The risk of bringing Indiana Jones out of retirement for another adventure was monumental. Fortunately, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas demonstrated they are keenly aware of the impending doom of a quick cash-in, evading complete disaster in the series' fourth installment, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.""
Twenty years after his last crusade, we join Dr. Jones after KGB agents have kidnapped him to find a certain crate in a familiar warehouse. An elaborate escape from his captors leads him to young greaser, Mutt Williams (Shia LeBeouf), who enlists his help to find one of the mythical crystal skulls in exchange for the rescue of his mother and surrogate father. The film becomes a race between the Russians and Dr. Jones to return the skull to its rightful place, with familiar faces and fan nods all along the way.
Spielberg talked up his efforts to make the film seem visually united with the earlier films, and much of that promise is delivered. However, the unnecessary CGI sequences in the film mar this success. In one scene, Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) - Jones' love interest in ""Raiders of the Lost Ark"" - drives a submergible jeep off a cliff into a hanging branch, which gently lowers them down to the river below and, in true Looney Tunes fashion, snaps back to thwack all the Russians climbing the nearby cliff face.
Harrison Ford seems ageless in his role - a combination of his extraordinary talent and more than a few able-bodied stunt-doubles. He subtly hints at the ravages of age in his performance - towards the end, he starts to look and sound more like Sean Connery's Henry Jones than the sarcastic youth we saw in the earlier films.
Cate Blanchett, however, fails to bring an equally impressive villain to the adventure. The character is also underdeveloped - little differentiates her from the other stern females of the series' past. Perhaps constant references to Marxist dogma would have made her a more unique villain - she just seems bland, quickly eclipsed by Ford's grander screen presence.
Constant rewrites have left the film's script with some rough transitions and unconnected sequences. The focus quickly shifts from characters to getting from one clue to the next, making for a more ""Temple of Doom"" vibe - a smaller, more predictable story that still impresses with fun action sequences and the occasional quip from our lovable hero.
Technical gripes aside, the film absolutely delivers on the mythos that makes these movies so magical. The science-fiction mythology lends itself to some unique sequences with staples of the era - ogreasers and atomic bombs. Along with the new we get ample references to the classics - a crate falls in front of the camera in the warehouse sequences, cracking open to reveal the Ark of the Covenant.
There are plenty of technical missteps, but overall the film succeeds in capturing the elusive feel of the franchise while still taking it to new places. If we end up with a fifth installment, let's just hope they can avoid the CGI.
