Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)

Director: Steven Spielberg

Cast: Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones, Cate Blanchett as Irina Spalko, Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood, Shia LaBeouf as Mutt Williams, Ray Winstone as 'Mac' George Michale, John Hurt as Professor Oxley, Jim Broadbent as Dean Charles Stanforth, Igor Jijikine as Dovchenko, Dimitri Diatchenko as Russian Suit, Ilia Volok as Russian Suit, Emmanuel Todorov as Russian Soldier, Pasha D. Lychnikoff as Russian Soldier, Andrew Divoff as Russian Soldier, Venya Manzyuk as Russian Soldier (as Veniamin Manzyuk), Alan Dale as General Ross

Usually, when you go to see an action/adventure movie, especially an
Indiana Jones movie, you're going to suspend your disbelief and just
allow yourself to "get into" the movie. These kinds of movies are
supposed to be mindless escapist fun. Still, one might expect some
small modicum of plausibility or connection to the real world. When it
comes to "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," forget
about suspending disbelief. Just pretend you're in another dimension
altogether. If you do that, you'll have have met one of the two
prerequisites for seeing this movie. (If you don't believe me now, you
will when you see this film and see our hero survive a cataclysmic
event in a fairly cartoonish manner a mere 15 minutes into the film.)
The other prerequisite is that you've seen the other three
movies...religiously. A huge chunk of the entertainment value of this
film comes from nostalgia, in-jokes, and self-parody. It is an
entertaining movie and I had fun and laughed while I was watching it
and the reason for this is because we are either enjoying seeing all of
the same old gags done once again in a bigger and cooler way, or we are
enjoying seeing those gags mocked. Trusty bullwhip? Check. Fedora?
Check. Long car chase with fighting and leaping and what-not? Check.
Dark tombs lit only by torches? Check. Gross creepy crawly critters?
Check.

This is what makes the movie entertaining, but is also what prevents it
from greatness and what makes me hesitant to call it a true "Indiana
Jones" movie. George Lucas (who co-wrote the screenplay) has tried to
do here what he did to the "Star Wars" prequels, namely that he thinks
that appealing to the fan base with in-jokes, self-parody, and
re-hashing the same old stuff can take the place of actually writing a
a story that can stand on its own merits. The "Star Wars" prequels
failed because Lucas could not get past his constant references to the
original trilogy and so instead created fan fiction instead of true
prequels. (Well, there was also the fact that Lucas' dialogue SUCKED.)
Here, the stunts and action sequences and in-jokes keep us feeling
entertained during the course of the film, but when we walk away, we
wonder where was the real story.

Indiana Jones is a homage to 1930s serials about treasure hunters. He's
out of place in the 1950s. Also out of place are the Soviets(led by
Cate Blanchett in a Rosa Kleb-like role). And there are many, many,
MANY instances where you will get to wondering just how implausible the
next stunt will be. All of that I can put up with, though, and in fact
can and do add to the entertainment value of the film. What I could not
put up with was the ending, which will remind you not of Indiana Jones
but of the ending to another Spielberg movies that pre-dates "Raiders
of the Lost Ark."

This movie is lots of fun to watch, but it doesn't take itself
seriously and probably shouldn't be part of the Indiana Jones canon.