Indiana Jones 4
Encyclopedia
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is a 2008 American adventure science fiction
film. It is the fourth film in the Indiana Jones franchise, created by George Lucas
and directed by Steven Spielberg
. Released nineteen years after the previous film
, the film acknowledges its star Harrison Ford
's age by being set in 1957. It pays tribute to the science fiction B-movies of the era
, pitting Indiana Jones
against Soviet
agents—led by Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett
)—for a psychic alien crystal skull
. Indiana is aided by his former lover Marion Ravenwood
(Karen Allen
) and their son Mutt Williams (Shia LaBeouf
). Ray Winstone
, John Hurt
and Jim Broadbent
are also part of the supporting cast.
Screenwriters Jeb Stuart
, Jeffrey Boam
, Frank Darabont
and Jeff Nathanson
wrote drafts before David Koepp
's script satisfied the producers. Shooting began on June 18, 2007 and took place in various locations: New Mexico, New Haven, Connecticut, Hawaii, Fresno, California and on soundstages in Los Angeles. To keep aesthetic continuity with the previous films the crew relied on traditional stunt work instead of computer-generated stunt doubles and cinematographer
Janusz Kamiński
studied Douglas Slocombe
's style from the previous films.
Marketing relied heavily on the public's nostalgia for the series, with products taking inspiration from all four films. Anticipation for the film was heightened by secrecy, which resulted in a legal dispute over an extra violating his non-disclosure agreement
and the arrest of another man for stealing a computer containing various documents related to the production. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released worldwide on May 22, 2008, and was a financial success, grossing over $786 million worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film of the franchise, the second highest-grossing film of 2008 and the third highest-grossing film ever produced by Lucasfilm
when not adjusted for inflation, after Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
.
hero Indiana Jones and his long-time partner George "Mac" McHale are kidnapped by a group of Soviet
agents led by the mysterious Colonel Dr. Irina Spalko. The Soviets infiltrate a warehouse labeled "51
" in Nevada
and force "Dr. Jones" to find a crate containing the remains of an extraterrestrial
being that crashed ten years prior
in Roswell, New Mexico
. After finding the crate—its content/s possessing magnetic
properties—Mac double-crosses Indiana, having been bought off by the Soviets. After a fight with the Soviets, Indiana manages to escape into the desert (though not before the crate containing the Ark of the Covenant
from Raiders of the Lost Ark
is revealed in the same warehouse); he then stumbles upon a nuclear test town
and survives a nuclear explosion by hiding in a lead
-lined refrigerator. He is later debriefed by the FBI
because of Mac's Soviet ties. Shortly after returning to Marshall College
, Indiana is offered an indefinite leave of absence to avoid being fired because of the incident.
At a train station, Indiana is stopped by greaser Henry "Mutt" Williams, who tells him that his old colleague Harold Oxley was kidnapped after discovering a crystal skull
in Peru
. Indiana proceeds to tell Mutt the legend of a crystal skull
found in the mystical city of Akator
, in which whoever returns the skull to the city would be given control over its supernatural powers. Mutt gives Indiana a letter from his mother, who was also kidnapped, containing a riddle written by Oxley in an ancient Native American
language, which leads them to the Nazca Lines
in Peru. There they discover that Oxley was incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital, having suffered a mental breakdown from the powers of the skull, until he was kidnapped by the Soviets. In Oxley's cell, they find clues that lead them to the grave of Francisco de Orellana
, a Conquistador
who went missing in the 16th century while searching for Akator. They discover the skull at the grave, with Indiana reasoning that Oxley had hidden it there after finding it.
Shortly afterward, Indiana and Mutt are captured by the Soviets and taken to their camp, where they find Oxley and Mutt's mother, who turns out to be Indiana's old love, Marion Ravenwood, and reveals that Mutt is Indiana's son, Henry Jones III. Spalko believes that the crystal skull belongs to an interdimensional being
and holds great psychic
power, and reveals that the specimen stolen from the warehouse is also a crystal skull. She also believes that returning the skull to Akator will grant the Soviets the advantage of psychic warfare. Indiana, Marion, Mutt and Oxley manage to escape from the Soviets into the Amazon
; however, they are recaptured after Indiana falls into a swamp and Oxley fetches the Soviets for help, and with their hands tied taken to the city temple
through the Rainforest. Marion and Indiana argue so much that the Soviet guard finally gags Marion with a cloth. However, Indiana and Mutt manage to overpower him while he does this. Indiana frees himself with a hidden knife of Mutt's. He ungags Marion, then Mutt frees her while Indiana throws out the driver. A fight ensues (displaying Spalko's fencing
prowess), but only after evading the Soviets again during a brush with siafu ants, negotiating three waterfalls in a duck
, and nearly being killed by an elusive tribe living in the long-abandoned city, are they able to enter the temple. Mac, who claims to be a double agent
(to Indiana's bewilderment, questioning his loyalty), secretly leaves a trail for the Soviets to follow.
Inside the temple, they find artifacts from several ancient civilizations
. Indiana deduces that the creatures were kindred spirits; they too were "archaeologists
" studying the different cultures of Earth
. The five enter a chamber containing the crystal skeletons of thirteen interdimensional beings seated on thrones in a circle, one missing a skull. After the Soviets arrive, Spalko places the skull onto the headless skeleton. They begin communicating to the group through Oxley in an ancient dialect, promising to reward them with a "big gift"; Spalko approaches them and demands to "know everything". The skeletons grant her request and psychically transfer their collective knowledge into her mind, activating a portal
to another dimension. Indiana, Marion, Mutt and the now-sane Oxley escape the temple, but Mac and the other Soviets are sucked into the portal. The skeletons, meanwhile, combine to form a single living interdimensional being which overwhelms Spalko, causing her to disintegrate; her scattered essence is then drawn into the portal. The temple crumbles and reveals a massive fast-spinning flying saucer
slowly rising from the debris (thought to be buried for millennia, the aliens "instructing" the human
ancestors to build a city on top of it to hide it from plain sight); the survivors watch as it hovers in the atmosphere, defying the laws of physics and disappears into the cosmos in a split second, the "space between spaces". Indiana, amazed by the spectacle but also overwhelmed by the sudden turn of events, is now happily reconciled with his new family.
Not long afterward, Indiana, now reinstated and made an associate dean at Marshall College, marries Marion. At the wedding's conclusion, a sudden wind bursts through the church doors and blows Indiana's hat onto the floor at Mutt's feet. Mutt picks it up and is about to place it on his head, only to have his father grab and put it on as he and his wife walk down the aisle.
Joel Stoffer
and Neil Flynn
have minor roles as FBI agents interrogating Indiana in a scene following the opening sequence. Alan Dale
plays General Ross, who protests his innocence. Andrew Divoff
and Pavel Lychnikoff
play Russian soldiers. Spielberg cast Russian-speaking actors as Russian soldiers so their accents would be authentic. Dimitri Diatchenko plays Spalko's right hand man who battles Indiana at Marshall College. Diatchenko bulked up to 250 pounds to look menacing, and his role was originally minor with ten days of filming. When shooting the fight, Ford accidentally hit his chin, and Spielberg liked Diatchenko's humorous looking reaction, so he expanded his role to three months of filming. Ernie Reyes, Jr.
plays a cemetery guard.
Sean Connery
turned down an offer to reprise his role as Henry Jones, Sr.
, as he found retirement too enjoyable. Lucas stated that in hindsight it was good that Connery did not briefly appear, as it would disappoint the audience when his character would not come along for the film's adventure. Ford joked, "I'm old enough to play my own father in this one." The film addresses Connery's absence by Indiana mentioning that both Henry, Sr. and Marcus Brody died before the events of this movie. Connery later stated that he liked the film, describing it as "rather good and rather long."
and Steven Spielberg
made a deal with Paramount Pictures
for five Indiana Jones films. Following the 1989 release of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
, Lucas let the series end as he felt he could not think of a good plot device
to drive the next installment, and chose instead to produce The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles for TV, which explored the character in his early years. Harrison Ford played Indiana in one episode, narrating his adventures in 1920 Chicago. When Lucas shot Ford's role in December 1992, he realized the scene opened up the possibility of a film with an older Indiana set in the 1950s. The film could reflect a science fiction 1950s B-movie, with aliens as the plot device. Meanwhile, Spielberg believed he was going to "mature" as a filmmaker after making the trilogy, and felt he would just produce any future installments.
Ford disliked the new angle, telling Lucas, "No way am I being in a Steven Spielberg movie like that." Spielberg himself, who depicted aliens in Close Encounters of the Third Kind
and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
, resisted it. Lucas came up with a story, which Jeb Stuart turned into a script from October 1993 to May 1994. (Stuart had previously written The Fugitive, which starred Ford.) Lucas wanted Indiana to get married, which would allow Henry Jones, Sr. to return, expressing concern over whether his son is happy with what he has accomplished. After he learned that Joseph Stalin
was interested in psychic warfare, he decided to have Russians as the villains and the aliens to have psychic powers. Following Stuart's next draft, Lucas hired Last Crusade writer Jeffrey Boam
to write the next three versions, the last of which was completed in March 1996. Three months later, Independence Day
was released, and Spielberg told Lucas he would not make another alien invasion film. Lucas decided to focus on the Star Wars prequels.
In 2000, Spielberg's son asked when the next Indiana Jones film would be released, which made him interested in reviving the project. The same year, Ford, Lucas, Spielberg, Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy met during the American Film Institute
's tribute to Ford, and decided they wanted to enjoy the experience of making an Indiana Jones film again. Spielberg also found returning to the series a respite from his many dark films during this period, such as A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, Minority Report, and Munich. Lucas convinced Spielberg to use aliens in the plot by saying they were not "extraterrestrials," but "interdimensional
," with this concept taking inspiration in the superstring theory
. Spielberg and Lucas discussed the central idea of a B-movie involving aliens, and Lucas suggested using the crystal skull
s to ground the idea. Lucas found those artifacts as fascinating as the Ark of the Covenant
, and had intended to feature them for a Young Indiana Jones episode before the show's cancellation. M. Night Shyamalan
was hired to write for an intended 2002 shoot, but he was overwhelmed writing a sequel to a film he loved like Raiders of the Lost Ark
, and claimed it was difficult to get Ford, Spielberg and Lucas to focus. Stephen Gaghan
and Tom Stoppard
were also approached.
Frank Darabont
, who wrote various Young Indiana Jones episodes, was hired to write in May 2002. His script, entitled Indiana Jones and the City of Gods, was set in the 1950s, with ex-Nazis pursuing Jones. Spielberg conceived the idea because of real life figures such as Juan Perón
in Argentina
, who protected Nazi war criminals. Darabont claimed Spielberg loved the script, but Lucas had issues with it, and decided to take over writing himself. Lucas and Spielberg acknowledged the 1950s setting could not ignore the Cold War
, and the Russians were more plausible villains. Spielberg decided he could not satirize the Nazis after directing Schindler's List
, while Ford noted, "We plum[b] wore the Nazis out."
Jeff Nathanson
met with Spielberg and Lucas in August 2004, and turned in the next drafts in October and November 2005, titled The Atomic Ants. David Koepp
continued on from there, giving his script the subtitle Destroyer of Worlds, based on the J. Robert Oppenheimer quote. It was changed to Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, as Spielberg found it more inviting a title and actually named the plot device of the crystal skulls. Lucas insisted on the Kingdom part. Koepp's "bright [title] idea" was Indiana Jones and the Son of Indiana Jones, and Spielberg had also considered having the title name the aliens as The Mysterians
, but dropped that when he remembered that was the name of a film. Koepp collaborated with Raiders of the Lost Ark screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan
on the film's "love dialogue."
Unlike the previous Indiana Jones films, Spielberg shot the entire film in the United States, stating he did not want to be away from his family. Shooting began on June 18, 2007 at Deming, New Mexico
. An extensive chase scene set at Indiana Jones's fictional Marshall College was filmed between June 28 and July 7 at Yale University
in New Haven, Connecticut (where Spielberg's son Theo was studying). To keep in line with the fact the story takes place in the 1950s, several facades were changed, although signs were put up in between shots to tell the public what the store or restaurant actually was.
Afterwards, they filmed scenes set in the Peruvian jungles in Hilo, Hawaii until August. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is the biggest film shot in Hawaii since Waterworld
, and was estimated to generate $
22 million to $45 million in the local economy. Because of an approaching hurricane
, Spielberg was unable to shoot a fight at a waterfall, so he sent the second unit
to film shots of Brazil
's and Argentina
's Iguazu Falls
. These were digitally combined into the fight, which was shot at the Universal
backlot.
Half the film was scheduled to shoot on five sound stages at Los Angeles: Downey
, Sony
, Warner Bros.
, Paramount
and Universal
. Filming moved to Chandler Field
in Fresno, California
, substituting for Mexico City International Airport
, on October 11, 2007. After shooting aerial shots of Chandler Airport and a DC-3
on the morning of October 12, 2007, filming wrapped. Although he originally found no need for re-shoots after viewing his first cut of the film, Spielberg decided to add an establishing shot
, which was filmed on February 29, 2008 at Pasadena, California
.
, who has shot all of the director's films since 1993's Schindler's List, reviewed the previous films to study Douglas Slocombe
's style. "I didn’t want Janusz to modernize and bring us into the 21st century," Spielberg explained. "I still wanted the film to have a lighting style not dissimilar to the work Doug Slocombe had achieved, which meant that both Janusz and I had to swallow our pride. Janusz had to approximate another cinematographer's look, and I had to approximate this younger director's look that I thought I had moved away from after almost two decades." Spielberg also hired production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas
after admiring his design work for Superman Returns
. Spielberg did not want to fast cut
action scenes, relying on his script instead for a fast pace, and had confirmed in 2002 that he would not shoot the film digitally, a format Lucas had adopted. Lucas felt "it looks like it was shot three years after Last Crusade. The people, the look of it, everything. You’d never know there was 20 years between shooting." Kamiński commented upon watching the three films back-to-back, he was amazed how each of them advanced technologically, but were all nevertheless consistent, neither too brightly or darkly lit.
While shooting War of the Worlds
in late 2004, Spielberg met with stunt coordinator Vic Armstrong
, who doubled for Ford in the previous films, to discuss three action sequences he had envisioned. However, Armstrong was filming The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
during shooting of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, so Dan Bradley
was hired instead. Bradley and Spielberg used previsualization
for all the action scenes, except the motorcycle chase at Marshall College, because that idea was conceived after the animators had left. Bradley drew traditional storyboard
s instead, and was given free rein to create dramatic moments, just as Raiders of the Lost Ark second unit
director Michael D. Moore
did when filming the truck chase. Spielberg improvised on set, changing the location of Mutt and Spalko's duel from the ground to on top of vehicles.
The Ark of the Covenant
is seen in a broken crate during the Hangar 51 opening sequence. Lucasfilm used the same prop from Raiders of the Lost Ark
. Guards were hired to protect the highly-sought after piece of film memorabilia during the day of its use. A replica of the staff carried by Charlton Heston
in The Ten Commandments
was also used to populate the set to illustrate the Hangar's history.
Producer Frank Marshall stated in 2003 that the film would use traditional stunt work so as to be consistent with the previous films. CGI
was used to remove the visible safety wires on the actors when they did their stunts (such as when Indy swings on a lamp with his whip). Timed explosives were used for a scene where Indiana drives a truck through crates. During the take, an explosive failed to detonate and landed in the seat beside Ford. However, it did not go off and he was not injured.
Steven Spielberg stated before production began that very few CGI effects would be used to maintain consistency with the other films. During filming however, significantly more CGI work was done than initially anticipated as in many cases it proved to be more practical. There ended up being a total of about 450 CGI shots in the film, with an estimated 30 percent of the film's shots containing CG matte painting
s. Spielberg initially wanted brushstrokes to be visible on the paintings for added consistency with the previous films, but decided against it. The script also required a non-deforested jungle for a chase scene, but this would have been unsafe and much CGI work was done to create the jungle action sequence. Visual effects supervisor
Pablo Helman (who worked on Lucas' Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
and Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones
as well as Spielberg's War of the Worlds
and Munich
) traveled to Brazil and Argentina to photograph elements that were composited into the final images. Industrial Light and Magic then effectively created a virtual jungle with a geography like the real Amazon.
The appearance of a live alien and flying saucer was in flux. Spielberg wanted the alien to resemble a Gray alien, and also rejected early versions of the saucer that looked "too Close Encounters
". Art director Christian Alzmann said the aesthetic was "looking at a lot of older B-movie designs – but trying to make that look more real and gritty to fit in with the Indy universe." Other reference for the visual effects work included government tapes of nuclear tests, and video reference of real prairie dog
s shot in 1080p by Nathan Edward Denning.
began composing the score in October 2007; ten days of recording sessions wrapped on March 6, 2008 at Sony Pictures Studios
. Williams described composing for the Indiana Jones universe again as "like sitting down and finishing a letter that you started 25 years ago". He reused Indiana's theme as well as Marion's from the first film, and also composed five new motifs for Mutt, Spalko and the skull. Williams gave Mutt's a swashbuckling feel, and homaged film noir
and 1950s B-movies for Spalko and the crystal skull respectively. As an in-joke, Williams incorporated a measure
and a half of Johannes Brahms
' "Academic Festival Overture
" when Indiana and Mutt crash into the library. The soundtrack features a Continuum
, an instrument often used for sound effects instead of music. The Concord Music Group
released the soundtrack
on May 20, 2008.
on May 18, 2008, ahead of its worldwide May 22 release date. It was the first Spielberg film since 1982's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
to premiere at Cannes. The film was released in approximately 4000 theaters in the United States, and dubbed into 25 languages for its worldwide release. More than 12,000 release print
s were distributed, which is the largest in Paramount Pictures
' history. Although Spielberg insisted his films only be watched traditionally at theaters, Paramount chose to release the film in digital cinema
s as part of a scheme to convert 10,000 U.S. cinemas to the format.
sets in hope of understanding plot details; Spielberg biographer Ian Freer
wrote, "What Indy IV is actually about has been the great cultural guessing game of 2007/08. Yet, it has to be said, there is something refreshing about being ten weeks away from a giant blockbuster and knowing next to nothing about it." To distract investigative fans from the film's title during filming, five fake titles were registered with the Motion Picture Association of America
; The City of Gods, The Destroyer of Worlds, The Fourth Corner of the Earth, The Lost City of Gold and The Quest for the Covenant. Lucas and Spielberg had also wanted to keep Karen Allen's return a secret until the film's release, but decided to confirm it at the 2007 Comic-Con
.
An extra in the film, Tyler Nelson, violated his nondisclosure agreement in an interview with The Edmond Sun
on September 17, 2007, which was then picked up by the mainstream media. It is unknown if he remained in the final cut. At Nelson's request, The Edmond Sun subsequently pulled the story from its website. On October 2, 2007, a Superior Court
order was filed finding that Nelson knowingly violated the agreement. The terms of the settlement were not disclosed. A number of production photos and sensitive documents pertaining to the film's production budget were also stolen from Steven Spielberg
’s production office. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department
set up a sting operation
after being alerted by a webmaster that the thief might try to sell the photos. On October 4, 2007, the seller, 37-year old Roderick Eric Davis, was arrested. He pleaded guilty to two felony counts and was sentenced to two years and four months in prison.
, Dr Pepper
, Burger King
, M&M's
and Lunchables
. Paramount sponsored an Indiana Jones open wheel car
for Marco Andretti
in the 2008 Indianapolis 500
, and his racing suit was designed to resemble Indiana Jones's outfit. The distributor also paired with M&M's
to sponsor the #18 Joe Gibbs Racing
Toyota, with NASCAR
driver Kyle Busch
behind the wheel, in the 2008 Dodge Challenger 500
at Darlington Raceway. Kyle Busch and the #18 team won the race and visited victory lane with Indiana Jones on the car. With the film's release, producer Frank Marshall and UNESCO
worked together to promote conservation of World Heritage Site
s around the world.
The Boston
-based design studio Creative Pilot created the packaging style for the film's merchandise, which merged Drew Struzan
's original illustrations "with a fresh new look, which showcases the whip, a map and exotic hieroglyphic patterns". Hasbro
, Lego
, Sideshow Collectibles, Topps
, Diamond Select
, Hallmark Cards
, and Cartamundi
all sold products. A THQ
mobile game
based on the film was released, as was a Lego video game based on the past films. Lego also released a series of computer-animated spoofs, Lego Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Brick
, directed by Peder Pedersen. Stern Pinball released a new Indiana Jones pinball machine
, designed by John Borg, based on all four films. From October 2007 to April 2008, the reedited episodes of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles were released in three DVD box sets.
Random House
, Dark Horse Comics
, Diamond Comic Distributors
, Scholastic and DK
published books, including James Rollins
' novelization
of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, a two-issue comic book
adaptation written by John Jackson Miller
and drawn by Luke Ross (Samurai: Heaven and Earth
), children's novelizations of all four films, the Indiana Jones Adventures comic book series aimed at children, and the official Indiana Jones Magazine. Scholastic featured Indiana and Mutt on the covers of Scholastic News and Scholastic Maths, to the concern of parents, though Jack Silbert, editor of the latter, felt the film would interest children in archaeology.
and DVD
in North America on October 14, 2008. This includes a two-disc edition Blu-ray; a two-disc Special Edition DVD; and a one-disc edition DVD. These editions were released in the UK on November 10. Among the collectible editions include; Kmart
, which contains four LEGO posters parodying those of the films; Target Corporation
, whose DVD has an eighty-page book of photographs; and Best Buy
, whose edition contains a replica of a crystal skull created by Sideshow Collectibles. As of March 1, 2009, it has made $109,296,975 in revenue. It made its worldwide television premiere on USA on December 9, 2010.
Indiana Jones is distributed by one entity, Paramount, but owned by another, Lucasfilm
. The pre-production arrangement between the two organizations granted Paramount 12.5% of the film's revenue. As the $185 million budget was larger than the original $125 million estimate, Lucas, Spielberg and Ford turned down large upfront salaries so Paramount could cover the film's costs. In order for Paramount to see a profit beyond its distribution fee, the film had to make over $400 million. At that point, Lucas, Spielberg, Ford and those with smaller profit-sharing deals would also begin to collect their cut.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released Thursday May 22 in North America and grossed $25 million its opening day. In its opening weekend, the film grossed an estimated $101 million in 4,260 theaters in the United States and Canada, ranking #1 at the box office, and making it the third widest opening of all time. Within its first five days of release, it grossed $311 million worldwide. The film's total $151 million gross in the United States ranked it as the second biggest Memorial Day
weekend release, behind Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. It was the third most successful film of 2008 domestically, behind The Dark Knight
and Iron Man
respectively, and the second highest-grossing film of 2008 internationally, behind The Dark Knight. In February 2010 it was the 25th highest-grossing film of all time domestically, and 35th highest-grossing worldwide, as well as the most financially successful Indiana Jones film when not adjusted for inflation of ticket prices.
reported that 77% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 246 reviews. The consensus was: "Though the plot elements are certainly familiar, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull still delivers the thrills and Harrison Ford's return in the title role is more than welcome." Metacritic
reported the film had a score of 65 out of 100, indicating "generally favorable reviews," based on 40 critics' reviews. Yahoo!
estimated an average rating of B from 15 reviews. A CinemaScore
survey conducted during its opening weekend indicated a general "B" rating.
Roger Ebert
gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4, a rating he also gave to The Last Crusade. Ebert argued that the only critical criterion for judging the latest film was comparing it to the previous three. He found it "same old, same old," but that was what "I want it to be." Leonard Maltin
also gave the film 3 1/2 stars out of 4, though he had only given 2 stars to Temple of Doom and 2 1/2 to Last Crusade. "After a 19-year hiatus," Maltin wrote, "Indy returns with the same brand of high adventure that marked the original Raiders of the Lost Ark."
The film was nominated for Best Action Movie at the 2009 Critics' Choice Awards. The Visual Effects Society
nominated it for Best Single Visual Effect of the Year (the valley destruction), Best Outstanding Matte Paintings, Best Models and Miniatures, and Best Created Environment in a Feature Motion Picture (the inside of the temple). The film ranks 453rd on Empire
s 2008 list of the 500 greatest movies of all time. At the 51st Grammy Awards
, John Williams won an award for the Mutt Williams theme. It was nominated at the Saturn Award
s for Best Science Fiction Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Costumes and Best Special Effects. It won Best Costumes.
However, the Associated Press
reported the film received a "respectful – though far from glowing – reception," saying that "some viewers at its first press screening loved it, some called it slick and enjoyable though formulaic, some said it was not worth the 19-year wait," adding that J. Sperling Reich, who writes for FilmStew.com, said: "It really looked like they were going through the motions. It really looked like no one had their heart in it."
USA Today
stated reviews were "mixed" and reviewers felt the "movie suffers from predictable plot points and cheesy special effects."
Critic James Berardinelli
gave the film 2 stars out of 4, calling it "the most lifeless of the series" and "simply [not] a very good motion picture." Margaret Pomeranz of At the Movies gave the film 2 1/2 stars out of 5, saying that the filmmakers "had 19 years since the last Indiana Jones movie to come up with something truly exciting and fresh, but I feel there’s a certain laziness and cynicism in this latest adventure." Metacritic user ratings for the film (as opposed to critics' ratings) rank at only 5.1 out of 10.
In 2009, the film won the Razzie Award for Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel. The film was voted by Comcast
as 11th worst movie sequel of all time. Paste
magazine ranked the movie 10th on its list "The 20 Worst Sequels to Good Movies." Listverse.com ranked the movie 8th on its list of the "Top 10 Worst Movie Sequels."
Some fans of the franchise who were disappointed with the film adopted the term "nuked the fridge," based on a scene in the film where Indiana Jones survives a nuclear blast by hiding in a refrigerator, which then blows Jones miraculously all the way to safety. To users of the phrase, the phrase denotes the point in a movie series when it has passed its peak and crossed into the level of the absurd, similar to "jumping the shark
" on television. This phrase has since appeared across the Internet, and was chosen as #5 on Time Magazine's list of "top ten buzzwords" of 2008. South Park
parodied the film in the episode "The China Probrem
," broadcast five months after the film's release. The episode was highly critical of the movie, with the characters filing a police report against Lucas and Spielberg for raping Indiana Jones.
The Communist Party of the Russian Federation
called for the film to be banned, accusing the production team of demonizing the Soviet Union. Party official Andrei Andreyev said: "It is very disturbing if talented directors want to provoke a new Cold War." Another party official commented, "(I)n 1957 the USSR was not sending terrorists to America but sending the Sputnik satellite
into space!" Spielberg responded that he is not unfamiliar with Russia. He explained: "When we decided the fourth installment would take place in 1957, we had no choice but to make the Russians the enemies. World War II
had just ended and the Cold War
had begun. The U.S. didn't have any other enemies at the time." The film's depiction of Peru also received criticism from the Peruvian and Spanish-speaking public.
Historical and Geographical inaccuracies are present throughout the movie - like Nazca being apparently located in Cuzco.
The mixed fanbase reaction did not surprise Lucas, who was familiar with mixed response to the Star Wars prequels. "We're all going to get people throwing tomatoes at us," the series' creator had predicted. "But it's a fun movie to make." David Koepp reflects, "I knew I was going to get hammered from a number of quarters [but] what I liked about the way the movie ended up playing was it was popular with families. I like that families really embraced it."
When asked about the infamous "nuke the fridge" sequence, Spielberg replied, Blame me. Don't blame George. That was my silly idea. People stopped saying 'jump the shark'. They now say, "nuked the fridge". I'm proud of that. I'm glad I was able to bring that into popular culture."
Adventure science fiction
Adventure science fiction also Sci-Fi Adventure is a subgenre of science fiction. Covers tense and rousing stories involving aliens, robots, the future and/or other science fiction elements....
film. It is the fourth film in the Indiana Jones franchise, created by George Lucas
George Lucas
George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
and directed by Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
. Released nineteen years after the previous film
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is a 1989 American adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, from a story co-written by executive producer George Lucas. It is the third film in the Indiana Jones franchise. Harrison Ford reprises the title role and Sean Connery plays Indiana's father, Henry...
, the film acknowledges its star Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford is an American film actor and producer. He is famous for his performances as Han Solo in the original Star Wars trilogy and as the title character of the Indiana Jones film series. Ford is also known for his roles as Rick Deckard in Blade Runner, John Book in Witness and Jack Ryan in...
's age by being set in 1957. It pays tribute to the science fiction B-movies of the era
B movies (Transition in the 1950s)
The 1950s mark a significant change in the definition of the B movie. The transformation of the film industry due to court rulings that brought an end to many long-standing distribution practices as well as the challenge of television led to major changes in U.S. cinema at the exhibition level...
, pitting Indiana Jones
Indiana Jones
Colonel Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., Ph.D. is a fictional character and the protagonist of the Indiana Jones franchise. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg created the character in homage to the action heroes of 1930s film serials...
against Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
agents—led by Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett
Cate Blanchett
Catherine Élise "Cate" Blanchett is an Australian actress. She came to international attention for her role as Elizabeth I of England in the 1998 biopic film Elizabeth, for which she won British Academy of Film and Television Arts and Golden Globe Awards, and earned her first Academy Award...
)—for a psychic alien crystal skull
Crystal skull
The crystal skulls are a number of human skull hardstone carvings made of clear or milky quartz rock, known in art history as "rock crystal", claimed to be pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artifacts by their alleged finders. However, none of the specimens made available for scientific study have been...
. Indiana is aided by his former lover Marion Ravenwood
Marion Ravenwood
Marion Ravenwood Jones is a fictional character that first appeared in the 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark. Played by Karen Allen, she enters the story when Indiana Jones visits her in Nepal, needing her help — specifically, he needs an artifact in her possession, originally obtained by her...
(Karen Allen
Karen Allen
Karen Jane Allen is an American actress best known for her role as Marion Ravenwood in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull...
) and their son Mutt Williams (Shia LaBeouf
Shia LaBeouf
Shia Saide LaBeouf is an American actor who became known among younger audiences for his part in the Disney Channel series Even Stevens and made his film debut in Holes . In 2007, he starred as the leads in Disturbia and Transformers...
). Ray Winstone
Ray Winstone
Raymond Andrew "Ray" Winstone is an English film and television actor. He is mostly known for his "tough guy" roles, beginning with that of Carlin in the 1979 film Scum and as Will Scarlet in the cult television adventure series Robin of Sherwood. He has also become well known as a voice over...
, John Hurt
John Hurt
John Vincent Hurt, CBE is an English actor, known for his leading roles as John Merrick in The Elephant Man, Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Mr. Braddock in The Hit, Stephen Ward in Scandal, Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant and An Englishman in New York...
and Jim Broadbent
Jim Broadbent
James "Jim" Broadbent is an English theatre, film, and television actor. He is known for his roles in Iris, Moulin Rouge!, Topsy-Turvy, Hot Fuzz, and Bridget Jones' Diary...
are also part of the supporting cast.
Screenwriters Jeb Stuart
Jeb Stuart (writer)
Jeb Stuart is an American film director, film producer and screenwriter. Among his scripts are Die Hard , The Fugitive , and an early draft of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, entitled Indiana Jones and the Saucer Men from Mars, in 1995.-Filmography:*Die Hard *Next of Kin Jeb...
, Jeffrey Boam
Jeffrey Boam
Jeffrey David Boam was an American screenwriter and film producer. He is known for writing the screenplays for Lethal Weapon 2 and Lethal Weapon 3, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Innerspace, and The Lost Boys. Boam's films had a cumulative gross of over US $1 billion. He was educated at...
, Frank Darabont
Frank Darabont
Frank Darabont is a Hungarian-American film director, screenwriter and producer who has been nominated for three Academy Awards and a Golden Globe. He has directed the films The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist, all based on stories by Stephen King...
and Jeff Nathanson
Jeff Nathanson
Jeff Nathanson is an American film writer, film producer, and director.He is best known for his work on the Rush Hour series, Catch Me If You Can, The Terminal, and The Last Shot, and has also co-written a story draft for the film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull with George Lucas...
wrote drafts before David Koepp
David Koepp
-Career:As a writer, Koepp has worked on such blockbuster Hollywood films as Jurassic Park, Mission Impossible, and Spider-Man. Koepp had a cameo as the "Unlucky Bastard" in The Lost World: Jurassic Park, in which he was serving as Writer and Second Unit Director.His work as a director has not had...
's script satisfied the producers. Shooting began on June 18, 2007 and took place in various locations: New Mexico, New Haven, Connecticut, Hawaii, Fresno, California and on soundstages in Los Angeles. To keep aesthetic continuity with the previous films the crew relied on traditional stunt work instead of computer-generated stunt doubles and cinematographer
Cinematographer
A cinematographer is one photographing with a motion picture camera . The title is generally equivalent to director of photography , used to designate a chief over the camera and lighting crews working on a film, responsible for achieving artistic and technical decisions related to the image...
Janusz Kamiński
Janusz Kaminski
Janusz Zygmunt Kamiński is a Polish cinematographer and film director. He has photographed all of Steven Spielberg's films since 1993's Schindler's List.-Life and career:...
studied Douglas Slocombe
Douglas Slocombe
Douglas Slocombe OBE, BSC, A.S.C. is a British cinematographer who has enjoyed a long career in the British film industry...
's style from the previous films.
Marketing relied heavily on the public's nostalgia for the series, with products taking inspiration from all four films. Anticipation for the film was heightened by secrecy, which resulted in a legal dispute over an extra violating his non-disclosure agreement
Non-disclosure agreement
A non-disclosure agreement , also known as a confidentiality agreement , confidential disclosure agreement , proprietary information agreement , or secrecy agreement, is a legal contract between at least two parties that outlines confidential material, knowledge, or information that the parties...
and the arrest of another man for stealing a computer containing various documents related to the production. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released worldwide on May 22, 2008, and was a financial success, grossing over $786 million worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film of the franchise, the second highest-grossing film of 2008 and the third highest-grossing film ever produced by Lucasfilm
Lucasfilm
Lucasfilm Limited is an American film production company founded by George Lucas in 1971, based in San Francisco, California. Lucas is the company's current chairman and CEO, and Micheline Chau is the president and COO....
when not adjusted for inflation, after Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a 1999 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the fourth film to be released in the Star Wars saga, as the first of a three-part prequel to the original Star Wars trilogy, as well as the first film in the saga in terms...
and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is a 2005 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the sixth and final film released in the Star Wars saga and the third in terms of the series' internal chronology....
.
Plot
In 1957, World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
hero Indiana Jones and his long-time partner George "Mac" McHale are kidnapped by a group of Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
agents led by the mysterious Colonel Dr. Irina Spalko. The Soviets infiltrate a warehouse labeled "51
Area 51
Area 51 is a military base, and a remote detachment of Edwards Air Force Base. It is located in the southern portion of Nevada in the western United States, 83 miles north-northwest of downtown Las Vegas. Situated at its center, on the southern shore of Groom Lake, is a large military airfield...
" in Nevada
Nevada
Nevada is a state in the western, mountain west, and southwestern regions of the United States. With an area of and a population of about 2.7 million, it is the 7th-largest and 35th-most populous state. Over two-thirds of Nevada's people live in the Las Vegas metropolitan area, which contains its...
and force "Dr. Jones" to find a crate containing the remains of an extraterrestrial
Extraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...
being that crashed ten years prior
Roswell UFO incident
The Roswell UFO Incident was the recovery of an object that crashed in the general vicinity of Roswell, New Mexico, in June or July 1947, allegedly an extra-terrestrial spacecraft and its alien occupants. Since the late 1970s the incident has been the subject of intense controversy and of...
in Roswell, New Mexico
Roswell, New Mexico
Roswell is a city in and the county seat of Chaves County in the southeastern quarter of the state of New Mexico, United States. The population was 48,366 at the 2010 census. It is a center for irrigation farming, dairying, ranching, manufacturing, distribution, and petroleum production. It is also...
. After finding the crate—its content/s possessing magnetic
Magnetism
Magnetism is a property of materials that respond at an atomic or subatomic level to an applied magnetic field. Ferromagnetism is the strongest and most familiar type of magnetism. It is responsible for the behavior of permanent magnets, which produce their own persistent magnetic fields, as well...
properties—Mac double-crosses Indiana, having been bought off by the Soviets. After a fight with the Soviets, Indiana manages to escape into the desert (though not before the crate containing the Ark of the Covenant
Ark of the Covenant
The Ark of the Covenant , also known as the Ark of the Testimony, is a chest described in Book of Exodus as solely containing the Tablets of Stone on which the Ten Commandments were inscribed...
from Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...
is revealed in the same warehouse); he then stumbles upon a nuclear test town
Nevada Test Site
The Nevada National Security Site , previously the Nevada Test Site , is a United States Department of Energy reservation located in southeastern Nye County, Nevada, about northwest of the city of Las Vegas...
and survives a nuclear explosion by hiding in a lead
Lead
Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...
-lined refrigerator. He is later debriefed by the FBI
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
because of Mac's Soviet ties. Shortly after returning to Marshall College
Marshall College
Marshall College was the name of Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia, before it was granted university status in 1961.Marshall College can also refer to:* Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania...
, Indiana is offered an indefinite leave of absence to avoid being fired because of the incident.
At a train station, Indiana is stopped by greaser Henry "Mutt" Williams, who tells him that his old colleague Harold Oxley was kidnapped after discovering a crystal skull
Crystal skull
The crystal skulls are a number of human skull hardstone carvings made of clear or milky quartz rock, known in art history as "rock crystal", claimed to be pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artifacts by their alleged finders. However, none of the specimens made available for scientific study have been...
in Peru
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
. Indiana proceeds to tell Mutt the legend of a crystal skull
Crystal skull
The crystal skulls are a number of human skull hardstone carvings made of clear or milky quartz rock, known in art history as "rock crystal", claimed to be pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artifacts by their alleged finders. However, none of the specimens made available for scientific study have been...
found in the mystical city of Akator
El Dorado
El Dorado is the name of a Muisca tribal chief who covered himself with gold dust and, as an initiation rite, dived into a highland lake.Later it became the name of a legendary "Lost City of Gold" that has fascinated – and so far eluded – explorers since the days of the Spanish Conquistadors...
, in which whoever returns the skull to the city would be given control over its supernatural powers. Mutt gives Indiana a letter from his mother, who was also kidnapped, containing a riddle written by Oxley in an ancient Native American
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...
language, which leads them to the Nazca Lines
Nazca Lines
The Nazca Lines are a series of ancient geoglyphs located in the Nazca Desert in southern Peru. They were designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994. The high, arid plateau stretches more than between the towns of Nazca and Palpa on the Pampas de Jumana about 400 km south of Lima...
in Peru. There they discover that Oxley was incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital, having suffered a mental breakdown from the powers of the skull, until he was kidnapped by the Soviets. In Oxley's cell, they find clues that lead them to the grave of Francisco de Orellana
Francisco de Orellana
Francisco de Orellana was a Spanish explorer and conquistador. He completed the first known navigation of the length of the Amazon River, which was originally named for him...
, a Conquistador
Conquistador
Conquistadors were Spanish soldiers, explorers, and adventurers who brought much of the Americas under the control of Spain in the 15th to 16th centuries, following Europe's discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492...
who went missing in the 16th century while searching for Akator. They discover the skull at the grave, with Indiana reasoning that Oxley had hidden it there after finding it.
Shortly afterward, Indiana and Mutt are captured by the Soviets and taken to their camp, where they find Oxley and Mutt's mother, who turns out to be Indiana's old love, Marion Ravenwood, and reveals that Mutt is Indiana's son, Henry Jones III. Spalko believes that the crystal skull belongs to an interdimensional being
Extraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...
and holds great psychic
Psychic
A psychic is a person who professes an ability to perceive information hidden from the normal senses through extrasensory perception , or is said by others to have such abilities. It is also used to describe theatrical performers who use techniques such as prestidigitation, cold reading, and hot...
power, and reveals that the specimen stolen from the warehouse is also a crystal skull. She also believes that returning the skull to Akator will grant the Soviets the advantage of psychic warfare. Indiana, Marion, Mutt and Oxley manage to escape from the Soviets into the Amazon
Amazon Rainforest
The Amazon Rainforest , also known in English as Amazonia or the Amazon Jungle, is a moist broadleaf forest that covers most of the Amazon Basin of South America...
; however, they are recaptured after Indiana falls into a swamp and Oxley fetches the Soviets for help, and with their hands tied taken to the city temple
Temple
A temple is a structure reserved for religious or spiritual activities, such as prayer and sacrifice, or analogous rites. A templum constituted a sacred precinct as defined by a priest, or augur. It has the same root as the word "template," a plan in preparation of the building that was marked out...
through the Rainforest. Marion and Indiana argue so much that the Soviet guard finally gags Marion with a cloth. However, Indiana and Mutt manage to overpower him while he does this. Indiana frees himself with a hidden knife of Mutt's. He ungags Marion, then Mutt frees her while Indiana throws out the driver. A fight ensues (displaying Spalko's fencing
Fencing
Fencing, which is also known as modern fencing to distinguish it from historical fencing, is a family of combat sports using bladed weapons.Fencing is one of four sports which have been featured at every one of the modern Olympic Games...
prowess), but only after evading the Soviets again during a brush with siafu ants, negotiating three waterfalls in a duck
Amphibious vehicle
An amphibious vehicle , is a vehicle or craft, that is a means of transport, viable on land as well as on water – just like an amphibian....
, and nearly being killed by an elusive tribe living in the long-abandoned city, are they able to enter the temple. Mac, who claims to be a double agent
Double agent
A double agent, commonly abbreviated referral of double secret agent, is a counterintelligence term used to designate an employee of a secret service or organization, whose primary aim is to spy on the target organization, but who in fact is a member of that same target organization oneself. They...
(to Indiana's bewilderment, questioning his loyalty), secretly leaves a trail for the Soviets to follow.
Inside the temple, they find artifacts from several ancient civilizations
Civilization
Civilization is a sometimes controversial term that has been used in several related ways. Primarily, the term has been used to refer to the material and instrumental side of human cultures that are complex in terms of technology, science, and division of labor. Such civilizations are generally...
. Indiana deduces that the creatures were kindred spirits; they too were "archaeologists
Ancient astronauts
Some writers have proposed that intelligent extraterrestrial beings have visited Earth in antiquity or prehistory and made contact with humans. Such visitors are called ancient astronauts or ancient aliens. Proponents suggest that this contact influenced the development of human cultures,...
" studying the different cultures of Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
. The five enter a chamber containing the crystal skeletons of thirteen interdimensional beings seated on thrones in a circle, one missing a skull. After the Soviets arrive, Spalko places the skull onto the headless skeleton. They begin communicating to the group through Oxley in an ancient dialect, promising to reward them with a "big gift"; Spalko approaches them and demands to "know everything". The skeletons grant her request and psychically transfer their collective knowledge into her mind, activating a portal
Portals in fiction
A portal in science fiction and fantasy is a magical or technological doorway that connects two distant locations separated by spacetime. It usually consists of two or more gateways, with an object entering one gateway leaving via the other instantaneously....
to another dimension. Indiana, Marion, Mutt and the now-sane Oxley escape the temple, but Mac and the other Soviets are sucked into the portal. The skeletons, meanwhile, combine to form a single living interdimensional being which overwhelms Spalko, causing her to disintegrate; her scattered essence is then drawn into the portal. The temple crumbles and reveals a massive fast-spinning flying saucer
Flying saucer
A flying saucer is a type of unidentified flying object sometimes believed to be of alien origin with a disc or saucer-shaped body, usually described as silver or metallic, occasionally reported as covered with running lights or surrounded with a glowing light, hovering or moving rapidly either...
slowly rising from the debris (thought to be buried for millennia, the aliens "instructing" the human
Human
Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...
ancestors to build a city on top of it to hide it from plain sight); the survivors watch as it hovers in the atmosphere, defying the laws of physics and disappears into the cosmos in a split second, the "space between spaces". Indiana, amazed by the spectacle but also overwhelmed by the sudden turn of events, is now happily reconciled with his new family.
Not long afterward, Indiana, now reinstated and made an associate dean at Marshall College, marries Marion. At the wedding's conclusion, a sudden wind bursts through the church doors and blows Indiana's hat onto the floor at Mutt's feet. Mutt picks it up and is about to place it on his head, only to have his father grab and put it on as he and his wife walk down the aisle.
Cast
- Harrison FordHarrison FordHarrison Ford is an American film actor and producer. He is famous for his performances as Han Solo in the original Star Wars trilogy and as the title character of the Indiana Jones film series. Ford is also known for his roles as Rick Deckard in Blade Runner, John Book in Witness and Jack Ryan in...
reprises the role of Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr.Indiana JonesColonel Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., Ph.D. is a fictional character and the protagonist of the Indiana Jones franchise. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg created the character in homage to the action heroes of 1930s film serials...
To prepare for the role, the 64-year-old Ford spent three hours a day at a gym, practiced with the bullwhipBullwhipA bullwhip is a single-tailed whip, usually made of braided leather, which was originally used as a tool for working with livestock.Bullwhips are pastoral tools, traditionally used to control livestock in open country...
for two weeks, and relied on a high-protein diet of fish and vegetables. Ford had kept fit during the series' hiatus anyway, as he hoped for another film. He performed many of his own stunts because stunt technology had become safer since 1989, and he also felt it improved his performance. He argued, "The appeal of Indiana Jones isn't his youth but his imagination, his resourcefulness. His physicality is a big part of it, especially the way he gets out of tight situations. But it's not all hitting people and falling from high places. My ambition in action is to have the audience look straight in the face of character and not at the back of a capable stuntman's head. I hope to continue that no matter how old I get." Ford felt his return would also help American culture be less paranoid about aging (he refused to dye his hair for the role), because of the film's family appeal: "This is a movie which is geared not to [the young] segment of the demographic, an age-defined segment [...] We've got a great shot at breaking the movie demographic constraints." He told Koepp to add more references to his age in the script. Spielberg said Ford was not too old to play Indiana: "When a guy gets to be that age and he still packs the same punch, and he still runs just as fast and climbs just as high, he's gonna be breathing a little heavier at the end of the set piece. And I felt, 'Let's have some fun with that. Let's not hide that. Spielberg recalled the line in Raiders, "It's not the years, it's the mileage," and felt he could not tell the difference between Ford during the shoots for Last Crusade and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
- Shia LaBeoufShia LaBeoufShia Saide LaBeouf is an American actor who became known among younger audiences for his part in the Disney Channel series Even Stevens and made his film debut in Holes . In 2007, he starred as the leads in Disturbia and Transformers...
plays Henry "Mutt Williams" Jones III, a motorcycle-riding greaser and Indiana's sidekick and son. The concept of Indiana Jones having offspring was introduced in The Young Indiana Jones ChroniclesThe Young Indiana Jones ChroniclesThe Young Indiana Jones Chronicles is an American television series that aired on ABC from March 4, 1992, to July 24, 1993. The series explores the childhood and youth of the fictional character Indiana Jones and primarily stars Sean Patrick Flanery and Corey Carrier as the title character, with...
, in which Old Indy is shown to have a daughter. During development of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, this idea was incorporated into Frank DarabontFrank DarabontFrank Darabont is a Hungarian-American film director, screenwriter and producer who has been nominated for three Academy Awards and a Golden Globe. He has directed the films The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist, all based on stories by Stephen King...
's script, with Indiana and Marion having a 13-year-old daughter. However, Spielberg found this too similar to The Lost World: Jurassic ParkThe Lost World: Jurassic ParkThe Lost World: Jurassic Park is a 1997 science fiction thriller film, directed by Steven Spielberg. The film was produced by Bonnie Curtis, Kathleen Kennedy, Gerald R. Molen and Colin Wilson...
, so a son was created instead. Koepp credited the character's creation to Jeff NathansonJeff NathansonJeff Nathanson is an American film writer, film producer, and director.He is best known for his work on the Rush Hour series, Catch Me If You Can, The Terminal, and The Last Shot, and has also co-written a story draft for the film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull with George Lucas...
and Lucas. Koepp wanted to make Mutt into a nerd, but Lucas refused, explaining he had to resemble Marlon BrandoMarlon BrandoMarlon Brando, Jr. was an American movie star and political activist. "Unchallenged as the most important actor in modern American Cinema" according to the St...
in The Wild OneThe Wild OneThe Wild One is a 1953 outlaw biker film directed by László Benedek and produced by Stanley Kramer. It is famed for Marlon Brando's iconic portrayal of the gang leader Johnny Strabler.-Basis:...
; "he needs to be what Indiana Jones' father thought of [him] – the curse returns in the form of his own son – he's everything a father can't stand". LaBeouf was Spielberg's first choice for the role, having been impressed by his performance in HolesHoles (film)Holes is a 2003 film based on the novel of the same name by Louis Sachar, who also wrote the screenplay, with Shia LaBeouf as the lead role of Stanley Yelnats...
. Excited at the prospect of being in an Indiana Jones film, LaBeouf signed on without reading the script and did not know what character he would play. He worked out and gained fifteen pounds of muscle for the role, and also repeatedly watched the other films to get into character. LaBeouf also watched Blackboard JungleBlackboard JungleBlackboard Jungle is a 1955 social commentary film about teachers in an inner-city school. It is based on the novel of the same name by Evan Hunter.-Plot:...
, Rebel Without a CauseRebel Without a CauseRebel Without a Cause is a 1955 American drama film about emotionally confused suburban, middle-class teenagers. Directed by Nicholas Ray, it offered both social commentary and an alternative to previous films depicting delinquents in urban slum environments...
and The Wild OneThe Wild OneThe Wild One is a 1953 outlaw biker film directed by László Benedek and produced by Stanley Kramer. It is famed for Marlon Brando's iconic portrayal of the gang leader Johnny Strabler.-Basis:...
to get into his character's mindset, copying mannerisms and words from characters in those films, such as the use of a switchbladeSwitchbladeA switchblade is a type of knife with a folding or sliding blade contained in the handle which is opened automatically by a spring when a button, lever, or switch on the handle or bolster is activated A switchblade (also known as an automatic knife, pushbutton knife, switch, Sprenger, Springer,...
as a weapon. Lucas also consulted on the greaser look, joking that LaBeouf was "sent to the American GraffitiAmerican GraffitiAmerican Graffiti is a 1973 coming of age film co-written/directed by George Lucas starring Richard Dreyfuss, Ron Howard, Paul Le Mat, Charles Martin Smith, Cindy Williams, Candy Clark, Mackenzie Phillips and Harrison Ford...
school of greaserland." LaBeouf pulled his rotator cuffRotator cuffIn anatomy, the rotator cuff is the group of muscles and their tendons that act to stabilize the shoulder. The four muscles of the rotator cuff, along with the teres major muscle, the coracobrachialis muscle and the deltoid, make up the seven scapulohumeral muscles of the human body.-Function:The...
when filming his duel with Spalko, which was his first injury in his career, an injury which worsened throughout filming. He later pulled his groin.
- Cate BlanchettCate BlanchettCatherine Élise "Cate" Blanchett is an Australian actress. She came to international attention for her role as Elizabeth I of England in the 1998 biopic film Elizabeth, for which she won British Academy of Film and Television Arts and Golden Globe Awards, and earned her first Academy Award...
plays the villainous Soviet agent Irina Spalko. Screenwriter David Koepp created the character. Frank Marshall said Spalko continued the tradition of Indiana having a love-hate relationship "with every woman he ever comes in contact with". Blanchett had wanted to play a villain for a "couple of years", and enjoyed being part of the Indiana Jones legacy as she loved the previous films. Spielberg praised Blanchett as a "master of disguise", and considers her his favorite Indiana Jones villain for coming up with much of Spalko's characteristics. Spalko's bob cutBob cutA "bob cut" is a short haircut for women in which the hair is typically cut straight around the head at about jaw-level, often with a fringe at the front.-The beginning:...
was her idea, with the character's stern looks and behaviour recalling Rosa KlebbRosa KlebbColonel Rosa Klebb is a fictional character and the main antagonist from the James Bond film and novel From Russia with Love. She was played by Lotte Lenya in the film version...
in From Russia with LoveFrom Russia with Love (film)From Russia with Love is the second in the James Bond spy film series, and the second to star Sean Connery as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Released in 1963, the film was produced by Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, and directed by Terence Young. It is based on the 1957 novel of the...
. Blanchett learned to fence for the character, but during filming, Spielberg decided to give Spalko "karate chop" skills. LaBeouf recalled Blanchett was elusive on set, and Ford was surprised when he met her on set outside of costume. He noted, "There's no aspect of her behavior that was not consistent with this bizarre person she's playing."
- Karen AllenKaren AllenKaren Jane Allen is an American actress best known for her role as Marion Ravenwood in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull...
reprises the role of Marion RavenwoodMarion RavenwoodMarion Ravenwood Jones is a fictional character that first appeared in the 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark. Played by Karen Allen, she enters the story when Indiana Jones visits her in Nepal, needing her help — specifically, he needs an artifact in her possession, originally obtained by her...
, under the married name of Marion Williams, who appeared in Raiders of the Lost ArkRaiders of the Lost ArkRaiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...
. Frank Darabont's script introduced the idea of Marion Ravenwood returning as Indiana's love interest. Allen was not aware her character was in the script until Spielberg called her in January 2007, saying, "It's been announced! We're gonna make Indiana Jones 4! And guess what? You're in it!" Ford found Allen "one of the easiest people to work with [he's] ever known. She's a completely self-sufficient woman, and that's part of the character she plays. A lot of her charm and the charm of the character is there. And again, it's not an age-dependent thing. It has to do with her spirit and her nature." Allen found Ford easier to work with on this film, in contrast to the first film, where she slowly befriended the private actor.
- Ray WinstoneRay WinstoneRaymond Andrew "Ray" Winstone is an English film and television actor. He is mostly known for his "tough guy" roles, beginning with that of Carlin in the 1979 film Scum and as Will Scarlet in the cult television adventure series Robin of Sherwood. He has also become well known as a voice over...
plays George "Mac" McHale, a British agent whom Jones worked alongside in World War II, but has now allied with the Russians due to his financial problems. The character acts as a spin on SallahSallahSallah Mohammed Faisel el-Kahir, better known as Sallah , is a fictional character played by John Rhys-Davies in two of the four Indiana Jones films: Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade...
and René Belloq - Jones's friend and nemesis, respectively, in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Spielberg cast Winstone as he found him "one of the most brilliant actors around", having seen Sexy BeastSexy BeastSexy Beast is a 2000 British-Spanish crime drama film directed by Jonathan Glazer and starring Ray Winstone, Ben Kingsley, and Ian McShane. Produced by Jeremy Thomas, it was Glazer's debut feature film, who had previously been a music video director for videos such as Rabbit in Your Headlights for...
. Winstone tore his hamstringHamstringIn human anatomy, the hamstring refers to any one of the three posterior thigh muscles, or to the tendons that make up the borders of the space behind the knee. In modern anatomical contexts, however, they usually refer to the posterior thigh muscles, or the tendons of the semitendinosus, the...
during filming. "I keep getting these action parts as I’m getting older," he remarked. Like John Hurt, Winstone wished to see the script prior to committing to the film. In interviews on British TV Winstone explained that he was only able to read the script if it was delivered by courier, who waited while he read the script, and returned to the US with the script once Winstone had read it. His reasoning for wanting to read the script was, "If I'm gonna be in it, I want to be in it." He gave suggestions to Spielberg, including the idea of Mac pretending to be a double agentDouble agentA double agent, commonly abbreviated referral of double secret agent, is a counterintelligence term used to designate an employee of a secret service or organization, whose primary aim is to spy on the target organization, but who in fact is a member of that same target organization oneself. They...
. He also stated that once filming was completed he had to return the script, such was the secrecy about the film. He was later presented with a copy of the script to keep.
- John HurtJohn HurtJohn Vincent Hurt, CBE is an English actor, known for his leading roles as John Merrick in The Elephant Man, Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Mr. Braddock in The Hit, Stephen Ward in Scandal, Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant and An Englishman in New York...
plays Harold "Ox" Oxley, Mutt's surrogate father and an old friend of Indiana, whom he lost contact with in 1937. Six months prior to the events of the film, he went insane after discovering the crystal skull, which commanded him to return it to Akator. Frank Darabont had suggested Hurt when he was writing the screenplay. The character is inspired by Ben Gunn from Treasure IslandTreasure IslandTreasure Island is an adventure novel by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, narrating a tale of "pirates and buried gold". First published as a book on May 23, 1883, it was originally serialized in the children's magazine Young Folks between 1881–82 under the title Treasure Island; or, the...
. Hurt wanted to read the script before signing on, unlike other cast members who came on "because Steven — you know, 'God' — was doing it. And I said, 'Well, I need to have a little bit of previous knowledge even if God is doing it.' So they sent a courierCourierA courier is a person or a company who delivers messages, packages, and mail. Couriers are distinguished from ordinary mail services by features such as speed, security, tracking, signature, specialization and individualization of express services, and swift delivery times, which are optional for...
over with the script from Los Angeles, gave it to me at three o'clock in the afternoon in London, collected it again at eight o'clock in the evening, and he returned the next day to Los Angeles."
- Jim BroadbentJim BroadbentJames "Jim" Broadbent is an English theatre, film, and television actor. He is known for his roles in Iris, Moulin Rouge!, Topsy-Turvy, Hot Fuzz, and Bridget Jones' Diary...
plays Dean Charles Stanforth, an academic colleague and friend of Jones. Broadbent's character stands in for Marcus Brody, whose portrayer, Denholm ElliottDenholm ElliottDenholm Mitchell Elliott, CBE was an English film, television and theatre actor with over 120 film and television credits...
, died in 1992. As a tribute to Elliott, the filmmakers put a portrait and a statue on the Marshall College location, and a picture on Jones' desk, saying he died shortly after Indiana's father.
- Igor JijikineIgor JijikineIgor Jijikine is a Russian actor working in Los Angeles and Moscow.Over the recent years, Igor has worked with such directors as Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood and J. J. Abrams and has appeared in numerous commercial spots for major brands.Igor is also an accomplished sportsman and stage performer...
plays the Russian Colonel Dovchenko. His character stands in for the heavily built henchman Pat RoachPat RoachFrancis Patrick "Pat" Roach was an English actor, wrestler and author, from Birmingham. His most famous role is that of West Country bricklayer Brian "Bomber" Busbridge in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet. He also played a memorable role as General Kael in Willow...
played in the previous films (Roach died in 2004).
Joel Stoffer
Joel Stoffer
Joel Stoffer is an American actor credited with performing in a variety of television series and film such as Charmed, The Shield, Judging Amy, Blind Justice, Species III, Cold Case, and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation...
and Neil Flynn
Neil Flynn
Neil Richard Flynn is an American actor and comedian, known for his role as Janitor in the medical comedy-drama Scrubs. He currently portrays Mike Heck in the ABC sitcom The Middle.-Early life:...
have minor roles as FBI agents interrogating Indiana in a scene following the opening sequence. Alan Dale
Alan Dale
Alan Hugh Dale is a New Zealand actor. As a child, Dale developed a love of theatre and also became a rugby player. After retiring from the sport he took on a number of professions to support his family, before deciding to become a professional actor at the age of 27. With work limited in New...
plays General Ross, who protests his innocence. Andrew Divoff
Andrew Divoff
Andrew Daniel Divoff is a Venezuelan film and television actor, best known for playing the evil Djinn in the two first Wishmaster films and the villains Cherry Ganz in Another 48 Hrs., Boris Bazylev in Air Force One, Ivan Sarnoff in CSI: Miami and Mikhail Bakunin in Lost.- Early life :Divoff was...
and Pavel Lychnikoff
Pavel Lychnikoff
Pavel Lychnikoff , also credited as Pasha D. Lychnikoff, is a Russian television, film and theatre actor, who lives and works in the United States.-Life and work:...
play Russian soldiers. Spielberg cast Russian-speaking actors as Russian soldiers so their accents would be authentic. Dimitri Diatchenko plays Spalko's right hand man who battles Indiana at Marshall College. Diatchenko bulked up to 250 pounds to look menacing, and his role was originally minor with ten days of filming. When shooting the fight, Ford accidentally hit his chin, and Spielberg liked Diatchenko's humorous looking reaction, so he expanded his role to three months of filming. Ernie Reyes, Jr.
Ernie Reyes, Jr.
Ernie Reyes, Jr. , is an American actor, martial artist, action choreographer, director, producer, filmmaker, screenwriter, entrepreneur, singer and stunt performer.-Early life:...
plays a cemetery guard.
Sean Connery
Sean Connery
Sir Thomas Sean Connery , better known as Sean Connery, is a Scottish actor and producer who has won an Academy Award, two BAFTA Awards and three Golden Globes Sir Thomas Sean Connery (born 25 August 1930), better known as Sean Connery, is a Scottish actor and producer who has won an Academy...
turned down an offer to reprise his role as Henry Jones, Sr.
Henry Jones, Sr.
Professor Henry Walton Jones, Sr. is a fictional character in the Indiana Jones franchise. He is the estranged father of Indiana Jones, who is captured by the Nazis while searching for the Holy Grail to act as bait for Indy....
, as he found retirement too enjoyable. Lucas stated that in hindsight it was good that Connery did not briefly appear, as it would disappoint the audience when his character would not come along for the film's adventure. Ford joked, "I'm old enough to play my own father in this one." The film addresses Connery's absence by Indiana mentioning that both Henry, Sr. and Marcus Brody died before the events of this movie. Connery later stated that he liked the film, describing it as "rather good and rather long."
Development
During the late 1970s, George LucasGeorge Lucas
George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
and Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
made a deal with Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
for five Indiana Jones films. Following the 1989 release of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is a 1989 American adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, from a story co-written by executive producer George Lucas. It is the third film in the Indiana Jones franchise. Harrison Ford reprises the title role and Sean Connery plays Indiana's father, Henry...
, Lucas let the series end as he felt he could not think of a good plot device
Plot device
A plot device is an object or character in a story whose sole purpose is to advance the plot of the story, or alternatively to overcome some difficulty in the plot....
to drive the next installment, and chose instead to produce The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles for TV, which explored the character in his early years. Harrison Ford played Indiana in one episode, narrating his adventures in 1920 Chicago. When Lucas shot Ford's role in December 1992, he realized the scene opened up the possibility of a film with an older Indiana set in the 1950s. The film could reflect a science fiction 1950s B-movie, with aliens as the plot device. Meanwhile, Spielberg believed he was going to "mature" as a filmmaker after making the trilogy, and felt he would just produce any future installments.
Ford disliked the new angle, telling Lucas, "No way am I being in a Steven Spielberg movie like that." Spielberg himself, who depicted aliens in Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 science fiction film written and directed by Steven Spielberg. The film stars Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Bob Balaban, and Cary Guffey...
and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a 1982 American science fiction film co-produced and directed by Steven Spielberg, written by Melissa Mathison and starring Henry Thomas, Dee Wallace, Robert MacNaughton, Drew Barrymore, and Peter Coyote...
, resisted it. Lucas came up with a story, which Jeb Stuart turned into a script from October 1993 to May 1994. (Stuart had previously written The Fugitive, which starred Ford.) Lucas wanted Indiana to get married, which would allow Henry Jones, Sr. to return, expressing concern over whether his son is happy with what he has accomplished. After he learned that Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
was interested in psychic warfare, he decided to have Russians as the villains and the aliens to have psychic powers. Following Stuart's next draft, Lucas hired Last Crusade writer Jeffrey Boam
Jeffrey Boam
Jeffrey David Boam was an American screenwriter and film producer. He is known for writing the screenplays for Lethal Weapon 2 and Lethal Weapon 3, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Innerspace, and The Lost Boys. Boam's films had a cumulative gross of over US $1 billion. He was educated at...
to write the next three versions, the last of which was completed in March 1996. Three months later, Independence Day
Independence Day (film)
Independence Day is a 1996 science fiction film about an alien invasion of Earth, focusing on a disparate group of individuals and families as they converge in the Nevada desert and, along with the rest of the human population, participate in a last-chance counterattack on July 4 – the same...
was released, and Spielberg told Lucas he would not make another alien invasion film. Lucas decided to focus on the Star Wars prequels.
In 2000, Spielberg's son asked when the next Indiana Jones film would be released, which made him interested in reviving the project. The same year, Ford, Lucas, Spielberg, Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy met during the American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
's tribute to Ford, and decided they wanted to enjoy the experience of making an Indiana Jones film again. Spielberg also found returning to the series a respite from his many dark films during this period, such as A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, Minority Report, and Munich. Lucas convinced Spielberg to use aliens in the plot by saying they were not "extraterrestrials," but "interdimensional
Multiverse
The multiverse is the hypothetical set of multiple possible universes that together comprise all of reality.Multiverse may also refer to:-In fiction:* Multiverse , the fictional multiverse used by DC Comics...
," with this concept taking inspiration in the superstring theory
Superstring theory
Superstring theory is an attempt to explain all of the particles and fundamental forces of nature in one theory by modelling them as vibrations of tiny supersymmetric strings...
. Spielberg and Lucas discussed the central idea of a B-movie involving aliens, and Lucas suggested using the crystal skull
Crystal skull
The crystal skulls are a number of human skull hardstone carvings made of clear or milky quartz rock, known in art history as "rock crystal", claimed to be pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artifacts by their alleged finders. However, none of the specimens made available for scientific study have been...
s to ground the idea. Lucas found those artifacts as fascinating as the Ark of the Covenant
Ark of the Covenant
The Ark of the Covenant , also known as the Ark of the Testimony, is a chest described in Book of Exodus as solely containing the Tablets of Stone on which the Ten Commandments were inscribed...
, and had intended to feature them for a Young Indiana Jones episode before the show's cancellation. M. Night Shyamalan
M. Night Shyamalan
Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan,known professionally as M. Night Shyamalan, is an Indian-born American screenwriter, film director, and producer known for making movies with contemporary supernatural plots that climax with a twist ending. He is also known for filming his movies in and around...
was hired to write for an intended 2002 shoot, but he was overwhelmed writing a sequel to a film he loved like Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...
, and claimed it was difficult to get Ford, Spielberg and Lucas to focus. Stephen Gaghan
Stephen Gaghan
Stephen Gaghan is an American screenwriter and director. He is noted for writing the screenplay for Steven Soderbergh's film Traffic, based on a Channel 4 series, for which he won the Academy Award, as well as Syriana which he wrote and directed.-Childhood and education:Born in either Louisville,...
and Tom Stoppard
Tom Stoppard
Sir Tom Stoppard OM, CBE, FRSL is a British playwright, knighted in 1997. He has written prolifically for TV, radio, film and stage, finding prominence with plays such as Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, Professional Foul, The Real Thing, and Rosencrantz and...
were also approached.
Frank Darabont
Frank Darabont
Frank Darabont is a Hungarian-American film director, screenwriter and producer who has been nominated for three Academy Awards and a Golden Globe. He has directed the films The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist, all based on stories by Stephen King...
, who wrote various Young Indiana Jones episodes, was hired to write in May 2002. His script, entitled Indiana Jones and the City of Gods, was set in the 1950s, with ex-Nazis pursuing Jones. Spielberg conceived the idea because of real life figures such as Juan Perón
Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón was an Argentine military officer, and politician. Perón was three times elected as President of Argentina though he only managed to serve one full term, after serving in several government positions, including the Secretary of Labor and the Vice Presidency...
in Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
, who protected Nazi war criminals. Darabont claimed Spielberg loved the script, but Lucas had issues with it, and decided to take over writing himself. Lucas and Spielberg acknowledged the 1950s setting could not ignore the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
, and the Russians were more plausible villains. Spielberg decided he could not satirize the Nazis after directing Schindler's List
Schindler's List
Schindler's List is a 1993 American film about Oskar Schindler, a German businessman who saved the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees during the Holocaust by employing them in his factories. The film was directed by Steven Spielberg, and based on the novel Schindler's Ark...
, while Ford noted, "We plum[b] wore the Nazis out."
Jeff Nathanson
Jeff Nathanson
Jeff Nathanson is an American film writer, film producer, and director.He is best known for his work on the Rush Hour series, Catch Me If You Can, The Terminal, and The Last Shot, and has also co-written a story draft for the film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull with George Lucas...
met with Spielberg and Lucas in August 2004, and turned in the next drafts in October and November 2005, titled The Atomic Ants. David Koepp
David Koepp
-Career:As a writer, Koepp has worked on such blockbuster Hollywood films as Jurassic Park, Mission Impossible, and Spider-Man. Koepp had a cameo as the "Unlucky Bastard" in The Lost World: Jurassic Park, in which he was serving as Writer and Second Unit Director.His work as a director has not had...
continued on from there, giving his script the subtitle Destroyer of Worlds, based on the J. Robert Oppenheimer quote. It was changed to Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, as Spielberg found it more inviting a title and actually named the plot device of the crystal skulls. Lucas insisted on the Kingdom part. Koepp's "bright [title] idea" was Indiana Jones and the Son of Indiana Jones, and Spielberg had also considered having the title name the aliens as The Mysterians
The Mysterians
The Mysterians, released in Japan as , is a tokusatsu science fiction film produced and released by Toho Studios in 1957. It was directed by the "Golden Duo" of Ishirō Honda and Eiji Tsuburaya . It is notable for being the first tokusatsu filmed in TohoScope and the first Toho film to use...
, but dropped that when he remembered that was the name of a film. Koepp collaborated with Raiders of the Lost Ark screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan
Lawrence Kasdan
Lawrence Edward "Larry" Kasdan is an American film producer, director and screenwriter.-Life and career:Kasdan was born in Miami, Florida, the son of Sylvia Sarah , an employment counselor, and Clarence Norman Kasdan, who managed retail electronics stores.His Brother is the writer/producer Mark...
on the film's "love dialogue."
Filming
Deming, New Mexico
Deming is a city in Luna County, New Mexico, United States, located 60 miles west of Las Cruces. The population was 14,116 at the 2000 census. Deming is the county seat and principal town of Luna County.-History:...
. An extensive chase scene set at Indiana Jones's fictional Marshall College was filmed between June 28 and July 7 at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
in New Haven, Connecticut (where Spielberg's son Theo was studying). To keep in line with the fact the story takes place in the 1950s, several facades were changed, although signs were put up in between shots to tell the public what the store or restaurant actually was.
Waterworld
Waterworld is a 1995 post-apocalyptic science fiction film. The film was directed by Kevin Reynolds and co-written by Peter Rader and David Twohy. It is based on Rader's original 1986 screenplay and stars Kevin Costner, who also produced it. It was distributed by Universal Pictures...
, and was estimated to generate $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
22 million to $45 million in the local economy. Because of an approaching hurricane
Hurricane Flossie (2007)
Hurricane Flossie was a strong Category Four Hurricane which brushed the island of Hawaiʻi as it rapidly weakened to a tropical storm. Flossie was the ninth tropical cyclone and sixth named storm of the 2007 Pacific hurricane season. Flossie developed from an ill defined wave which formed off the...
, Spielberg was unable to shoot a fight at a waterfall, so he sent the second unit
Second unit
In film, the second unit is a team that shoots subsidiary footage for a motion picture. Its work is distinct from that of the first unit, which shoots all scenes involving principal actors...
to film shots of Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
's and Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
's Iguazu Falls
Iguazu Falls
Iguazu Falls, Iguassu Falls, or Iguaçu Falls are waterfalls of the Iguazu River located on the border of the Brazilian State of Paraná and the Argentine Province of Misiones. The falls divide the river into the upper and lower Iguazu. The Iguazu River originates near the city of Curitiba. It flows...
. These were digitally combined into the fight, which was shot at the Universal
Universal Studios Hollywood
Universal Studios Hollywood is a movie studio and theme park in the unincorporated Universal City community of Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is one of the oldest and most famous Hollywood movie studios still in use...
backlot.
Half the film was scheduled to shoot on five sound stages at Los Angeles: Downey
Downey, California
Downey is a city located in southeast Los Angeles County, California, United States, southeast of downtown Los Angeles. The city is best known as the birthplace of the Apollo space program, and is the city where folk singer Karen Carpenter lived and died...
, Sony
Sony Pictures Studios
The Sony Pictures Studios are a television and film studio complex located in Culver City, California at 10202 West Washington Boulevard and bounded by Culver Boulevard , Washington Boulevard , Overland Avenue and Madison Avenue...
, Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
, Paramount
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
and Universal
Universal Studios Hollywood
Universal Studios Hollywood is a movie studio and theme park in the unincorporated Universal City community of Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is one of the oldest and most famous Hollywood movie studios still in use...
. Filming moved to Chandler Field
Fresno Chandler Executive Airport
Fresno Chandler Executive Airport is a public use airport located two nautical miles west of the central business district of Fresno, a city in Fresno County, California, United States. It is owned by the City of Fresno....
in Fresno, California
Fresno, California
Fresno is a city in central California, United States, the county seat of Fresno County. As of the 2010 census, the city's population was 510,365, making it the fifth largest city in California, the largest inland city in California, and the 34th largest in the nation...
, substituting for Mexico City International Airport
Mexico City International Airport
Benito Juárez International Airport , in Venustiano Carranza, one of the sixteen boroughs into which Mexico's Federal District is divided, is a commercial airport that serves Mexico City, the capital of Mexico...
, on October 11, 2007. After shooting aerial shots of Chandler Airport and a DC-3
Douglas DC-3
The Douglas DC-3 is an American fixed-wing propeller-driven aircraft whose speed and range revolutionized air transport in the 1930s and 1940s. Its lasting impact on the airline industry and World War II makes it one of the most significant transport aircraft ever made...
on the morning of October 12, 2007, filming wrapped. Although he originally found no need for re-shoots after viewing his first cut of the film, Spielberg decided to add an establishing shot
Establishing shot
An establishing shot in filmmaking and television production sets up, or establishes the context for a scene by showing the relationship between its important figures and objects...
, which was filmed on February 29, 2008 at Pasadena, California
Pasadena, California
Pasadena is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Although famous for hosting the annual Rose Bowl football game and Tournament of Roses Parade, Pasadena is the home to many scientific and cultural institutions, including the California Institute of Technology , the Jet...
.
Design
Spielberg and Janusz KamińskiJanusz Kaminski
Janusz Zygmunt Kamiński is a Polish cinematographer and film director. He has photographed all of Steven Spielberg's films since 1993's Schindler's List.-Life and career:...
, who has shot all of the director's films since 1993's Schindler's List, reviewed the previous films to study Douglas Slocombe
Douglas Slocombe
Douglas Slocombe OBE, BSC, A.S.C. is a British cinematographer who has enjoyed a long career in the British film industry...
's style. "I didn’t want Janusz to modernize and bring us into the 21st century," Spielberg explained. "I still wanted the film to have a lighting style not dissimilar to the work Doug Slocombe had achieved, which meant that both Janusz and I had to swallow our pride. Janusz had to approximate another cinematographer's look, and I had to approximate this younger director's look that I thought I had moved away from after almost two decades." Spielberg also hired production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas
Guy Hendrix Dyas
Guy Hendrix Dyas, Production Designer, most recently collaborated with Christopher Nolan on his ambitious science fiction thriller “Inception” which earned him an Academy Award Nomination®™ as well as a BAFTA award for best Production Design...
after admiring his design work for Superman Returns
Superman Returns
Superman Returns is a 2006 superhero film directed by Bryan Singer. It is the fifth and final installment in the original Superman film series and serves as a alternate sequel to Superman and Superman II by ignoring the events of Superman III and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace .The film stars...
. Spielberg did not want to fast cut
Fast cutting
Fast cutting is a film editing technique which refers to several consecutive shots of a brief duration . It can be used to convey a lot of information very quickly, or to imply either energy or chaos...
action scenes, relying on his script instead for a fast pace, and had confirmed in 2002 that he would not shoot the film digitally, a format Lucas had adopted. Lucas felt "it looks like it was shot three years after Last Crusade. The people, the look of it, everything. You’d never know there was 20 years between shooting." Kamiński commented upon watching the three films back-to-back, he was amazed how each of them advanced technologically, but were all nevertheless consistent, neither too brightly or darkly lit.
While shooting War of the Worlds
War of the Worlds (2005 film)
War of the Worlds is a 2005 American science fiction film adaptation of H. G. Wells' novel of the same name, directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Josh Friedman and David Koepp. It is one of three film adaptations of War of the Worlds released that year, alongside The Asylum's version and...
in late 2004, Spielberg met with stunt coordinator Vic Armstrong
Vic Armstrong
Victor Monroe Armstrong is a BAFTA winning British film director and stunt double -- the world's most prolific according to the Guinness Book of Records...
, who doubled for Ford in the previous films, to discuss three action sequences he had envisioned. However, Armstrong was filming The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is a 2008 American action adventure film and sequel to The Mummy and The Mummy Returns . The film stars Brendan Fraser, Maria Bello, John Hannah, Luke Ford, and Jet Li, and was released on August 1, 2008 in the United States...
during shooting of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, so Dan Bradley
Dan Bradley
Dan Bradley is a stunt coordinator and second unit film director.He has worked on Independence Day, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, The Bourne Supremacy, The Bourne Ultimatum, Superman Returns, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Where The Wild Things Are, and Quantum of Solace.In July...
was hired instead. Bradley and Spielberg used previsualization
Previsualization
Previsualization is a function to visualise complex scenes in movie before filming. It is also a concept in still photography...
for all the action scenes, except the motorcycle chase at Marshall College, because that idea was conceived after the animators had left. Bradley drew traditional storyboard
Storyboard
Storyboards are graphic organizers in the form of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence....
s instead, and was given free rein to create dramatic moments, just as Raiders of the Lost Ark second unit
Second unit
In film, the second unit is a team that shoots subsidiary footage for a motion picture. Its work is distinct from that of the first unit, which shoots all scenes involving principal actors...
director Michael D. Moore
Michael D. Moore
Michael D. Moore is a Canadian-born American film actor and director.Born Michael Sheffield in Victoria, British Columbia, both he and his brother Patrick were Hollywood child actors. At the age of five he appeared in his first film under the stage name "Mickey Moore". He appeared in two dozen...
did when filming the truck chase. Spielberg improvised on set, changing the location of Mutt and Spalko's duel from the ground to on top of vehicles.
The Ark of the Covenant
Ark of the Covenant
The Ark of the Covenant , also known as the Ark of the Testimony, is a chest described in Book of Exodus as solely containing the Tablets of Stone on which the Ten Commandments were inscribed...
is seen in a broken crate during the Hangar 51 opening sequence. Lucasfilm used the same prop from Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...
. Guards were hired to protect the highly-sought after piece of film memorabilia during the day of its use. A replica of the staff carried by Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston was an American actor of film, theatre and television. Heston is known for heroic roles in films such as The Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor, El Cid, and Planet of the Apes...
in The Ten Commandments
The Ten Commandments (1956 film)
The Ten Commandments is a 1956 American epic film that dramatized the biblical story of the Exodus, in which the Hebrew-born Moses, an adopted Egyptian prince, becomes the deliverer of the Hebrew slaves. The film, released by Paramount Pictures in VistaVision on October 5, 1956, was directed by...
was also used to populate the set to illustrate the Hangar's history.
Effects
Computer-generated imagery
Computer-generated imagery is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media...
was used to remove the visible safety wires on the actors when they did their stunts (such as when Indy swings on a lamp with his whip). Timed explosives were used for a scene where Indiana drives a truck through crates. During the take, an explosive failed to detonate and landed in the seat beside Ford. However, it did not go off and he was not injured.
Steven Spielberg stated before production began that very few CGI effects would be used to maintain consistency with the other films. During filming however, significantly more CGI work was done than initially anticipated as in many cases it proved to be more practical. There ended up being a total of about 450 CGI shots in the film, with an estimated 30 percent of the film's shots containing CG matte painting
Matte painting
A matte painting is a painted representation of a landscape, set, or distant location that allows filmmakers to create the illusion of an environment that would otherwise be too expensive or impossible to build or visit. Historically, matte painters and film technicians have used various techniques...
s. Spielberg initially wanted brushstrokes to be visible on the paintings for added consistency with the previous films, but decided against it. The script also required a non-deforested jungle for a chase scene, but this would have been unsafe and much CGI work was done to create the jungle action sequence. Visual effects supervisor
Visual effects supervisor
In the context of film and television production, a visual effects supervisor is responsible for achieving the creative aims of the director and/or producers through the use of visual effects...
Pablo Helman (who worked on Lucas' Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a 1999 American epic space opera film written and directed by George Lucas. It is the fourth film to be released in the Star Wars saga, as the first of a three-part prequel to the original Star Wars trilogy, as well as the first film in the saga in terms...
and Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones
Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones
Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones is a 2002 American epic space opera film directed by George Lucas and written by Lucas and Jonathan Hales. It is the fifth film to be released in the Star Wars saga and the second in terms of the series' internal chronology...
as well as Spielberg's War of the Worlds
War of the Worlds (2005 film)
War of the Worlds is a 2005 American science fiction film adaptation of H. G. Wells' novel of the same name, directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Josh Friedman and David Koepp. It is one of three film adaptations of War of the Worlds released that year, alongside The Asylum's version and...
and Munich
Munich (film)
Munich is a 2005 historical fiction film about the Israeli government's secret retaliation attacks after the massacre of Israeli athletes by the Black September terrorist group during the 1972 Summer Olympics. The film stars Eric Bana and was produced and directed by Steven Spielberg...
) traveled to Brazil and Argentina to photograph elements that were composited into the final images. Industrial Light and Magic then effectively created a virtual jungle with a geography like the real Amazon.
The appearance of a live alien and flying saucer was in flux. Spielberg wanted the alien to resemble a Gray alien, and also rejected early versions of the saucer that looked "too Close Encounters
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 science fiction film written and directed by Steven Spielberg. The film stars Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Bob Balaban, and Cary Guffey...
". Art director Christian Alzmann said the aesthetic was "looking at a lot of older B-movie designs – but trying to make that look more real and gritty to fit in with the Indy universe." Other reference for the visual effects work included government tapes of nuclear tests, and video reference of real prairie dog
Prairie dog
Prairie dogs are burrowing rodents native to the grasslands of North America. There are five different species of prairie dogs: black-tailed, white-tailed, Gunnison's, Utah and Mexican prairie dogs. They are a type of ground squirrel, found in the United States, Canada and Mexico...
s shot in 1080p by Nathan Edward Denning.
Music
John WilliamsJohn Williams
John Towner Williams is an American composer, conductor, and pianist. In a career spanning almost six decades, he has composed some of the most recognizable film scores in the history of motion pictures, including the Star Wars saga, Jaws, Superman, the Indiana Jones films, E.T...
began composing the score in October 2007; ten days of recording sessions wrapped on March 6, 2008 at Sony Pictures Studios
Sony Pictures Studios
The Sony Pictures Studios are a television and film studio complex located in Culver City, California at 10202 West Washington Boulevard and bounded by Culver Boulevard , Washington Boulevard , Overland Avenue and Madison Avenue...
. Williams described composing for the Indiana Jones universe again as "like sitting down and finishing a letter that you started 25 years ago". He reused Indiana's theme as well as Marion's from the first film, and also composed five new motifs for Mutt, Spalko and the skull. Williams gave Mutt's a swashbuckling feel, and homaged film noir
Film noir
Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
and 1950s B-movies for Spalko and the crystal skull respectively. As an in-joke, Williams incorporated a measure
Bar (music)
In musical notation, a bar is a segment of time defined by a given number of beats of a given duration. Typically, a piece consists of several bars of the same length, and in modern musical notation the number of beats in each bar is specified at the beginning of the score by the top number of a...
and a half of Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...
' "Academic Festival Overture
Academic Festival Overture
Academic Festival Overture , Op. 80, by Johannes Brahms, was one of a pair of contrasting concert overtures — the other being the Tragic Overture, Op. 81, written to balance it as its pair...
" when Indiana and Mutt crash into the library. The soundtrack features a Continuum
Continuum (instrument)
The Continuum Fingerboard or Haken Continuum is a music performance controller developed by Lippold Haken, a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois, and sold by Haken Audio, located in Champaign, Illinois....
, an instrument often used for sound effects instead of music. The Concord Music Group
Concord Music Group
Concord Music Group is a record company owned by Village Roadshow formed in 2004 by the merger of Concord Records and Fantasy Records. In 2005, the company acquired the classics and jazz label Telarc International. On December 18, 2006, Concord announced the re-launch of the soul label Stax;...
released the soundtrack
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (soundtrack)
The Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull soundtrack was released on May 20, 2008 as a soundtrack album to the 2008 film of the same name...
on May 20, 2008.
Release
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull premiered at the Cannes Film FestivalCannes Film Festival
The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...
on May 18, 2008, ahead of its worldwide May 22 release date. It was the first Spielberg film since 1982's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a 1982 American science fiction film co-produced and directed by Steven Spielberg, written by Melissa Mathison and starring Henry Thomas, Dee Wallace, Robert MacNaughton, Drew Barrymore, and Peter Coyote...
to premiere at Cannes. The film was released in approximately 4000 theaters in the United States, and dubbed into 25 languages for its worldwide release. More than 12,000 release print
Release print
A release print is a copy of a film that is sent to a movie theater for exhibition.-Definitions:Release prints are not to be confused with the other types of print used in the photochemical post-production process:...
s were distributed, which is the largest in Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
' history. Although Spielberg insisted his films only be watched traditionally at theaters, Paramount chose to release the film in digital cinema
Digital cinema
Digital cinema refers to the use of digital technology to distribute and project motion pictures. A movie can be distributed via hard drives, optical disks or satellite and projected using a digital projector instead of a conventional film projector...
s as part of a scheme to convert 10,000 U.S. cinemas to the format.
Secrecy
Frank Marshall remarked, "In today's information age, secrecy has been a real challenge. [...] People actually said, 'No, we're going to respect Steven's vision." Fans on the internet have scrutinized numerous photos and the film's promotional LEGOLego
Lego is a line of construction toys manufactured by the Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of colorful interlocking plastic bricks and an accompanying array of gears, minifigures and various other parts...
sets in hope of understanding plot details; Spielberg biographer Ian Freer
Ian Freer
Ian Freer is a British non-fiction author and Film magazine editor, who has written several books relating to films. His most recent work was The Complete Spielberg, a guide to the films of Steven Spielberg....
wrote, "What Indy IV is actually about has been the great cultural guessing game of 2007/08. Yet, it has to be said, there is something refreshing about being ten weeks away from a giant blockbuster and knowing next to nothing about it." To distract investigative fans from the film's title during filming, five fake titles were registered with the Motion Picture Association of America
Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
; The City of Gods, The Destroyer of Worlds, The Fourth Corner of the Earth, The Lost City of Gold and The Quest for the Covenant. Lucas and Spielberg had also wanted to keep Karen Allen's return a secret until the film's release, but decided to confirm it at the 2007 Comic-Con
Comic-Con International
San Diego Comic-Con International, also known as Comic-Con International: San Diego , and commonly known as Comic-Con or the San Diego Comic-Con, was founded as the Golden State Comic Book Convention and later the San Diego Comic Book Convention in 1970 by Shel Dorf and a group of San Diegans...
.
An extra in the film, Tyler Nelson, violated his nondisclosure agreement in an interview with The Edmond Sun
The Edmond Sun
The Edmond Sun is a six-day morning daily newspaper published in Edmond, Oklahoma, U.S., covering the northern suburbs of Oklahoma City.It is published by Community Newspaper Holdings Inc. It is located in Edmond Oklahoma....
on September 17, 2007, which was then picked up by the mainstream media. It is unknown if he remained in the final cut. At Nelson's request, The Edmond Sun subsequently pulled the story from its website. On October 2, 2007, a Superior Court
Superior court
In common law systems, a superior court is a court of general competence which typically has unlimited jurisdiction with regard to civil and criminal legal cases...
order was filed finding that Nelson knowingly violated the agreement. The terms of the settlement were not disclosed. A number of production photos and sensitive documents pertaining to the film's production budget were also stolen from Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
’s production office. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department
Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department
The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department is a local county law enforcement agency that serves Los Angeles County, California. It is the fourth largest local policing agency in the United States, with the New York City Police Department being the first. The second largest is the Chicago Police...
set up a sting operation
Sting operation
In law enforcement, a sting operation is a deceptive operation designed to catch a person committing a crime. A typical sting will have a law-enforcement officer or cooperative member of the public play a role as criminal partner or potential victim and go along with a suspect's actions to gather...
after being alerted by a webmaster that the thief might try to sell the photos. On October 4, 2007, the seller, 37-year old Roderick Eric Davis, was arrested. He pleaded guilty to two felony counts and was sentenced to two years and four months in prison.
Marketing
Howard Roffman, President of Lucas Licensing, attributed the film's large marketing campaign to it having been "nineteen years since the last film, and we are sensing a huge pent-up demand for everything Indy". Paramount spent at least $150 million to promote the film, whereas most film promotions range from $70 to 100 million. As well as fans, the film also needed to appeal to younger viewers. Licensing deals include ExpediaExpedia
Expedia is an Internet-based travel website based in the US with localised sites for 21 countries...
, Dr Pepper
Dr Pepper
Dr Pepper is a soft drink, marketed as having a unique flavor. The drink was created in the 1880s by Charles Alderton of Waco, Texas and first served around 1885. Dr Pepper was first nationally marketed in the United States in 1904 and is now also sold in Europe, Asia, Canada, Mexico, Australia ...
, Burger King
Burger King
Burger King, often abbreviated as BK, is a global chain of hamburger fast food restaurants headquartered in unincorporated Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. The company began in 1953 as Insta-Burger King, a Jacksonville, Florida-based restaurant chain...
, M&M's
M&M's
M&M's are dragée-like "colorful button-shaped candies" produced by Mars, Incorporated...
and Lunchables
Lunchables
Lunchables are a line of instant children's meals manufactured by Kraft Foods, Inc. They are marketed under the Oscar Mayer brand in the United States and Dairylea in the United Kingdom. Many Lunchables products are produced at Kraft Foods, Inc.'s Fullerton factory in Fullerton, California, and are...
. Paramount sponsored an Indiana Jones open wheel car
Open wheel car
Open-wheel car, formula car, or often single-seater car in British English, describes cars with the wheels outside the car's main body and, in most cases, one seat. Open-wheel cars contrast with street cars, sports cars, stock cars, and touring cars, which have their wheels below the body or fenders...
for Marco Andretti
Marco Andretti
Marco Michael Andretti is an Italian American auto racing driver who drives the #26 car for Andretti Autosport in the IndyCar Series. He is the son of 1991 IndyCar World Series champion Michael Andretti and the grandson of racing legend Mario Andretti...
in the 2008 Indianapolis 500
2008 Indianapolis 500
The 92nd Indianapolis 500-Mile Race was run on Sunday May 25, 2008 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana, USA. Scott Dixon of New Zealand won the race from the pole position. It was the thirteenth Indy 500 sanctioned by the Indy Racing League, and served as the showcase event of...
, and his racing suit was designed to resemble Indiana Jones's outfit. The distributor also paired with M&M's
M&M's
M&M's are dragée-like "colorful button-shaped candies" produced by Mars, Incorporated...
to sponsor the #18 Joe Gibbs Racing
Joe Gibbs Racing
Joe Gibbs Racing is a group of NASCAR racing teams owned and operated by former Washington Redskins coach Joe Gibbs, who first started racing on the NASCAR circuit in 1991, and J. D. Gibbs, his son...
Toyota, with NASCAR
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing is a family-owned and -operated business venture that sanctions and governs multiple auto racing sports events. It was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1947–48. As of 2009, the CEO for the company is Brian France, grandson of the late Bill France Sr...
driver Kyle Busch
Kyle Busch
Kyle Thomas Busch, is an American NASCAR driver and team owner. He currently drives the No. 18 Mars/Interstate Batteries Toyota Camry for Joe Gibbs Racing in the Sprint Cup Series, the No. 18 Z-Line Designs/NOS Energy Drink Toyota Camry for Joe Gibbs in the Nationwide Series, and the No...
behind the wheel, in the 2008 Dodge Challenger 500
2008 Dodge Challenger 500
The 2008 Dodge Challenger 500, the eleventh race on the NASCAR Sprint Cup season, was held on Saturday, May 10th at the fabled Darlington Speedway in Darlington, South Carolina. This race was the 52nd edition of the Confederate Memorial Day race originally known as the Rebel 300...
at Darlington Raceway. Kyle Busch and the #18 team won the race and visited victory lane with Indiana Jones on the car. With the film's release, producer Frank Marshall and UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
worked together to promote conservation of World Heritage Site
World Heritage Site
A UNESCO World Heritage Site is a place that is listed by the UNESCO as of special cultural or physical significance...
s around the world.
The Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
-based design studio Creative Pilot created the packaging style for the film's merchandise, which merged Drew Struzan
Drew Struzan
Drew Struzan is an American artist known for his more than 150 movie posters, which include all the films in the Indiana Jones, Back to the Future and Star Wars film series. He has also painted album covers, collectibles, and book covers.- Early life and education :Drew Struzan was born in Oregon...
's original illustrations "with a fresh new look, which showcases the whip, a map and exotic hieroglyphic patterns". Hasbro
Hasbro
Hasbro is a multinational toy and boardgame company from the United States of America. It is one of the largest toy makers in the world. The corporate headquarters is located in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, United States...
, Lego
Lego
Lego is a line of construction toys manufactured by the Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of colorful interlocking plastic bricks and an accompanying array of gears, minifigures and various other parts...
, Sideshow Collectibles, Topps
Topps
The Topps Company, Inc., manufactures chewing gum, candy and collectibles. Based in New York, New York, Topps is best known as a leading producer of baseball cards, football cards, basketball cards, hockey cards and other sports and non-sports themed trading cards.-Company history:Topps itself was...
, Diamond Select
Diamond Comic Distributors
Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. is the largest comic book distributor serving North America. They transport comic books from both big and small comic book publishers, or suppliers, to the retailers. Diamond dominates the direct market in the United States, and has exclusive arrangements with most...
, Hallmark Cards
Hallmark Cards
Hallmark Cards is a privately owned American company based in Kansas City, Missouri. Founded in 1910 by Joyce C. Hall, Hallmark is the largest manufacturer of greeting cards in the United States. In 1985, the company was awarded the National Medal of Arts....
, and Cartamundi
Cartamundi
Cartamundi, also called Carta Mundi, is a Belgian company, based in Turnhout, that produces and sells board games, card games, collectible card games, packages and playing cards through its manufacturing and sales subsidiaries...
all sold products. A THQ
THQ
THQ Inc. is an American developer and publisher of video games. Founded in 1989 in the United States, the company develops products for video game consoles, handheld game systems, as well as for personal computers and wireless devices...
mobile game
Mobile game
A mobile game is a video game played on a mobile phone, smartphone, PDA, tablet computer or portable media player. This does not include games played on handheld video game systems such as Nintendo DS or PlayStation Portable....
based on the film was released, as was a Lego video game based on the past films. Lego also released a series of computer-animated spoofs, Lego Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Brick
Lego Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Brick
Lego Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Brick is a 3-D computer-animated Lego movie directed by Peder Pedersen. It combines details from all four Indiana Jones features into one continuous adventure with a humorous twist, and includes several inside-jokes for fans of both the Indiana Jones...
, directed by Peder Pedersen. Stern Pinball released a new Indiana Jones pinball machine
Pinball
Pinball is a type of arcade game, usually coin-operated, where a player attempts to score points by manipulating one or more metal balls on a playfield inside a glass-covered case called a pinball machine. The primary objective of the game is to score as many points as possible...
, designed by John Borg, based on all four films. From October 2007 to April 2008, the reedited episodes of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles were released in three DVD box sets.
Random House
Random House
Random House, Inc. is the largest general-interest trade book publisher in the world. It has been owned since 1998 by the German private media corporation Bertelsmann and has become the umbrella brand for Bertelsmann book publishing. Random House also has a movie production arm, Random House Films,...
, Dark Horse Comics
Dark Horse Comics
Dark Horse Comics is the largest independent American comic book and manga publisher.Dark Horse Comics was founded in 1986 by Mike Richardson in Milwaukie, Oregon, with the concept of establishing an ideal atmosphere for creative professionals. Richardson started out by opening his first comic book...
, Diamond Comic Distributors
Diamond Comic Distributors
Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. is the largest comic book distributor serving North America. They transport comic books from both big and small comic book publishers, or suppliers, to the retailers. Diamond dominates the direct market in the United States, and has exclusive arrangements with most...
, Scholastic and DK
Dorling Kindersley
Dorling Kindersley is an international publishing company specializing in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 51 languages. It is currently part of the Penguin Group....
published books, including James Rollins
James Rollins
* For the American baseball pitcher, see Jim Czajkowski* For the American baseball shortstop, see Jimmy Rollins* For the 19th century American politician from Missouri, see James S. Rollins...
' novelization
Novelization
A novelization is a novel that is written based on some other media story form rather than as an original work.Novelizations of films usually add background material not found in the original work to flesh out the story, because novels are generally longer than screenplays...
of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, a two-issue comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
adaptation written by John Jackson Miller
John Jackson Miller
John Jackson Miller is an American comic book writer and commentator, known for his work on the Star Wars franchise as well as his research into comic book circulation history, as presented in the Standard Catalog of Comic Books series.-Biography:...
and drawn by Luke Ross (Samurai: Heaven and Earth
Samurai: Heaven and Earth
Samurai: Heaven and Earth is a comic book about a samurai and his journey to rescue the woman he loves, published by Dark Horse Comics. The title refers to an oath he swore to return to her ....
), children's novelizations of all four films, the Indiana Jones Adventures comic book series aimed at children, and the official Indiana Jones Magazine. Scholastic featured Indiana and Mutt on the covers of Scholastic News and Scholastic Maths, to the concern of parents, though Jack Silbert, editor of the latter, felt the film would interest children in archaeology.
Home media
The film was released on Blu-ray DiscBlu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
and DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
in North America on October 14, 2008. This includes a two-disc edition Blu-ray; a two-disc Special Edition DVD; and a one-disc edition DVD. These editions were released in the UK on November 10. Among the collectible editions include; Kmart
Kmart
Kmart, sometimes styled as "K-Mart," is a chain of discount department stores. The chain acquired Sears in 2005, forming a new corporation under the name Sears Holdings Corporation. The company was founded in 1962 and is the third largest discount store chain in the world, behind Wal-Mart and...
, which contains four LEGO posters parodying those of the films; Target Corporation
Target Corporation
Target Corporation, doing business as Target, is an American retailing company headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the second-largest discount retailer in the United States, behind Walmart. The company is ranked at number 33 on the Fortune 500 and is a component of the Standard & Poor's...
, whose DVD has an eighty-page book of photographs; and Best Buy
Best Buy
Best Buy Co., Inc. is an American specialty retailer of consumer electronics in the United States, accounting for 19% of the market. It also operates in Mexico, Canada & China. The company's subsidiaries include Geek Squad, CinemaNow, Magnolia Audio Video, Pacific Sales, and, in Canada operates...
, whose edition contains a replica of a crystal skull created by Sideshow Collectibles. As of March 1, 2009, it has made $109,296,975 in revenue. It made its worldwide television premiere on USA on December 9, 2010.
Box office
| Box office revenue | Box office ranking | Reference | |||
| United States | Foreign | Worldwide | All time domestic | All time worldwide | |
| $317,101,119 | $469,534,914 | $786,636,033 | #28 | #35 |
Indiana Jones is distributed by one entity, Paramount, but owned by another, Lucasfilm
Lucasfilm
Lucasfilm Limited is an American film production company founded by George Lucas in 1971, based in San Francisco, California. Lucas is the company's current chairman and CEO, and Micheline Chau is the president and COO....
. The pre-production arrangement between the two organizations granted Paramount 12.5% of the film's revenue. As the $185 million budget was larger than the original $125 million estimate, Lucas, Spielberg and Ford turned down large upfront salaries so Paramount could cover the film's costs. In order for Paramount to see a profit beyond its distribution fee, the film had to make over $400 million. At that point, Lucas, Spielberg, Ford and those with smaller profit-sharing deals would also begin to collect their cut.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released Thursday May 22 in North America and grossed $25 million its opening day. In its opening weekend, the film grossed an estimated $101 million in 4,260 theaters in the United States and Canada, ranking #1 at the box office, and making it the third widest opening of all time. Within its first five days of release, it grossed $311 million worldwide. The film's total $151 million gross in the United States ranked it as the second biggest Memorial Day
Memorial Day
Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the last Monday of May. Formerly known as Decoration Day, it originated after the American Civil War to commemorate the fallen Union soldiers of the Civil War...
weekend release, behind Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. It was the third most successful film of 2008 domestically, behind The Dark Knight
The Dark Knight (film)
The Dark Knight is a 2008 superhero film directed, produced and co-written by Christopher Nolan. Based on the DC Comics character Batman, the film is part of Nolan's Batman film series and a sequel to 2005's Batman Begins...
and Iron Man
Iron Man (film)
Iron Man is a 2008 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Directed by Jon Favreau, the film stars Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark, an industrialist and master engineer who builds a powered exoskeleton and becomes the technologically advanced superhero, Iron...
respectively, and the second highest-grossing film of 2008 internationally, behind The Dark Knight. In February 2010 it was the 25th highest-grossing film of all time domestically, and 35th highest-grossing worldwide, as well as the most financially successful Indiana Jones film when not adjusted for inflation of ticket prices.
Reception
The film received mostly positive reviews. Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
reported that 77% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 246 reviews. The consensus was: "Though the plot elements are certainly familiar, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull still delivers the thrills and Harrison Ford's return in the title role is more than welcome." Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
reported the film had a score of 65 out of 100, indicating "generally favorable reviews," based on 40 critics' reviews. Yahoo!
Yahoo!
Yahoo! Inc. is an American multinational internet corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, United States. The company is perhaps best known for its web portal, search engine , Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Groups, Yahoo! Answers, advertising, online mapping ,...
estimated an average rating of B from 15 reviews. A CinemaScore
CinemaScore
CinemaScore is a market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts based on the data.-Background:...
survey conducted during its opening weekend indicated a general "B" rating.
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4, a rating he also gave to The Last Crusade. Ebert argued that the only critical criterion for judging the latest film was comparing it to the previous three. He found it "same old, same old," but that was what "I want it to be." Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
also gave the film 3 1/2 stars out of 4, though he had only given 2 stars to Temple of Doom and 2 1/2 to Last Crusade. "After a 19-year hiatus," Maltin wrote, "Indy returns with the same brand of high adventure that marked the original Raiders of the Lost Ark."
The film was nominated for Best Action Movie at the 2009 Critics' Choice Awards. The Visual Effects Society
Visual Effects Society
The Visual Effects Society is the entertainment industry's only organization representing the full breadth of visual effects practitioners including artists, animators, technologists, model makers, educators, studio leaders, supervisors, PR/marketing specialists and producers in all areas of...
nominated it for Best Single Visual Effect of the Year (the valley destruction), Best Outstanding Matte Paintings, Best Models and Miniatures, and Best Created Environment in a Feature Motion Picture (the inside of the temple). The film ranks 453rd on Empire
Empire (magazine)
Empire is a British film magazine published monthly by Bauer Consumer Media. From the first issue in July 1989, the magazine was edited by Barry McIlheney and published by Emap. Bauer purchased Emap Consumer Media in early 2008...
s 2008 list of the 500 greatest movies of all time. At the 51st Grammy Awards
51st Grammy Awards
The 51st Annual Grammy Awards took place at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, CA on February 8, 2009. Robert Plant and Alison Krauss were the biggest winners of the night, jointly winning five awards including Album of the Year and Record of the Year...
, John Williams won an award for the Mutt Williams theme. It was nominated at the Saturn Award
Saturn Award
The Saturn Award is an award presented annually by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films to honor the top works in science fiction, fantasy, and horror in film, television, and home video. The Saturn Awards were devised by Dr. Donald A. Reed in 1972, who felt that films within...
s for Best Science Fiction Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Costumes and Best Special Effects. It won Best Costumes.
However, the Associated Press
Associated Press
The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
reported the film received a "respectful – though far from glowing – reception," saying that "some viewers at its first press screening loved it, some called it slick and enjoyable though formulaic, some said it was not worth the 19-year wait," adding that J. Sperling Reich, who writes for FilmStew.com, said: "It really looked like they were going through the motions. It really looked like no one had their heart in it."
USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
stated reviews were "mixed" and reviewers felt the "movie suffers from predictable plot points and cheesy special effects."
Critic James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli is an American online film critic.-Personal life:Berardinelli was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey and spent his early childhood in Morristown, New Jersey. At the age of nine years, he relocated to the township of Cherry Hill, New Jersey...
gave the film 2 stars out of 4, calling it "the most lifeless of the series" and "simply [not] a very good motion picture." Margaret Pomeranz of At the Movies gave the film 2 1/2 stars out of 5, saying that the filmmakers "had 19 years since the last Indiana Jones movie to come up with something truly exciting and fresh, but I feel there’s a certain laziness and cynicism in this latest adventure." Metacritic user ratings for the film (as opposed to critics' ratings) rank at only 5.1 out of 10.
In 2009, the film won the Razzie Award for Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel. The film was voted by Comcast
Comcast
Comcast Corporation is the largest cable operator, home Internet service provider, and fourth largest home telephone service provider in the United States, providing cable television, broadband Internet, and telephone service to both residential and commercial customers in 39 states and the...
as 11th worst movie sequel of all time. Paste
Paste (magazine)
Paste is a monthly music and entertainment digital magazine published in the United States by Wolfgang's Vault. Its tagline is "Signs of Life in Music, Film and Culture."-History:...
magazine ranked the movie 10th on its list "The 20 Worst Sequels to Good Movies." Listverse.com ranked the movie 8th on its list of the "Top 10 Worst Movie Sequels."
Some fans of the franchise who were disappointed with the film adopted the term "nuked the fridge," based on a scene in the film where Indiana Jones survives a nuclear blast by hiding in a refrigerator, which then blows Jones miraculously all the way to safety. To users of the phrase, the phrase denotes the point in a movie series when it has passed its peak and crossed into the level of the absurd, similar to "jumping the shark
Jumping the shark
Jumping the shark is an idiom used to describe the moment in the evolution of a television show when it begins a decline in quality that is beyond recovery....
" on television. This phrase has since appeared across the Internet, and was chosen as #5 on Time Magazine's list of "top ten buzzwords" of 2008. South Park
South Park
South Park is an American animated television series created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network. Intended for mature audiences, the show has become famous for its crude language, surreal, satirical, and dark humor that lampoons a wide range of topics...
parodied the film in the episode "The China Probrem
The China Probrem
"The China Probrem" is the eighth episode of the twelfth season of the animated series South Park, and the 175th episode of the series overall. It originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on October 8, 2008. It was the mid-season premiere for season 12...
," broadcast five months after the film's release. The episode was highly critical of the movie, with the characters filing a police report against Lucas and Spielberg for raping Indiana Jones.
The Communist Party of the Russian Federation
Communist Party of the Russian Federation
The Communist Party of the Russian Federation is a Russian political party. It is the second major political party in the Russian Federation.-History:...
called for the film to be banned, accusing the production team of demonizing the Soviet Union. Party official Andrei Andreyev said: "It is very disturbing if talented directors want to provoke a new Cold War." Another party official commented, "(I)n 1957 the USSR was not sending terrorists to America but sending the Sputnik satellite
Sputnik 1
Sputnik 1 ) was the first artificial satellite to be put into Earth's orbit. It was launched into an elliptical low Earth orbit by the Soviet Union on 4 October 1957. The unanticipated announcement of Sputnik 1s success precipitated the Sputnik crisis in the United States and ignited the Space...
into space!" Spielberg responded that he is not unfamiliar with Russia. He explained: "When we decided the fourth installment would take place in 1957, we had no choice but to make the Russians the enemies. World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
had just ended and the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
had begun. The U.S. didn't have any other enemies at the time." The film's depiction of Peru also received criticism from the Peruvian and Spanish-speaking public.
Historical and Geographical inaccuracies are present throughout the movie - like Nazca being apparently located in Cuzco.
The mixed fanbase reaction did not surprise Lucas, who was familiar with mixed response to the Star Wars prequels. "We're all going to get people throwing tomatoes at us," the series' creator had predicted. "But it's a fun movie to make." David Koepp reflects, "I knew I was going to get hammered from a number of quarters [but] what I liked about the way the movie ended up playing was it was popular with families. I like that families really embraced it."
When asked about the infamous "nuke the fridge" sequence, Spielberg replied, Blame me. Don't blame George. That was my silly idea. People stopped saying 'jump the shark'. They now say, "nuked the fridge". I'm proud of that. I'm glad I was able to bring that into popular culture."