Well Deserved Praise

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Many view the film in a negative light, but I don't think it's as bad as they've said. The acting is top notch with Ford, Blanchett, and surprisingly LaBeouf giving there best. This is a Spielberg film so you know the direction is great. The visual effects are dated (even for 2008) and it feels a little off seeing a franchise that was built around practical effects go full CG in some scenes, that said when scenes are done practically they look very nice. You can feel the Later Lucas try and nudge its way in like he did with the prequels, but you can also feel the Classic Spielberg try and protect the beloved franchise. The writing is pretty bad, the addition of inter dimensional beings and some cheesy dialogue don't help. However I've realized this film is a great way to introduce little kids to the Indiana Jones franchise. It doesn't have many dark scenes in the classic trilogy, but that's also where some of the charm is lost. The good thing about Indiana Jones is that it was fun adventure for the family that could be dark at times, not a straight cartoon. In the end the film definitely has its moments, but it's not a classic Indy story.

In 2008 I was a kid and I hadn't really heard of Indiana Jones before but my parents insisted on taking me to this movie, I obviously didn't pay any attention to reviews at that age so all I had to go off was my own opinions and I was impressed then and I still am. I still find this movie to be a fantastic way to continue one of my favourite franchises, even if it's not without its flaws.The character of Indiana Jones is better than ever, Harrison Ford clearly cares about this character and put real effort into playing him again, he's great in the action sequences and is great at playing him as an older man. I liked that he's been through a lot since the last movie, he's seen things now and the fact that he was more on top of things in this movie makes sense and felt like the right direction for his character in this movie. Unlike most people I actually liked Shia LaBoeuf in this movie, he's clearly having a good time in this movie and the fact that he isn't the most likable guy is part of his character arc in this movie. I liked the return of Marion in this film and the implications it had for Indy. Steven Spielberg is clearly still on top of this franchise, he made this film feel like the franchise was still in the 80s and I liked that he chose not to forget the past while still making it feel like a modern movie. The action sequences are all great, really brutal and I liked that Indy was a bit more capable in them in this movie. After the last films have done God-like artefacts, blood magic and Holy Grail's, why are aliens so unbelievable? One of the goals of this movie was to make it feel like a 1950's B- movie so Aliens felt like the obvious choice. Like the last film there was still a lot of mythology around them and the mystery being built up was always intriguing. They did something different with this movie to separate it from the rest of the series which is something a sequel this long in the making should do. As much as I like this film it definitely isn't flawless, a major problem being an overuse of CGI, I don't mind it when there isn't any other option but there are plenty of instances in this film where visual effects were used where practical could have been used to better effect. It didn't help that the CGI was often underwhelming and very noticeable which did take me out of the experience at times. I really didn't care for a lot of new character in this film. I've never been a very big fan of Cate Blanchett, especially not here. He accent was really goofy and over the top, she was also a very one-note villain who wasn't given much motivation. John Hurts character didn't really add much, they built him up for so long that I couldn't help but be underwhelmed when he arrived on screen. I liked Ray Winstone in this movie for his charisma but his character wasn't the best, he did add much and they could have fleshed out his past with Indy more. I still really like this movie after all these years, Harrison Ford is still perfect as the titular character, I liked LaBoeuf and Allens additions, Spielberg directed the film very well and it took the franchise in different directions. It may suffer from an overuse if CGI and an underwhelming villain but I find this film so enjoyable that I'll continue to watch it with the rest of the series for many years too come. 8.3/10: A- (Fantastic)

After a two-year-break from directing following up his arguably best movie "Munich" (2005) in terms of daring the utmost controversial theme surrounding an Hebrew death squad on an international assassination streak as retaliation of a race-inflicted massacre at 1972 Olympic Games, Steven Spielberg returns to his roots with an overlong-awaited fourth adventure of the character of Indiana Jones, created by George Lucas and Philip Kaufman at the end of 1970s, in the Hollywood event movie "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of Crystal Skull".Utilizing no references from graphic novels or contents of international comics, the movie had become a gentle contender in May 2008 for the emerging Marvel empire with first installment of "Iron Man" directed by Jon Favreau to second-career coming of actor Robert Downey Jr. after a 10 year struggle of addiction and low-profile role playing. Director Steven Spielberg, backed up by his 25-year-plus collaboration producing partners Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall to fight off the competitive battle for the U.S. domestic audience, which worked out due to a three-week separation window from the Marvel Phase 1 movie.Nevertheless, the collaborators encircling Steven Spielberg as trademark of a director had to witness that the landscape of high-end budgeted Hollywood movies were about to change forever after. Actor Harrison Ford still holding the torch since the summer of 1981 of having created an on-screen iconic character, which has been connected to his acting career ever since not harming his occasionally diverse performances as the character of Rozat "Rusty" Sabich in Alan J. Pakula directed "Presumed Innocent" (1990).The fourth time around in 27 years through cinematic landscape as Indiana Jones, Harrison Ford receives two challenging actors to his journey to South America to retrieve the title given artifact and encounters extra-terrestrial powers in Amazon rain-forest of Peru, on the one side Cate Blanchett, as power-addicted Russian military executive Irina Spalko, able to strap Indy to a chair under hypnosis dropping the infamous punchline on Indy's question, "Do you always get what you want?", she replies without even honor him with a look, "I usually do!"; on the other side fresh-out of Michael Bay's establishing "Transformers" boot-camp, actor Shia LaBeouf, seemingly had to have a ball under Steven Spielberg's care-taking directorial approach, which led him to an homage on Marlon Brando's leading character in "The Wild One" (1953) without taking himself to seriously to fall into a trap of the need to exceed an the unrepeatable character of Johnny Strabler.With his cast in safe-keeping play-mood, Director Steven Spielberg ignites a festival of a wholesome orchestra of every cinematic ingredient given from Cinematography by Janusz Kaminski utilizing Arriflex 235/435 with Panavision Primos to computer-generated imagery by George Lucas' special effects company, established in May 1975 just before pre-production to the very first "Star Wars" movie, Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), the director gathers in his 35-year-plus career as an Director for Life all his knowledge on movie-making into "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" that it still keeping up after 9 years on an occasional revisit as joyful, comic-madness challenging entertainment movie; which leaves me only left to wish for the already announced fifth installment finally to be the 1990s LucasArts adventure game adaptation of "The Fate of Atlantis" in a film noir environmental setting with less 185 Million U.S. Dollar justifying action sequences and more Hitchcockian suspense. © 2017 Felix Alexander Dausend (Cinemajesty Entertainments LLC)

I finally decided to watch an Indiana Jones movie. What a disappointment. I seen snippets of the first one and that seemed fine, so i bought this DVD looking for something fun. All I got was cheese. Why do these same two directors seem to be good at making technically good movies then blow it with the cheesy goofball kids stuff. It started off okay,, but quickly descended into a child's movie. The seen where the monkeys join in and attack the Russians...seriously? Indiana Jones finds out he has a 20 year old son and suddenly is saying things like 'you're going back to school" as if a 20 year old guy is excited to find out his mother lied to him all those years. And the Shia Labouf character,, seriously,, he arrives wearing the same hat as and motorcycle as a 1950s James Dean movie AND he carries a switchblade? Wow, The whole scene of the fighting in the jungle between two vehicles the sword fight was unbelievably bad.. bad... bad. These guys really need to hire some GOOD screen writers who can write a script for people - not children. They have no sense of humor. I watched a few of Spielbergs' early movies which were well done,,same with Lucas,, but this thing were they have a kid all the time and children's humor is just too much. I'm not usually the guy who writes negative reviews. I like most films,, but seriously,, it's like the movie was done from the mind of a 12 year old.!