You have heard from Boba Phil and Eggy Matt. They have had two pretty opposing views on Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny so far. Will a third point of view be the clincher? One among you has stepped forward and answered the call to… erm… Outpost? As you know, being a contributor makes you more attractive to the opposite sex, funnier at dinner parties, and makes birds suddenly appear every time you are near.
So what did long-time Outposter Poopy Pants make of this fifth Indiana Jones outing? Well, his chosen title will probably give you a BIG clue right away.
Indiana Jones And The Diarrhoea Of Dysentry
Yeesh. I’m just gunna rip this to shreds and spoil the fuck out of it. Spoil being the operative word. There’s nothing to spoil. This movie is rotten.
Some positive feedback. For the most part, it looks great and there are some real moments that make you go “Wow, I’m watching an Indiana Jones movie!” Unfortunately, they are just moments, and even in the times it feels classic Indiana Jones it is just… hollow… empty… devoid of the spark that ignited the original 3 films. Much like the 4th.
I was curious how the film would start, as the originals began with the Paramount transition. The moment had finally arrived – fade in; the Disney logo (sort of expected)… fade out… and then holy fuck, the Paramount logo fades in… and then… fade out. Fade in on Lucasfilm. OK, so if I didn’t feel fucked over enough watching the Paramount logo turn into a CGI gopher, they didn’t even fucking bother here? Fail. Fucking FAIL!
The movie starts and it’s classic Indy era. Hitler has surrendered. Nazis are frantically rushing around rounding up treasures and artifacts and Indiana Jones is there to get as many as he can, But in true Indy style, he’s been captured and he’s enjoying gloating about how the Nazis have failed. This would have made a great Indiana Jones film back in the 90s.
Here, it could have worked. It should have worked, and for a time it looked like it was going to work. The relic of choice here is the Spear of Destiny and I almost had a heart attack. The Spear of Destiny was what my friends and I would talk about back in high school when we were daydreaming about what could have been the 4th Indiana Jones macguffin. The Spear of Destiny! Unreal. But… the spear is a fake and there happens to be a better relic.
This whole opening sequence looks like a cut scene from a PlayStation game circa 2010. It is really awful to look at. I’m not being hyperbolic. For a motorcycle chase and a train chase, we’ve got The Last Crusade to compare all this with. It’s a cartoon and de-aged Indy looks just as rubbery as Christopher Reeves in The Flash. I’ve seen better, there’s no excuse for this shit in 2023.
But fuck all that for a minute. I remember a time I just wanted a de-aged Indy movie so kudos to them for trying, but then the main character is literally blown up and he’s just fine. Then the bad guy is seemingly obliterated, only to turn up later absolutely fine. It’s hard to get invested in this bullshit now. Then, standing on top of the rushing train, up ahead the train bridge is blown up. Indiana Jones must jump 100 feet to the river below lest he perish with the train. Well, he jumps and it’s fine, but he didn’t even need to because when he looks up the train is stopped and sitting up there on the tracks perfectly fine. This is all in the first 10 minutes. It’s fucking bizarre and I’m astonished this all made it through editorial.
Cut to 1969 and all of a sudden old people make sense. Indy is out of his time and he’s a cranky old c*nt. Seeing him teaching was really well done and he looked like a man in his true element. Then it all turns weird again and for some reason, the people he was just battling with are back and he’s in a chase scene through a parade of… I don’t know… I thought it was supposed to be the moon astronauts, but it also looks like some Scottish heritage celebration mixed with some anti-war rally. I don’t know, but indy’s on a horse, and its all chase-chase-chase but I honestly can’t remember what for? All I remember was that the music was unusual and very good. I look forward to listening to it on its own.
The film starts to take some head-scratching turns and I can’t help but feel that if they’d have given me a call, maybe I could have helped walk them through all this shit. Salah is a cab driver. He takes Indy to the airport and he even offers to come along, but why didn’t he? There were so many forgettable characters in the movie that Salah, and even Short Round, could have replaced if only the filmmakers had a fucking clue.
There’s another chase scene, this time on tuktuks and it’s actually pretty good. It felt dangerous and didn’t look cgi craptastic. I suspect it was all shot on The Mandalorian stage, it truly looked great. If only it made any sense. Honestly, it’s all pretty fuzzy from here. It’s so fucking boring the only things coming to mind are the astounding continuity errors.
1) Some woman gets shot and every time we cut back to her she’s laid out in a different position. First a few different ways on her stomach, and then lastly she’s on her back.
2) I swear a bridge collapsed causing some characters to be washed away, only for the same bridge to be intact when they cross back over it later.
But it was when they travel back in time to the Roman times that I seriously checked out. Here’s what I did. I stood up. I walked out. Shame.
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