The Indiana Jones Franchise (Steven Spielberg/James Mangold, 1981-2023)

[Cde.]

It could have been a lot better (and at times it seems the filmmakers are trying to ruin it) but it's not nearly a Phantom Menace level disappointment.

Then again, I don't like Star Wars.

[Fletch F. Fletch]

It's more disappointing than TPM because Star Wars always had crummy acting and already sucked it up with ROTJ. Indy had farther to fall, and it did. Go for the beer. I wish I had.

I disagree. There is nothing on the offensive level of Jar Jar in the new Indy film that's for sure! Farther to fall? Howzabout Temple of Doom? This latest Indy adventure is waaay better than that one, IMO.

[chaddoli]

Phantom Menace is a much better film than the KOCS. Indy could have used a pod race or two. It would have made just as much sense as the rest of the film, and wouldn't have been so fucking boring.

[moviscop]

He definitely nuked the fridge with KOtCS.

I hope George Lucas is happy, he was aroused by the fact that he was able to implement aliens into the franchise.

[domino harvey]

I got a PM, George Lucas just optioned the rights to my post about the fancy cereal spoon. You'll never believe it but I guess the ancient Greek civilization of the Arcadians are behind the mystical light-up spoon.

[moviscop]

I got mine too, but it had an ancient Mayan bug with a red light. It came in my frosted mini wheats. I can't believe they are just handing these out, must be a promotional thing. I still think it looks like a fuckin' lightsaber.

not my picture, not my gross nail.

[Joe Buck]

He definitely nuked the fridge with KOtCS.

I hope George Lucas is happy, he was aroused by the fact that he was able to implement aliens into the franchise.

You bet your ass. The Han/Indy handshake is only a mouse click away for ILM, and there will most likely be a bounty hunter 2 feet away who misses them both with a blaster shot.

[moviscop]

I honestly about died when Shia reached down for the hat. If he ended up putting that on, it would not only mean a Young Indiana Jones franchise, but the entire movie would have been made a lot worse.

By the way, was anyone else pissed about the prairie dog/gophers reacting to different things in the film?

Spielberg = Uwe Boll

[jorencain]

By the way, was anyone else pissed about the prairie dog/gophers reacting to different things in the film?

Not only that, but I was annoyed when, during the big jungle chase, one of the Russians threw a monkey over the cliff.....

Cut to a shot of the CGI monkey landing safely on a branch, so we know that the evil Russian didn't hurt the poor defenseless animal.

I HATE that kind of schitt!

Anyway, the movie was "fine" for me. Pretty forgettable overall, but fairly entertaining while I watched it.

[moviscop]

I'm sorry, but as we talk about the jungle scene should we alse mention that Shia was Tarzan-swinging from vine to vine?

[Murdoch]

To me the most angering part of the movie was how Indy kept talking about all the stuff he did before, like really, you and this other guy were double agents working with the Russians? Why not make THAT fucking movie!

[Joe Buck]

I honestly about died when Shia reached down for the hat. If he ended up putting that on, it would not only mean a Young Indiana Jones franchise, but the entire movie would have been made a lot worse.

I was hoping after the doors blew open and Shia contemplated the hat, we'd see Lucas outside the door with a big fan screaming, "Pick it up! Put it on! I'll make you a superstar! Trust me! I can save Padme's life! Woof woof! I'm insane and just killed a drifter to raise my Midichlorine count! Muhaw!"

[moviscop]

shia grabs the hat and yells "part 5 bitches!"

[Steven H]

The uniformly humorless Socialist Worker takes a stab at the film's political antics, enjoy.

Imagine a movie about a Native American Iraq war veteran, who, after witnessing the U.S. Army stand by and allow the looting of the treasures of Iraqi civilization in the early days of the occupation, decides to lead a raid on the Smithsonian Institution and return all the stolen artifacts there to the rightful Native American nations. In the process, he battles the FBI, the D.C. cops, corrupt politicians and sanctimonious museum officials, including a very old Indiana Jones.

Oh, and the Childcare Action Project had a similar reaction to mine, though, I can't say their specific issues were shared...

# Sexual Immorality (S)
# nudity (male) behind steamed glass shower wall, genitals not seen
# attention to crotch, twice
# child by immoral sex
# innuendo
# semi-thong nudity, many

"Attention to crotch" you say? "Twice"? I don't recall.

[filmnoir1]

Steven the article you linked to does provide compelling evidence for the problems that are inherent in Eurocentric discourses like those advocated by this film and its so called "enjoyable" lineage. Those Saturday morning serials were designed by the studios in league with the Motion Picture Production Code, the Federal government and the Catholic church as ways to educate young, impressionable American boys about how to be 'truly' American. For many this meant adopting an imperialist mindset (a la Teddy Roosevelt and Hearst) that would endorse the belief that masculinity in the US was defined by combat, paternalism, racism, homophobia, and determinate economic oppression (for a more complete discussion of these ideas see Gail Bederman's book Manliness and Civilization and Kristin Hoganson's book Fighting for American Manhood).
Thus once again we are faced with the prospect of 'enjoy' and entertainment as nothing of real consequence. However, as film historians and theoreticians have demonstrated much of classical Hollywood sold the idea that 'white' American masculinity, violence, and hetereosexuality were the only true options for being a good citizen. Thus we can look at this new installment of the franchise as a closer kin to the serials of the 30s and 40s because it is a bildungsroman meant to sell the notion that the character of Mutt is cool and the kind of figure that all young people who see this film should identify with. Yet, in identifying with this character they are also asked to embrace "traditional" American values; values which may be responsible for the really dark times that we are living in.

[the dancing kid]

What individual films register about the culture that produced them or how they feed into existing political discourses is one thing, but claiming that the American film industry has been consistently involved in a pedagogical project is an incredibly difficult argument to make. There have been isolated cases of such ideas, such as the gangster films of the thirties (think the warning at the beginning of 'Scarface'), but the political and cultural implications of a film are usually not an act of social agency so much as they are the product of a certain cultural discourse.

One example of this sort of thing that I'm interested in is science fiction and fantasy literature produced during the end of the age of imperialism and exploration. Young men had always had the option of joining the military to go around the world on adventure back in the day, sailing off to exotic locations, goofing around with like minded men, and of course getting their fair share of violence and conquest. That lifestyle had a significant impact on Americans and Europeans viewed the rest of the world, the construction of male gender identity in the modern world, and how people viewed military action and military enthusiasm. I think literature like Burrough's 'Princes of Mars', 'The Land that Time Forgot' and similar works of popular fiction used fantastic settings like Mars, Atlantis, the center of earth at al to provide new exotic locations that could be explored and conquered vicariously. They weren't allegories per se, but they did reflect the desire to fill that cultural impulse. I don't know if the people who wrote them were racists or imperialists, but I don't think it matters that much either; what the text can show us about the cultural that produced it is what I believe is salient.

Personally I've always felt that the Indiana Jones films owe more to wartime adventure films than they do adventure serials of the thirties. The idea of the "colonial sidekick" (Shortround in 'Temple of Doom', Sallah in the other two) has a long history in adventure films that were distributed abroad. These characters would supply audiences from the colony/occupied state with a way of identifying with the dramatic conflict of the foreign adventurer. It's an understated form of film as cinematic diplomacy, sort of like colonial romance. The baddies in the Indiana Jones films are also usually opposing occupying forces (Nazis in the Middle East, ancient cults in India, and now Soviets in the jungle), with the battle between Jones and the baddies underscoring international conflict and the battle for the "hearts and minds" of the occupied people. I think one of the most interesting parts of 'Temple of Doom' is that the British imperialists basically save the day at the end of the film, which, if it had been made during the age of empire, could easily be viewed as justification for their continuing presence in the region.

[Murdoch]

Imagine a movie about a Native American Iraq war veteran, who, after witnessing the U.S. Army stand by and allow the looting of the treasures of Iraqi civilization in the early days of the occupation, decides to lead a raid on the Smithsonian Institution and return all the stolen artifacts there to the rightful Native American nations. In the process, he battles the FBI, the D.C. cops, corrupt politicians and sanctimonious museum officials, including a very old Indiana Jones.

I think that might beat Raiders as the best of the series.

[AWA]

What individual films register about the culture that produced them or how they feed into existing political discourses is one thing, but claiming that the American film industry has been consistently involved in a pedagogical project is an incredibly difficult argument to make. There have been isolated cases of such ideas, such as the gangster films of the thirties (think the warning at the beginning of 'Scarface'), but the political and cultural implications of a film are usually not an act of social agency so much as they are the product of a certain cultural discourse.

While your opinion is interesting and well written, I have to disagree here (speaking as a deep south Canadian too, btw). Just taking one quick look at how the MPAA operates - and good luck finding out anything how it operates - it is pretty easy to see the studios all shake hands on agreeing what content is deemed acceptable to Americans (and, indirectly or directly, the rest of the world) and the ideas therein.

Watch "This Film Is Not Yet Rated" and it is pretty clear and made quite simple that censorship in Hollywood is made in the editing room by the filmmakers out of fear of what rating their film is going to be tabbed with by the exceptionally conservative MPAA, which is a puppet organization of all the major studios. That way they can say "it was the filmmaker's choice to censor that content, America is the home of freedom, we don't censor our films", when, in fact, the whole process is done to please the government so they can't threaten to take over the ratings system themselves... the government in the US neglecting to have any true liberal side to anything (a Democrat in the States, 9 times out of 10, coming to Canada or Europe would be in the right wing party), thus the ratings systems are to please the conservative factions of the establishment.

[filmnoir1]

Here is a link to an interesting analysis of the summer blockbusters.

[filmnoir1]

Dancing Kid it is interesting that you mention the fiction of Edgar Rice Burroughs because in fact he did see his work as an author in support of the policies and ideas advocated by those in America who believed Imperialism was a remedy for the preponderance of 'soft males.' In fact the Boy Scouts were formed, first in England and then later in America to combat what the men of that time believed were the negative after effects of boys being raised around too many women.
Interestingly, American masculinity and politics have always been linked and it is usually men who are considered effete, intelligent, or polished that are deemed 'sissies,' or incomplete men. Simply look at how Hilary Clinton adopted a more masculine persona against Barack Obama. She has been labeled a candidate of steel, as someone possessing a a great deal of "testicular fortitude" and has even been compared to the fictional figure of Rocky. Obama is consistently described as someone who is elitiist and his actual physical build also add to the ways in which people read him as less than manly.

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

# Sexual Immorality (S)
# nudity (male) behind steamed glass shower wall, genitals not seen
# attention to crotch, twice
# child by immoral sex
# innuendo
# semi-thong nudity, many

"Attention to crotch" you say? "Twice"? I don't recall.

"Semi-thong nudity"? Did I read that right? Can't be exposing kids to semi-thong nudity.

[Antoine Doinel]

# Sexual Immorality (S)
# nudity (male) behind steamed glass shower wall, genitals not seen
# attention to crotch, twice
# child by immoral sex
# innuendo
# semi-thong nudity, many

"Attention to crotch" you say? "Twice"? I don't recall.

"Semi-thong nudity"? Did I read that right? Can't be exposing kids to semi-thong nudity.

What's semi-thong?

[Chull]

Sounds like a wedgie.

[Petty Bourgeoisie]

Just got back from the theater, and while I have nothing to add about the movie (didn't like it), I must rail against the modern state of projection. The entire film was blurry, unfocused and just plain messy. I actually left to complain, but in the lobby I looked around for somebody in charge and all I could see was teenagers behind the concessions counter. I said to myself "Screw it" and returned to watch the movie under terrible conditions. In regards to the above conversations about U.S. movies acting as imperialist propaganda, that is funny because I actually thought halfway through the movie "I'd love to be watching this with Godard and hear his critiques". Man, that would be brutal!

[filmnoir1]

Bordwell and Thompson's thoughts on the new film.