Indiana Jones & The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull Discussion Thread (Spoilers)

[Brent72]

Bottom line is that Lucas killed the Darabont script that both Spielberg and Ford loved which is just a damn shame. Spielberg will never publicly say anything because of his friendship with George, but deep down I'm sure he gets pissed off about Lucas dictating how this movie got made. It's sad to think that a truly great Indy IV movie could have been made, but it didn't happen because George had to get his way.

 

[Ultimate Weapon]

Does anyone have any details about what the Darabont script entailed? Of course I have heard that he wrote a script that Lucas nixed, but I have yet to hear any details regarding it.

Anyone have info on it?

 

[Darklord Dave]

For those keeping rating scores, here is a link to metacritic.com. It seems to fall in line with most of the polls I've seen, including our own freaks poll. I wouldn't count Rotten Tomatoes on this one. That poll seems off...

https://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/indianajones4

67% favorable...

The rottentomatoes score is based on 195 reviews, and metacritic on 38. Sure there are some nothing critics in the tomatoes score, but I don't think it's off.

The fact that either of them use Mahnola DArgis automatically discounts their credibility though.

 

[IrishJedi]

Does anyone have any details about what the Darabont script entailed? Of course I have heard that he wrote a script that Lucas nixed, but I have yet to hear any details regarding it.

Anyone have info on it?

No one outside of a very select few has read "City of Gods" (yet), but I'm pretty sure that at least one of the final drafts contained the following:

-The opening sequence at Area 51 (been there in every script since "Saucermen From Mars")
-Marion was in it (that was Darabont's major contribution that stuck)
-No Mutt character (Nathanson added him after Darabont)

Also, I've heard that Darabont wasn't keen on the Cold War and Anti-Commie stuff and made the villains a left-over group of Nazis, which I think would actually be pretty lame. If that's indeed the case, I completely side with Lucas on that one. Of course, that probably changed by the time Darabont turned in his last draft.

One major quabble Lucas was said to have had was how Darabont worked The Ark into the story. Supposedly, he had it reveal that the Ark was also made by the aliens and was used as a radio/transmitter to communicate with them. Lucas felt this went a bit too far in having the aliens completely replace God, so that idea was quashed as well.

The Darabont draft was also said to feature much less action (which isn't necessarily a bad thing).

 

[Agent0028]

So we don't really know that it's a better script?

 

[IrishJedi]

So we don't really know that it's a better script?

No we don't. That's really just an assumption at best. But I gotta say that I would normally tend to give Darabont the benefit of the doubt (particularly over Lucas).

 

[DarthNeil]

No we don't. That's really just an assumption at best. But I gotta say that I would normally tend to give Darabont the benefit of the doubt (particularly over Lucas).

George "You Can Write This Crap But You Can't Speak It" Lucas?

 

[icruise]

One major quabble Lucas was said to have had was how Darabont worked The Ark into the story. Supposedly, he had it reveal that the Ark was also made by the aliens and was used as a radio/transmitter to communicate with them. Lucas felt this went a bit too far in having the aliens completely replace God, so that idea was quashed as well.

That would suck. One thing I hate is when a sequel introduces something that changes how you view the earlier movies in the series. The classic example (and one that's actually pretty similar to what you describe) is Highlander 2, in which you learn that the immortals are not magical beings at all, but rather aliens from the planet Zeist.

 

[The Josh]

I could see that really pissing some people off even more than some are pissed off with this current version.

 

[Ultimate Weapon]

One major quabble Lucas was said to have had was how Darabont worked The Ark into the story. Supposedly, he had it reveal that the Ark was also made by the aliens and was used as a radio/transmitter to communicate with them. Lucas felt this went a bit too far in having the aliens completely replace God, so that idea was quashed as well.

Thanks for posting that info Irishjedi. It's nice to have an idea of what the script was about and given Darabont's other works it is hard not to give him the benefit of the doubt in script quality, especially given his relationship to Lucas in regards to Indiana Jones.

I agree with icruise (and Lucas) that the ark being a radio transmitter for aliens would have been a bad idea. No need to change the way Raiders is viewed just to add a plot twist into a new movie. I'm sure that would have had even more people complaining.

Generally speaking I enjoyed the movie and the connection to aliens. For me I think the biggest criticism would be that there just weren't a lot of character exposition/development moments that tied everything else together, more like a move from action piece to action piece. I've watched both Raiders and Temple a few times each over the weekend since viewing KOTCS, and the amount of actual character conversation dispersed throughout the movie really contrasts sharply with many of today's movies that simply move from action sequence to action sequence with minimal exposition to connect them. From a critical view these character conversations were one of the larger missed opportunities because if the relationships between characters are strong it resonates throughout the rest of the film and balances even the more outlandish action sequences, which goes for almost any movie.

 

[tomandshell]

Raiders cut back and forth between Indy in the Well of Souls and Marion in Belloq's tent. I don't think the other films ever cared enough about another character to cut away from the main Indy story to that extent.

 

[LOTRFan]

I can't for the life of me figure one part of this film out --

When Indy and Mutt are escaping via switchblade, Mutt's s*&% when Indy cuts his ties ... eh?

 

[BadMoon]

Well my wife wanted to see it so I just went for the second time. I know why I left so bitter the first time. It is definately the UFO taking off. I was good with everything except that. I did enjoy the movie much better thought knowing what I was getting into. I just wished they would have warped away or something rather than having an actual UFO take off. Other than that I really enjoyed it.

 

[icruise]

I can't for the life of me figure one part of this film out --

When Indy and Mutt are escaping via switchblade, Mutt's s*&% when Indy cuts his ties ... eh?

That was an odd moment. It seems pretty obvious that Mutt (and the audience) thinks that Indy has accidentally cut his pants or possibly even stabbed himself with the switchblade (the sound is of ripping cloth, not of ropes being cut), but then it goes nowhere.

 

[The Josh]

I thought he cut his pants too and if they had showed it I would have picked that moment as one that kind of annoyed me. They went no place with it so I was like no biggie.

 

[icruise]

You know, I think the deal with that scene is this:

Mutt at that point still feels that Indy is kind of a "square." He just got done complaining that his dad was an RAF pilot, not some "teacher." He assumes that Indy is unable to handle the switchblade, and so thinks that he has stabbed himself or something, when in fact he used it just fine to cut his bonds. The scene wasn't handled that well, but that's my take on it.

 

[Agent0028]

I figured Indy was messing with him making Mutt think he stabbed himself or something.

 

[The Mike]

I liked it enough, I've decided. The question is would you have liked it more in one of these?

 

[LOTRFan]

You know, I think the deal with that scene is this:

Mutt at that point still feels that Indy is kind of a "square." He just got done complaining that his dad was an RAF pilot, not some "teacher." He assumes that Indy is unable to handle the switchblade, and so thinks that he has stabbed himself or something, when in fact he used it just fine to cut his bonds. The scene wasn't handled that well, but that's my take on it.

Makes sense, but it certainly was a moment that didn't work in the slightest.

 

[The Josh]

I like that shirt.