Buckeye Jones wrote:
: Sure looks like little aliens in that last shot.

Maybe ... but they looked to me more like skeletons with, uh, blue helmets or something ... so then I started thinking that maybe they were skeletons from the neck down, but crystal skulls from the neck up ...

Interesting ... it seems the two sites from which I got the two images of the crystal skull have since been asked by the studio to take their images down (even though one of them was from a toy company's brochure, and would thus presumably be at least semi-public already) ... so far the Lego pictures are still up, at least ...

NO NEW SPOILERS

Looking back at an old post of Jeffrey Wells's, I came across two points in the comments that had not occurred to me yet, both of which were made by "Mgmax":

[someone else wrote:] "Alien" is jumping the gun. The supernatural elements of the Indy series have always been religious in nature.

Yes, when the villains were the neo-pagan Nazis-- rather than the staunchly atheistic Commies.

Plus, is it set after Sputnik?

Re: the first point. I have always figured the switch from Nazi to Commie was just part-and-parcel of accepting the fact that Harrison Ford is now 20+ years older than he used to be, and therefore the character should be 20+ years older too, and therefore the story had to take place in the 1950s and not the 1930s, and therefore the story had to deal with the fact that a very different ideology was now trying to achieve global domination. And I accepted it at face value when Lucas said that he switched from the religious supernatural to the sci-fi supernatural because the cheesy B-movies of the 1930s were different from the cheesy B-movies of the 1950s. But now I wonder... does the connection run deeper than that? Did Lucas go for a sci-fi rather than religious supernatural MacGuffin in this film BECAUSE the villains were atheists this time? Or, alternatively, were the rise of explicitly atheistic Communism and the rise of a more "science" oriented form of B-movie both spurred by some even LARGER trend that was in the air at that time?

Re: the second point. Why yes, word is that this film takes place in 1957, which just happens to be the same year that Sputnik was launched and the Space Age began. I wonder if the film itself will make that connection.

'Indy' trailer finally on its way
Paramount, Lucasfilm prep Valentine's Day tease
Variety, February 7

And now for the "alternate comic cover":

Y'know, the little fella's beginning to grow on me. We'll see, I guess.
Coming Soon has links to an Italian magazine with new pics (I don't think there's anything particularly spoilery about them, but who knows?):

Classic Indy


Ford and Blanchett


Ford and an Old Friend (I don't mean Marion)

Does anyone else think that all the pics released so far of Blanchett look a little...weird? I don't mean her--I mean the way they're shot; they almost have a hyper-active, plastic quality that I can only compare to the kid's show Lazy Town. It's a bit contrast to the realistic, classic-Indy look of all the other shots released so far.

Hmm.... Now that I think of it, these shots of Blanchett also look like shots from old S.F. movies like War of the Worlds--the pictures at IMDB are in B&W, but the movie's in Technicolor, and it also has a distinctly plastic and/or artificial look. Another link to the movies of the fifties?

Trailer's up, and it looks good. I love the silhouette shot of Indy picking up his hat, and the bullwhip action looks pretty sweet.

. I'm really excited for this movie now. It doesn't look like a drop-dead classic, but it looks fun. And, having seen actual footage, it definitely looks like it's going to be indebted to the Fifties in more ways than plot--it has a Fifties look.

Not too shabby, although it certainly looks more like a sequel to Last Crusade than Raiders.

Same self-conscious sense of humor. And wow, Spielberg's really pouring out the love for Shia, letting him copy Indy's slow, anxious turn to look back over his shoulder. That shot is straight outta Raiders.

You all noticed the "Roswell, New Mexico 1947" reference, right?

Jeffrey Overstreet wrote:
: Not too shabby, although it certainly looks more like a sequel to Last Crusade than Raiders.

Yeah... I particularly didn't care much for the way Indy tosses off a quip of some sort AFTER he lands in the truck with the Commies but BEFORE he does anything to them. It's kind of funny, but it has the same cartoonish lack-of-believability element that afflicted the other Indiana Jones sequels. The original Raiders would have been brisker, would have gone for a humorous LOOK instead of calling a dramatic time-out for the verbal joke, I think. (Opinion subject to revision if I re-watch all three films again and realize that the distinction I'm making isn't true, of course.)

I actually got chills during that.

That bodes well for the first viewing at least--I really enjoyed Last Crusade in 70mm on opening night. It was only after the second or third time that I really started getting annoyed by its inadequacies.

ehhh... why rush to see it in a theatre? It's scheduled to premiere on the USA network in 2011.

Screen captures of what tiny, tiny bits we see in the trailer of the character who is probably being played by John Hurt.

Is Indiana Jones a "patriotic" hero?

MTV Movies Blog got REAL CLOSE to the Lego version of the crystal skull at last weekend's Toy Fair. (Possible spoiler in the photo posted there?)

Shia LaBeouf Confirms 'Raiders' Link, Apologizes To Spielberg
Nearly three weeks ago, an official photo from “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” seemed to confirm to legions of fans that the intrepid archeologist was heading back to the government warehouse from “Raiders of the Lost Ark.”
Forget seems (I know not seems). He most certainly is, “Indy” co-star Shia LaBeouf told MTV News, and it’s “crazy!” . . .
MTV Movies Blog, February 22

- - -

I wonder if Harrison Ford or Karen Allen had any reactions similar to Shia's. I mean, NEITHER of them got to be in the warehouse in the original film, so for them, too, appearing on that set in the fourth film could have been like stepping into an iconic image for the first time.

That just seems so wrong.

An Indiana Jones film should open late Friday night in an ordinary American neighborhood to an audience of hysterical fans, where the crowd will erupt in riotous applause as the fanfare begins... not in the company of the international filmmaking elite.

I'm sure many of the filmmaking elite are hysterical fans that will applaud riotously once the lights dim, though....

Didn't Revenge of the Sith open there? Or did it just play there after the fact?

I'm anxious to see how Spielberg introduces the warehouse in Indy IV. At the end of Raiders, IIRC, Spielberg does a pullback that slowly reveals the enormity of the place. A rather daring shot, since 95% of what is shown is a beautiful and completely convincing matte painting by Michael Pangrazio. Will Spielberg do a similar shot? And how much of what we see in the background will now be a CG effect?

Here's a recent interview with Harrison Ford, discussing Indy IV, his favorite film making experiences, his recent box office stumbles, and his surprise conversation with his accountant about Star Wars.

The second Crystal Skull trailer is supposed to go online this week. There is also going to be a widget contest associated with it.


Story here.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS

I can't recall if I linked to a certain rumour earlier in this thread -- I probably did, but I'm too lazy to look for it right now -- but, since I just watched Close Encounters of the Third Kind for the first time in decades tonight, I figured I'd compare the face of the climactic alien to that of the crystal skull in the new Indiana Jones pic.

Pictures of the Close Encounters alien are surprisingly difficult to find; I would do a screen-capture, except I have the film on Blu-Ray, not DVD, and I don't even know if I CAN do screen-captures yet. (My laptop doesn't have a Blu-Ray drive, but I wonder if there is some way to connect my PS3 and my laptop such that I could capture a still frame...) Anyway, there's an okay photo at EW.com's review of the DVD that came out seven years ago:

http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,128903,00.html

And then, of all the images of the "crystal skull" that have been leaked so far, the one that gives us the best angle for comparing its physique to that of the Close Encounters alien can be seen here:

http://www.hollywoodnorthreport.com/article.php?Article=5298

Does a connection between the two seem plausible?

George Lucas is such a tease.

Though I guess it's possible he's just posing with an old prop, and not with anything that happens to appear in the new film. I mean, for starters, that panel with the Nazi emblem surely can't be a part of this film; this film takes place in the '50s, not the '30s, and I highly doubt the U.S. government types would have put the Ark back into the Nazi crate before putting the Ark into storage.

Then again, maybe he IS trying to suggest something. Oh well, less than two months to go.

A new teaser, with a little bit more fun this time.

Bond movies have Bond girls, so apparently Indy movies have... Indy girls.

Except the Indy girls won't spend time with Indiana Jones, they'll spend time with Mutt Williams. Oh-kay ...

Some people say the track listing on the soundtrack album gives away the movie's ending, but I, personally, don't feel like I've learned much of anything from reading it. I will say, though, that the phrase "City of Gold" (from one of the middle tracks) makes me nervous.

Jeffrey Wells: "Indiana Jones & the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (Paramount, 5.21) is locked and runs around two hours and twenty-something minutes."

Previous runtimes, according to the IMDb:

• Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) -- 115 minutes
• Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) -- 118 minutes
• Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) -- 127 minutes

The runtimes on Spielberg's directorial efforts since then:

• Always (1989) -- 122 minutes
• Hook (1991) -- 144 minutes
• Jurassic Park (1993) -- 127 minutes
• Schindler's List (1993) -- 195 minutes
• The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) -- 129 minutes
• Amistad (1997) -- 152 minutes
• Saving Private Ryan (1998) -- 170 minutes
• A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001) -- 146 minutes
• Minority Report (2002) -- 145 minutes
• Catch Me If You Can (2002) -- 141 minutes
• The Terminal (2004) -- 128 minutes
• War of the Worlds (2005) -- 116 minutes
• Munich (2005) -- 164 minutes

So the new Indy film's reported running time is pretty much par for the course. Heck, I'm shocked to see that Spielberg has actually made at least one film in the past two decades that was LESS than two hours, namely War of the Worlds.

Spielberg movies on this list that might have benefitted had they run under 2 hours, IMHO...

Always
Hook
The Lost World: Jurassic Park
Catch Me If You Can
The Terminal

"E.T. wuz here." As if the graffiti caused by humans were not bad enough.



Or perhaps we should say: "A spaceman called Kilroy."

Hmmm, sort of a cross between Kilroy and Dr. Zoidberg, now that I think about it.

If I were just a fan, I might be avoiding this sort of thing, but darn it, I'm a journalist too, and I've got to keep abreast of this sort of thing so I know what to pitch and stuff. The latest alleged revelation: the leaked production notes, apparently traceable to some publicist's office in Italy. And here's what they have to say about the John Hurt character:

The movie’s distinguished cast includes Oscar®-nominated actor John Hurt, who portrays an old colleague of Indy’s who is reported missing as “Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” begins. Hurt’s character has spent much of his life pursuing the Crystal Skull of Akator, and the endless search has nearly driven him mad.
Director Steven Spielberg says he hoped from the start that Hurt would accept the role, which was inspired by the character Ben Gunn in the Robert Louis Stevenson classic Treasure Island. “I sent the script to John and said, ‘Please, John, think of Ben Gunn when you read the script.’ And he did. And he plays the part brilliantly.”
Hurt elaborates: “He’s the man who was left on the island for 20 years before they came back for him. But, as it turns out, my character isn’t a man who was simply left on his own – he is a man who has become possessed, which comes out as a kind of madness. Of course, the Russians have also now become interested in the skull for completely different reasons, and that’s where the story picks up.”

And later, in the list of cast member bios, there is this:

Playing Professor Oxley is JOHN HURT, who was born in Chesterfield, Derbyshire and lived until the age of 12 in the industrial countryside of the Midlands, in a small village named Woodville. The son of a Church of England clergyman, he first went to Grimsby Art School and St. Martin’s School of Art in London before winning a scholarship to RADA.

What's interesting is that the track listing on the soundtrack album reportedly includes a reference to someone named Oxley, as well. So is this the character's real name, or is there some deliberately-placed misinformation going on here?

This may be my fourth and final chance to go to an Indy film without knowing the surprises ahead of time. It's so rare that I get that buzz of in-theater surprise anymore... there's no way I'm going to let Ain't It Cool or anybody else ruin that experience for me.

What about the trailers and posters?

I've never seen this before. I was just invited to a press-only advance screening of this film -- on a Sunday. I don't go to movies on Sunday, but it made me wonder: Many family-oriented films, like the upcoming "Speed Racer," screen on Saturday mornings. But that would violate the Jewish Sabbath. And we all know who directed "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull."

So -- could this be Spielberg's directive? Has this happened with other screenings of family-oriented Spielberg movies in the past?

Same here: Sunday, May 18, 2 p.m.

Christian wrote:
: I've never seen this before. I was just invited to a press-only advance screening of this film -- on a Sunday. I don't go to movies on Sunday, but it made me wonder: Many family-oriented films, like the upcoming "Speed Racer," screen on Saturday mornings.

Actually, Speed Racer is being screened on a Sunday here too, at noon, which IS unusual since, as you say, family-oriented films tend to screen on Saturdays instead. (But I'm skipping the screening to go to church; I'll see the movie at the media-only screening the following Thursday.) What makes the Speed Racer screening even weirder is that it's taking place out here in the boonies, in Surrey, and not in Vancouver.

Crystal Skull is screening in Vancouver, though. Sunday May 18 at 11:00am. Oh, and that's a long weekend for us, so this screws up my vacation plans.

A bit of new footage in this trailer, but nothing spoiler-ish -- at least nothing that wasn't already implicit in the earlier trailer:

Yet another new trailer -- and it gives us our best glimpse of John Hurt to date.

I wrote:
: Yet another new trailer -- and it gives us our best glimpse of John Hurt to date.

The trailer has been yanked ... but you can read a shot-by-shot analysis of it here.

Official Pix has new photos for sale ... including photos of the crystal skull itself and of the ever-reclusive John Hurt character.

I wrote:
: The trailer has been yanked ... but you can read a shot-by-shot analysis of it here.

And now you can see it, once again, in high-def ... on the movie's official website!

Make of this what you will.

Well....here's the first review(supposedly)

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/36667

I'm not sure, I've heard that he could have gotten all his spoilers from other sources(the trading cards etc.), so it may just be a fanboy with a bone to pick with Lucas.

There's a second review on there (full of spoilers like the first) that is described as "more positive but also more damning." Man, I hope those reviews are wrong. They seem to confirm everyone's fears about George Lucas and his ability to royally screw up our favorite childhood movie franchises. Or, as has been argued with regard to Star Wars, maybe we all just grew up.

Note the nun -- though it looks like she's just running an asylum or something.

- - -

Indiana Jones and the Savior of a Lost Art
In fact, Mr. Spielberg said, he tries to cut as little as possible in these movies’ action sequences, because “every time the camera changes dynamic angles, you feel there’s something wrong, that there’s some cheating going on.” So his goal is “to do the shots the way Chaplin or Keaton would, everything happening before the eyes of the audience, without a cut.”
Warming to the subject, he went on: “The idea is, there’s no illusion; what you see is what you get. My movies have never been frenetically cut, the way a lot of action is done today. That’s not a put-down; some of that quick cutting, like in ‘The Bourne Ultimatum,’ is fantastic, just takes my breath away. But to get the comedy I want in the Indy films, you have to be old-fashioned. I’ve studied a lot of the old movies that made me laugh, and you’ve got to stage things in full shots and let the audience be the editor. It’s like every shot is a circus act.”
New York Times, May 4

The first trailer gave us "Roswell, New Mexico, 1947". The second trailer gave us a glimpse of the not-exactly-humanoid crystal skull. And now, the third trailer gives us the Nazca Lines. Either one of the old rumours is coming true, or the makers of these trailers are jerking our chains.

Another trailer has just appeared.

How can you not love Paulene Kael's review of Raiders of the Lost Ark?

Are you positive this isn't a review of Treasure of the Four Crowns in 3-D?

Overstreet wrote:
: Another trailer has just appeared.

And it seems to give us another clue re: the aliens.

BTW, Jeff, your recent blog post on the question of whether Marion Ravenwood will be as spunky here as she was in Raiders prompted this blog post of mine, where I briefly compare and contrast the Indy-Marion relationship with the JamesBond-BondGirl dynamic. (A bit of a tangent springing off of a tangent, but there you go.)