Indiana Jones: The Quest for Death...aka Harrison says kill Indy!!

[Too Much Fun]

RJDonner&Blitzen wrote:

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Temple of Doom was an early example of an inappropriate descent into the dark and gritty fad; sort of a precursor of what was to come over the next quarter century.

I agree. The first time I watched the Indiana Jones trilogy together, "Temple of Doom" was the only one I didn't like. I'm not averse to gore generally. I laughed my ass off at the gore in "The Thing", but in this movie it just felt inappropriate and bothered me.

I'll never forget the scene of a heart being realistically ripped from a chest. Way out of place in what should be a light-hearted fun summer adventure movie. I wasn't keen on the poverty either, with beggars coming up to Indiana Jones and his friends. I know there was some rather macabre violence in the first one with the Nazis being melted, but that just looked cool. The gore in the sequel, on the other hand, was simply disgusting and contradicted the movie's otherwise lighter tone.

The kid sidekick and the wacky loudmouth female love interest had me believing this would just be a pleasant movie, and then there was all this grotesque stuff thrown in. Most people who don't like the movie seem to complain about Willie and Short Round, but I didn't mind them. Willie even amused me. It was just all the dark, depressing, and violent content that bothered me. That mine cart scene at the end is incredible, though. It almost redeems the rest of the movie. That scene is worth the price of admission alone, but the rest isn't so good.

[Gaith]

Captaindemotion wrote:

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Maybe it's because TOD was the first Indy movie I saw and, until KOTCS, the only one I saw in the cinema, but I've never gotten the hatred for it.

- Much more cartoonish action than anything in Raiders
- Terrorized children, where Raiders had none
- A vapid, annoying and generally useless female protagonist, where Raiders had an excellent one
- Pointless and cartoonish scenes like the jungle-noises sequence, where Raiders had none
- A random kid Indy entrusts his life to, where Raiders had none
- An Asian kid who, without any explanation or warning, suddenly knows kung-fu, and is super-strong enough to knock a large, grown man down with a midair kick, where Raiders had none
- Evil Indy hurting and scaring the crap out of that same kid
- A lack of interesting villains, where Raiders had two
- A wildly flailing tone, where Raiders had a consistent one


If you like the movie, that's dandy, but with all due respect, if you can't "get" why others don't, you're either insulting those same people by acting as if they're bereft of legitimate complaints, or severely intellectually challenged. I trust that it's the former, but still, would it rip your heart out to have the courtesy to not implicitly belittle other people's responses to a not-at-all universally-loved movie?

[JiNX-01]

Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote:

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I don't mind except that I don't like Mutt

I didn't like the kid either. I would have preferred to see Indy adopt Short Round and then they could have met with up Marion (the only "loved interest" of Indy's I ever liked ... and don't get me started on Willie ).

I also hated Kingdom of Crystal Skulls ... Aliens? Really?

Captaindemotion wrote:

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If any fifth film is like the fourth, he'll probably die of boredom. And so will the audience.

If the fifth is like the fourth, I won't be at risk of dying of boredom. I won't be there.

[Trevacious]

Just have Indy screw up a knee and lose an eye in the course of his next adventure, leaving a vicious new scar across his forehead and cheek, which causes him to don a patch and step back a bit from the kind of field work he used to do, but leaving him no less active in Life.

Then they could re-film the Old Indy bookends with Harrison in the role and restore The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles to their original format.

[Turtletrekker]

IIRC, ToD was the impetus behind creating the PG-13 rating.

[JarodRussell]

Gaith wrote:

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- Much more cartoonish action than anything in Raiders
- Terrorized children, where Raiders had none
- A vapid, annoying and generally useless female protagonist, where Raiders had an excellent one
- Pointless and cartoonish scenes like the jungle-noises sequence, where Raiders had none
- A random kid Indy entrusts his life to, where Raiders had none
- An Asian kid who, without any explanation or warning, suddenly knows kung-fu, and is super-strong enough to knock a large, grown man down with a midair kick, where Raiders had none
- Evil Indy hurting and scaring the crap out of that same kid
- A lack of interesting villains, where Raiders had two
- A wildly flailing tone, where Raiders had a consistent one

So essentially, its biggest problem is that it's not a carbon copy of Raiders. But gladly, we got Last Crusade. But oh no, one of the biggest problems with Last Crusade is:

- Indiana Jones' father, where Raiders had none

[Gaith]

JarodRussell wrote:

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So essentially, its biggest problem is that it's not a carbon copy of Raiders.

Are you trying to be spiteful and condescending? Because if so, you're doing a bang-up job. And if wanting interesting characters, at least partly grounded action, a consistent tone and a lack of pandering and other cheap movie tricks amounts to demanding a "carbon copy" of Raiders, than by all means call me guilty of hoping for a good movie.

[JarodRussell]

Gaith wrote:

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Are you trying to be spiteful and condescending? Because if so, you're doing a bang-up job. And if wanting interesting characters, at least partly grounded action, a consistent tone and a lack of pandering and other cheap movie tricks amounts to demanding a "carbon copy" of Raiders, than by all means call me guilty of hoping for a good movie.

Is it a good movie on its own in your opinion or not? If it's not even that, then it can't be just because it's different from Raiders, can it?

[Samuel Walters]

ToD is not a good movie on its own merits. Its tone far too campy (the night noises, the Indy-Willie "night of passion", ripping out still-beating-hearts) to be taken seriously -- a problem for a film that explicitly wanted to be "dark." The difference between ToD and KotCS is that the latter had every intention of being campy from start to finish (Exhibit A: The Paramount logo fading into a prairie dog hill).

[Gaith]

^ Exactly. And for those saying "ESB was dark too", ESB was also funnier, more romantic, more emotionally mature and a far more accomplished piece of filmmaking than ToD.

JarodRussell wrote:

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So essentially, its biggest problem is that it's not a carbon copy of Raiders.

To take but one example, The Mummy had

- Internally consistent action believability
- An interesting female co-protagonist
- An interesting villain
- No random kid who beats up grown men and who is tasked by the hero of protecting his own life
- A consistent overall tone of tongue-in-cheek action horror
- No superfluous scenes. None. Name one,if you can.

Hell, for that matter, The Bourne Identity had about all of the above.

But show me a person who calls either The Mummy or The Bourne Identity a "carbon copy" of Raiders and I will show you a blooming moron.

[Captain Craig]

Captaindemotion wrote:

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^See, what I don't get is the way Empire Strikes Back is (rightly) acclaimed for being darker and more grown up than its predecessor; TOD gets slated for the same reason. Return of the Jedi is slated for being too similar to the first movie in that trilogy and for being too comedic- Last Crusade gets a by-ball on those counts. Go figure!

That is an interesting comparison that I think holds water. I'm likely to use that if it comes up elsewhere in my travels.

Count me as one who has a new appreciation for TOD in the last 10 years. I still find Willie annoying as all get out but hey, she isn't Jar Jar. It may be things such as Jar Jar that help me realize, hey there is more annoying out there.

[Phily B]

I really don't want to see any more Mutt, he was a terrible character and Shia is a shit actor.

[RJDiogenes]

I wasn't overly impressed with Mutt, and I doubt he could carry further adventures, especially since the time frame is now moving into the 60s. But I'm open minded about it.

Trevacious wrote:

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Just have Indy screw up a knee and lose an eye in the course of his next adventure, leaving a vicious new scar across his forehead and cheek, which causes him to don a patch and step back a bit from the kind of field work he used to do, but leaving him no less active in Life.

Then they could re-film the Old Indy bookends with Harrison in the role and restore The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles to their original format.

That's not a bad idea.

Turtletrekker wrote:

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IIRC, ToD was the impetus behind creating the PG-13 rating.

Yeah, that sounds familiar. As I think someone mentioned earlier, the problem with TOD (and what differentiates it from ESB) is not that it was gory or scary-- but that it was gruesome and vicious.

[Shazam!]

Reverend wrote:

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In all the other Indy films the female lead was always able to stand toe to with Indy and take care of herself...admittedly in two of those films it's the same woman, but the point remains.

Y'know, a damsel in distress is actually a break from the norm, where - as you say - most female leads these days have to be 'tough' and 'sassy'.

BRING BACK DAMSELS IN DISTRESS!

[Australis]

RJDonner&Blitzen wrote:

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But I'm open minded about it.

Wait, what....?