Reviews

Most people who watch this will have a warm place in their hearts for the original 3 films. I count myself as one of those people. As a result of this soft and fuzzy feeling many people will be blind to the multitude of faults in this film and not feel that the level of 'suspension of disbelief' required to enjoy it is several steps too far. Their critical compass will be switched off. For those people that's great, they're lucky, they'll love this film probably as much as the others, and do you know what? I'm jealous of them for that. This fourth instalment has all the same ingredients as the previous films:- a grumpy old Indy, a younger side-kick, nasty enemy soldiers, chases, action set pieces, and a big finale. It was also nice to see Karen Allen reprise her role, she was always my favourite female love interest.

I watched this film as best as I could without already giving it a free pass because of what had gone before. I judged it on its merits and compared it to the numerous films of this type that have been made in the years since the last 'indy'. On that basis I was disappointed. In my view the acting and story was quite good, but the plotting was awful, as was the script, and there certainly wasn't as many laughs as should be expected in a film of this type. Movies have moved on since the original trilogy and I feel that it was stuck in a 'back in the day' mentality. The first hour consisted of every cliché and trope of the genre being clumsily thrown into the melting pot as if some child had written the plot and script and wanted to show off his pop culture knowledge. To be honest I was embarrassed for Spielberg.

The repetitive clichés one piled on top of the other, the appallingly dodgy plotting in the warehouse, the popular icon imagery, the 'better dead than red' demos, the Roswell tie in all made it seem like someone was in a contest to write the worst ever episode of 'Dark Skies'. There were also so many inaccuracies and dumb impossibilities of the type that most modern action adventure films of today do their utmost to exorcise from their scripts. It was lazy and sloppy writing through and through. I also felt there was a character relationship deficiency, or at least that the chemistry was lacking, there wasn't enough fire between them. In the first movie there was Karen Allen. In the second Kate Capshaw and the boy, and in the third there was Sean Connery. Shia LaBeouf and Ray Winstone were responsible for those types of interactions here but I felt they were lacking. I know these types of movies aren't meant to have twists or surprises but surely you aren't also supposed to be able to surmise every scene, act and the finale within minutes of the movie starting.

I strongly believe that if anyone watched this movie and Matthew Mcconaughey's 'Sahara' back to back it would be no contest as to which was more entertaining, funny, and action packed, as well as which had the best story, plot and script. It would be Sahara every time. I know I'm going to get negative feedback for this review but I'm just being honest and trying to review it with detachment and without my love of the previous movies creating a positive bias. It's a real shame. If only Spielberg had raised the bar in regards to story, plot and script to what we've come to expect in the 21st century this could have been an amazing film. In closing, having thoroughly slagged it off, I must add that the very final scene was quite spectacular from an 'FX eye candy' perspective.

I don't see how anyone can give this film a good rating and to compare it favourably with True Romance is an insult to that movie and film-making in general. The plot is you're standard 'couple stumble across wads of cash and go on the run'. There's nothing new in this story but that is not what makes it a bad film.

What makes this cringe-worthy viewing is the absolutely sloppy writing. The characters (all of them) are made to do such stupid things like leaving bags of cash wide open for all to see, not once, not twice, not thrice...And other things like buying a massively conspicuous getaway car, not locking a car with wads of cash in it. Our heroine in a maid's uniform with a massive and fresh gash on her head allowed to walk past a Police checkpoint who are on the look out for such a person.The list is absolutely endless, and there's even an apparently abandoned but fully functioning, rust and dereliction free power plant.

I had given this 3/10 but now that I've written about it I realise that is too generous 2 is all it's worth despite the odd amusing reference to True Romance that has been slipped in.

I always try to support or fight for low budget or independent film and from what I understand this is a low budget one, and for that it should be commended. To be fair it's not overly obvious that money was tight. However that's not the reason I didn't like this film.

The plot in a nutshell is troubled teenager fresh out of rehab rejoins family in a new town. Cue an urban legend about a school bus stopping on the railroad tracks and a train smashing into it and killing all involved. Legend has it that if you put your car in neutral on the tracks the ghosts of the dead children will move your car off leaving behind fingerprints that you can see if you cover your car with talc beforehand.......yawn! Then there's a twist that's so blatant you want to shout at the scriptwriter, and a dark figure killing people all of a sudden. So there's nothing original in the story, it's cliché ridden, but acted okay...so far so average.

The problem I had with the film was there wasn't a nice person in it, I couldn't have cared less about any of them including the heroine. I found myself refusing to give up on the film in case some good came of it, but desperately clock watching and wishing it would finish. It drags, it treats you like you're stupid, and you want them all to die.

I wouldn't recommend it but it's not bad enough to say avoid like the plague.