For those of you who, like me, got the Indy DVD set mainly for Raiders, this may be of interest...
Hmm, I got it mainly for Raiders and Crusade
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Says the Droid:
I've been able to turn it into a fun, dignified, slightly more serious and much more worthy sequel to Raiders.
I think it's tons of fun, very dignified (in no small part thanks to Connery) and serious enough to be a very worthy sequel to Raiders as it is.
This is what Spielberg was aiming for: after getting a well-deserved scolding for the violence and oppressive tone of “Temple of Doom”, “Crusade” was a mea culpa of sorts. His first priority was to make a kid-friendly film, not to make a tonal match to “Raiders”.
It's quite presumptious to assume to know PRECISELY what Spielberg was aiming for, isn't it? I don't even see how it's relevant. What's relevant is what's on the screen, not any of the authors' intentions.
Here's my take on some of the edits. I'm not going into all of them. I don't necessarily agree with the ones I left out but don't find them important enough to go into detail:
- Removing the Young Indy scene is a REALLY bad move IMHO. While much of this is goofy and harks back to slapstick films, it's also not only great fun but provides some interesting insights into the Indy character. No, I don't mean how he got the whip, the hat or why he's afraid of snakes. It's about his dedication to archeology (he's not just in it for the thrills), his share of pride and arrogance ("Everyone but me is lost") and the core reason for why he is the way he is: His father. That scene where he runs in to his father to tell him something very important but doesn't listen to him is priceless and VERY important to the character (and it needs to follow a setup like the one we're given IMHO). So losing that entire scene is just one big mistake IMHO since it misses what it's actually about.
- Inserting scenes from "The Perfect Storm" (I think, please correct me if I'm wrong). Complete anachronism. Even on that one shot you can totally see that that ship just doesn't belong in Indy's timeframe.
- The shots with the librarian are hilarious IMHO. I see no reason to remove them at all.
- Removing Kazim's follow-up line to "My soul is prepared", "How's yours?": I think again, this is missing one of the core points of the movie, albeit a different one. It's very much about faith in many places. Indy's leap near the end is just that, a leap of faith. So I think that line is important for setting the tone of the film.
- Any edits to the fireplace scene are considered heresy by me
. Seriously, I think that scenes perfect. It's hilarious but it still retains a sense of danger and urgency.
- Cutting down the scene between Indy and his Dad before going to Berlin (which InfoDroid refers to as too preachy) again misses out on the point. Again, faith plays an important part, and it's an important distinction between the two Joneses. Also, I think the image of "The army of darkness..." is a very powerful one and makes the stakes very, very clear. I think InfoDroid should concentrate more on the contents and not so much on Connery's accent which he doesn't seem to like and seems bent on cutting down.
- "No ticket!" - one of the best Indy scenes IMHO. No way you can remove this.
- Yeah, the plane flying into the tunnel may be silly but it's also very, very funny IMHO and again an Indy classic. Who the hell cares if it's realistic? Indy's never been about being realistic. It's always been over the top to a point, and this one doesn't cross that point by any measure.
- Another moment that was removed because it's supposedly "nonsense" is the one where Indy's father comes to rescue Markus. They have this 'ritual' they share (with a few lines of text, some gestures and almost a little dance). Yeah, it's a little silly but it's far from nonsense. It gives us a sense of how close these two are, how long they've known each other and how different Indy's father is from Indy himself (could you picture Indy doing that?).
- Why on earth would he want to lose the scene with the ink? And why is he so happy he's lost the "The pen is mightier than the sword” line? Jones Sr. and Marcus aren't as physical as Indy but they'll do the best they can in their own way to prevail. They're arguably more intellectual than Indy so they'd definitely appreciate the irony of the pen being mightier than the "sword" (or gun) in a situation like this.
I think this sums up my feelings about the whole edit best: "And comparing each scene with Raiders to try to get a more consistent feel." Then why not just watch Raiders?
I also think this guy seriously lacks a sense of humor.
