Originally there were three knights guarding the grail - two left. Indy discovers the tomb of one of them who had died (IIRC) a couple of hundred years after the grail quest. The knight had died of (dramatic pause) extreme old age, just having enough time to carve directions to the grail into his coffin lid.
So, Indy and his dad would have had an extension of their lifespans after drinking from the grail, but you’re spot on about having to remain behind the seal for immortality.
I saw there was something stiched onto his jacket. I thought the script t’s were d’s. I guess I should have said “Mudd” earlier.
As for the atomic test, there were loudspeakers informing people to put on their safety goggles and not look at the blast for one full minute or whatever, so the base wasn’t completely abandoned. What would be the point of having tests of bombs with fake villages to blow up if there’s not going to be anyone around to watch what happens?
Finally, in Temple of Doom, they make a point of having Indiana realize the bridge is coming down and attaching themselves to it. Most of the black clad Evil Hindoos do indeed fall to their deaths, either from the fall or the man eating crocodiles in the river. A couple of black clad Evil Hindoos, including Mr. Heartstealer himself, stay on the bridge by also tying themselves on.
Perhaps they should have all fallen off, but at least the movie gives a semi-believable explanation for why they do not. Compare this to the Russians getting into the temple, for instance.
probably absailed, thats how they got down the cliff face.
Anyway’s, Just back from second helpings. We’re done with spoiler boxes, surely?
1: I think Spalko could have been introduced as the baddie in a much better way; as it is, she just comes across as a very good communist, sent to do a job. There’s nothing particularly evil about the woman, she just wants to win a war for her country. I was hoping that she would shoot the tyres out of the hotrod in the opening scenes, killing the kids, setting her up as a take-no-shit kinda gal.
2: The fridge; The seven hundred people in the theater tonight all groaned when Indy emerged unscathed. There’s no reason for Indy to have to survive a nuclear blast, other than that awesomely cool shot of him silhouetted against the mushroom cloud. That was awesome.
3: Yep, he cracks the whip TWICE in the movie; to disarm a guard, then to swing towards the jeep. THATS IT.
4: Mutt’s opening scene in the diner, explaining about Oxley and Marion being kidnapped, is SO clunky. There’s such a concentrated dose of exposition, that even on second helpings, I was lost.
5: Again, bronze statues aren’t as tough as they should be. Hitting one will dislodge it’s head, instead of just denting the statue, as I would have thought. Are bronze statues not all one piece? Seemingly not.
6: In my mind, the character of Oxley isn’t really vital to the plot. They could have written him out. As it is, John Hurt annoyed the piss out of me. Henry…Jones… JUNIOR! If I heard that one more time, I was gonna barf. John Hurt is to Indy 4 as jar Jar Binks is to Episode 1.
7: Why is Spalko trying to run Indy off the cliff? She needs him to bring her to the temple! If thats not th’ case, why not just shoot him in the camp?
8: The waterfalls. This is gow I would have played it; Three Times They Drop! have the first waterfall to be a wee bitty thing. The second, not much better. Have indy say hey, this isn’t too bad! Then BANG, the big massive waterfall. Funnier, I think. As it is, you could practically hear every eye in the theater rolling.
9: Mac’s change of heart is strange; he dies a noble death, even though seconds earlier, he was stuffing his pockets with jewels. Given his character up to then, he would have clung onto Indy, and even dragged him with him. He wouldnt just give up.
10: Loved Indy’s “I’ve got a bad feeling about this…”. Brilliant.
11: They’re not spacemen, they’re “Interdimensional Beings”. That line is delivered as if them being spacemen was some crazy notion. Also, they’ve gone to “the space BETWEEN spaces”. I smiled at this line, because it was SO '50s sci-fi.
12: The swirling temple vortex at the end looked practically IDENTICAL to the end of The Mummy Returns. Again, another fantastic shot of Indy watching the saucer rise.
13: Questions; what is the book that Jim Broadbent takes out of the drawer at the end? Also, when Mutt tosses his knife to Indy in the truck to cut his bonds, there’s a tearing noise, following Mutt sayiong “Oh shit”. It looked like Indy cut his pants, or stabbed himself in the arse, but nothing came of it. What was going on there? And would it have killed them to have Short Round at the wedding?
I’m finding it very hard to Love or Hate this movie. It’s just so… Meh.
How sad is that?
I would have liked to know more about why and when Indy decided to use his real name and to not mind when people addressed him as such. He was so adamant about his preference for his nickname at the end of Crusade that it seemed odd everytime someone called him Henry.
You know, you’re right. I don’t think he’s refered to as Indiana more than twice in the whole movie.
Ox calls him Henry.
Spalko calls him Dr Jones.
Mutt calls him Professor, or some derivitive of “Daddio”.
Mac calls him Jonesy.
Marion calls him Jones, in a way only Marion can.
Jim Broadbent calls him Henry.
In fact, the guy from Ugly Betty who plays his army buddy in the interogation scene is the only guy who calls him “Indy”…
Does anyone call him Indiana? In the whole f’kin movie?!?!?
i read the book on friday, saw the movie saturday. the bits and bobs:
she went with mary williams. my speculation is she went with a total name change so indy couldn’t find her and the munchkin.
the book mentioned that indy was annoyed by the dean calling him henry. he finally gave up on it.
re: last crusade, you got immortality as long as you drank from the chalice on a regular basis in the cavern. once you left the cavern, barring any illnesses or accident you would have a bit of an extended life. (the knight in the cave tryed not drinking a few times due to depression. it was quite a long wait for another knight to arrive, and he would age in the times he didn’t drink.).
indy was born in 1899, he is at 58 in this movie, marion was born in 1909 she is 48 in the movie. mutt could be 18 or 20 from what marion said about them living together for a year before she left. she would have left somewhere in 1937 or 38 having him in 38 or 39.
4a. indy’s dad apparently died in 54 or 55, in his late seventies or early eighties.
i thought the crystal skull and skeletons were not well done at all. they seemed like they ran out of budget in the prop department, and someone said: “oh no! we forgot to make the crystal stuff. i’ll make a quick run out to the dollar store. good thing it is close to halloween.”
do they ever eat, sleep, or go to the bathroom? get a drink of water? except for the restaurant scene they really don’t even gulp down some water.
they did rather well with the russian and ukranian dialogue.
i liked how ox and indy had their “teacher” moments. you can take the teacher out of the classroom but you can’t take the classroom out of the teacher.
all in all it was a fun, don’t think to hard, movie.
They climbed down ropes.
Mrs. Plant wants a Russian lawn mower. I’m glad she doesn’t have one. 
However, one thing… Don’t you think it was heartwarming to see all those little ants storing food for the winter…? 
'Nother thing that didn’t occur to me till just now, after re-watching Temple and Raiders last night: Indy doesn’t kill anyone. Pretty low-violence movie. They neutered him! Indiana Jones and the Missing Testicles!
Funny how certain things in other movies are forgivable but not so in this one.
For example some people have a hard time with the Soviet agents freely roaming America.
Yet never batted an eye that in Raiders the Nazis sent an Army and part of an Airforce into British controlled Egypt and operated a major dig without arousing any attention whatso ever.
I enjoyed the big dumb movie. Not crazy about the non ending, but what the heck.
I missed the 1930’s background and was half expecting a CG’d Ron Howard and Richard Dreyfuss to be in that hot rod in the opening sequence (That’s two openings you can Blame Lucas for: The Buzby Berkely opening in ToD and now the American Graffiti opening credits)
I would have had them use the items in area 51 more in the opening. Imagine Indy and Soviets breaking into boxes to use alien and magic items against each other, Including a bit where the obvious BAD ASS GUN looking thing turns out to be a muscial instument or something lame at a crucial moment. But that is just me.
I think the Hat joke was over used in this movie. Once is good enough I believe there were 4 hat gags in this film.
The missing whip is disapointing, but I won’t lie I love his reaction to the Snake Rope.
I Enjoyed the opening escape But, did Indy really just accidentally shoot the guy in the foot? I mean really. (You know, I missed the impossibly big cannon sound of his gun)
The CG worked for me in the Rocket ride and the Ant Picnic.
Sure It was dumb as a bag of rocks but I had fun and that was all I really wanted from the movie.
Well Indy did smash that guy into the Ants… and Fried a bunch of Commies with the Rocket sled.
I think he just failed to shoot anyone.
We saw the movie this weekend. It was a fun popcorn flick, and we aren’t thinking much about it. I’m surprised how much I liked Mutt. I thought he did a great job (except, of course, for the monkey army scene).
So last night we watched Raiders. My almost 3 year old was still up for the beginning of the movie. She loved the scene with all the snakes on the floor. We got a little worried when, after Indy breaks through the wall, Marion runs into all the corpses and skeletons – but was Anneliese scared? Nope, she was just worried about Marion’s lost shoe! She talked about it the rest of the night, until bedtime. What happened to her shoe? Are the snakes wearing her shoe now? What is she going to do without her shoe? Who cares about scary corpses and screaming scenes – we want to know about Marion’s shoe!
Well, that’s the rub. You can make a film full of plot holes, unlikely character archetypes, and logistical impossibilities, and if it is entertaining, the audience doesn’t care. As you note, Raiders is full of things that don’t make sense, but you are walking back from the refrigerator before you start to figure out it, becuase the story is involving, the characters are sympathetic, and the pace is utterly perfect, never leaving time to ponder the improbabilities. Casablanca, almost universally beloved, makes utterly no sense from beginning to end (at least not unless you assign Ilsa the role of manipulative grifter) and yet the interactions between the characters (especially the minor characters), the quick pace, and the fantastic bantering dialogue sell the film despite its ostensible problems.
There is no formula that captures this, though; all the elements have to come together to make a film that is entertaining despite its flaws, and it seems that, for at least a significant minority of moviegoers, The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull doesn’t accomplish this by far. I could point out any number of individual reasons why this isn’t so–the lack of psychological realism of any kind in the protagonists, an excessive reliance upon nostalgia and in-jokes to supstitute for audience empathy, inaction and lack of motivation on the part of the characters, et cetera–but in the end, it is the lack of the necessary elements gelling together in a way that keeps a critical viewer too involved to excercise his reasoning capacity. This is needed with any film–when was that last time you saw a film that was exactly like something that could happen to you in real life?–but especially in a fantastical actioneer with supernatural or science fiction elements.
Stranger
Well, a bunch of commies were fried by a rocket sled that had Indy on it, if I recall correctly. I don’t think it was his intention to kill them, in fact, he was doing his damn best to stay alive himself. I’m not too annoyed about Indy not killing anyone as such, I mean, I didn;t want him to machine gun a bunch of guys, laughing maniacally like that guy in Home Alone, ya filthy animal.
He killed the guy with the blow gun.
Band name!
Coming Summer 2010-
Indiana Jones and Cancer
I can imagine the theme song playing as the doctors inject the IV for his chemo treatment.
it was a bible that was in brody’s family for many years. brody left it to the uni. in his will.
uh oh, rachelchristine, sounds like anneliese’s got the shoe gene. y’all may have to add a “shoe room” into your abode. it is funny that was her “sore thumb” in the movie.
OK, just saw it last night. MHO: Good, not great. The IJ series is full of plot holes and WTF moments; this one maybe had a few more than usual.
That being said, I still enjoyed it. Even with the non-revelation of Mutt’s parentage (seriously, who didn’t see that coming?) and other various silly moments, it satisfied.
The biggest missed opportunity for me was when the Reds were chasing Indy and Mutt through the campus and drove right through an anti-Commie rally ! These people were paranoid to begin with; how cool would it have been to just yell out, “COMMIES!” and have the crowd swarm them like ants?
Speaking of ants–easily the coolest scene in the movie. The Russian guy thrashing around, and then the ants drag him into the hill–fantastic!
Agree with the whole “Skull-as-Deus-ex-machina” criticism, though. The skull did everything but sell popcorn in the lobby.
I think that was the point. During the Red Scare, people were seeing Communists around every corner and under every bed; while everyone’s looking under the bed, they could just walk right by.
Not nearly as good as Raiders or Crusade , but as a “4th-film-after-a-long-hiatus”, it was a heckuva lot better than Phantom Mess .
It did at my theatre. Handy, them interdimensional crystal Skulls!