Sunday 21 December 2008

#14 Watch the Indiana Jones films

Status: Watched

My attention to this list has reached even higher levels of slackness. Though if there was one image I wanted to leave languishing at the top of my blog, it's the Baconator.

Either way, it's probably inexcusable that I haven't updated this task, which was completed by the time Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released.

Perhaps it's because they were ridiculously hyped before I had a chance to see them, but I do feel the Indiana Jones franchise is overrated. That Empire magazine recently voted Raiders of the Lost Ark the second-greatest film of all time only cemented my belief. I mean, it's very good, but the second-greatest film ever? I don't see it. I know I'm a fan and I know Indiana Jones was partly inspired by 007, but I find a number of the Bond films significantly superior to the Indy flicks.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom's dark story is undermined by a screeching heroine and annoying child, while Sean Connery's appearance in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade elevated that film to equal status to Raiders, in my view. The controversial Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is an adequate, even fun follow-up, but, like another of this summer's resurrections, The X-Files: I Want To Believe, it didn't really do much to warrant bringing these characters back.