catch your breath in Jurassic Park.

Of course, after twenty years, some cracks begin to show in the varnish of such a classic. The tech sometimes seems hopelessly outdated… interactive cd-rom, wow!, the operating system at the end of the movie and other little things. The acting is also not always the greatest ever. I always felt Laura Dern missed a lot of beats and overplayed some of the scenes, although she is great in the Triceratops scene, which is arguably one of the better ones in the movie. The scares can be a bit cheap at times. Spoiler. When, for instance, Sam Jackson’s arm comes to rest on Dern’s shoulder and it is revealed that it is just his arm. Cheap, and unnecessary.

While I was very much an immediate fan of Jurassic Park, I couldn’t help but be a bit disappointed that they left out some of the coolest scenes from the book, which I had already read. There was a scene with the flying Pterodactyls and a scene where Grant and the kids are being pursued by a swimming T-Rex. I soon realized that these scenes were nearly impossible to make at the beginning of the ’90s, when they were still testing the deep waters of digital visual effects. They tried to make up for these omissions in the two sequels, but these movies were so bad that the excitement over the inclusions of these parts was killed almost immediately.

Jurassic Park will always be one of the watershed moments for myself. Like seeing Back to the Future in the theater as a kid, or watching Terminator 2 for the first time, or being blown away by the Star Wars movies (not the prequels). It doesn’t matter to me that Jurassic Park starts showing its age after twenty years, I watch this movie for the sheer fun of it and now I get to share that with my kids, which makes it even better. I love Jurassic Park. Period.

> IMDb

019: War Horse

I hold Steven Spielberg in very high regard, as does every fan of the modern blockbuster. The man made Close Encounters, Jaws, the Indiana Jones movies, Schindler’s List and so forth. There was a time when Spielberg could do no wrong. Even when he made movies like Amistad and The Lost World I defended him. But since Catch Me If You Can he has been directing on a slippery slope.

Catch Me If You Can was an ok film, but was not his project to begin with; The Terminal was a terribly sappy tearjerker; War of the Worlds was fun, but marred by an excruciating finale; Munich was overly heavy-handed and let’s not get into Indiana Jones 4, because I am still recovering from that one. His newest attempt at a live action movie is War Horse and I am very sad to say that this downward trend has not been turned around. War Horse is bad, really bad.

In War Horse Spielberg takes us to Europe before and during the First World War, one of the most brutal altercations man has ever seen. He revolves his movie around a horse, a supposedly very special horse, that is bought by a poor farmer. This creature has a way of charming his way through life, even when the horse is sold to the military to fight in France on battlefields unimaginable in our times.

There are some moderately interesting battle scenes, but overall Spielberg is more concerned with pulling the audience’s heartstrings then telling a compelling story. And he knows no boundaries, because with a running time of close to two and a half hours it is also way overlong. Somebody needs to tell these high profile directors that making a movie that is 100 to 110 minutes is nothing to be ashamed about.

Spielberg has been known to manipulate the feelings of his audience in overt ways. He is not known for his subtlety, but in War Horse he takes that to a new level. Almost constantly during the movie the music of John Williams is slathered onto War Horse like a thick layer of icing on an incredibly sweet cake. It is ubiquitous and stifling. The audience never gets a chance to make up their own mind and is told what to feel and when. It is truly one of Spielberg’s most blatant attempts at manipulating his audience. Shockingly so.

Everything about War Horse feels like it should be a Lifetime Movie of the Week, except that it is way too pretty for that. If you like horses and like being manipulated, then War Horse is perfect for you. Otherwise, leave this for what it is and wait for better days in Spielberg’s career.

> IMDb

010: The Adventures of Tintin

Formerly called The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, this is the first episode in a proposed trilogy based on the popular Belgian comic series about a young reporter who travels around the world solving crimes. Steven Spielberg took on the direction of this episode, with Peter Jackson ready to pick up the reins for part two, Prisoners of the Sun.

The Adventures of Tintin is a fantastic adventure movie in the vein of Indiana Jones. Non-stop action dominates Spielberg’s movie, which is reflected in the way Spielberg handles the camera. It is clear that Spielberg felt freed from the physical boundaries in live action movies. It is seldom that the camera is not moving, even during seemingly calm shots. Someone who doesn’t like this constant movement should steer clear. I must say I did not see this in 3D. My movie theatre gives its patrons a choice and I almost always opt out of the 3D option. It is just not worth it for me. I imagine that with 3D the moving camera becomes even more a part of the experience.

I have read the Tintin comics since I was a little boy and know almost all of them by heart. But still, I had to read up on this chapter before coming to the theatre. I must say that the story has been extensively doctored. This is in fact not one installment in the comic series, but two. They combined Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham’s Treasure into one story and that is fine. Whole sections have been omitted, sections have been added and the opening sequence has been altered to accommodate a more logical meeting between Tintin and Haddock. I was originally convinced that the second movie would have been Red Rackham’s Treasure, but that has been changed to Seven Crystal Balls and Prisoners of the Sun. Also a great choice. My bets are on the Moon duology for the third movie, although I would love a movie version of Flight 714, my favorite of all the books.

With that said, I enjoyed The Adventures of Tintin quite a bit. The animation was, for the most part, astonishing. Even in close-up the characters were incredibly detailed. The only problem I had was with the sometimes overly slapstick humor. I know some of this stems from the source material, but nonetheless I thought they could have taken that down a notch. Highly recommended.

» BoxofficeNL.net