Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Thursday afternoon I saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. If you don’t want to know about it, STOP READING NOW.

Seriously. I’m going to talk about the movie in moderate detail. Not great detail because I’ve only seen it once so far, but I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who wants to be surprised.

So if you’re still reading at this point, I can only assume that you want to know about the movie.

Here goes.

It’s definitely better than Temple of Doom. Of course, I haven’t watched Temple of Doom in several years, because it annoys me so greatly and I have to watch much of it on mute so that I can enjoy ogling Harrison Ford without having to hear Kate Capshaw. But Crystal Skull was better than I remember Temple of Doom being.

However, it was not as good as either Raiders or Last Crusade. Those are two very different movies, I’ll admit, that bear very little resemblance to each other besides having several of the same characters and the same basic premise. Raiders is much more action/shoot-em-up while Last Crusade is more comic and almost slapstick. Raiders is quite serious; Last Crusade is much, much lighter.

The thing that Raiders and Last Crusade do have in common that Temple of Doom and Crystal Skull don’t is a Judeo-Christian quest. I’m not trying to be racist or anything like that, and I sincerely apologize if I come across that way. I don’t think the quests in Raiders and Last Crusade are the only reason that they are better movies than Temple of Doom and Crystal Skull, but I do think they are a part of it, for two reasons. First, the predominant culture in the US/UK has a Judeo-Christian background, so the quests are already at least slightly familiar to at least some of the movie-going audience. Second, setting the quests in the context of the predominant culture limits the stereotyping that unfortunately affects both Temple of Doom and Crystal Skull. For example, Temple of Doom is set in India and the things that people remember (other than the annoyingness of Kate Capshaw and the kid who plays Short Round)? Eating monkey brains and pulling out people’s hearts. And in Crystal Skull, technically it takes place in South America, and has to do with ancient Mesoamerican culture. Apart from pictographs, the only representations of that culture are loincloth-clad people who blend in with the wall, move like monkeys, and shoot poison darts.

Crystal Skull is not a bad movie, though. There are a few inside jokes and references, but not so many that it overwhelms the story. Of course, I probably wouldn’t have noticed, since I am a long-time Indy fan. Karen Allen is more than welcome – she’s always been my favourite of the Indy girls. Not that there’s a lot of competition: Kate Capshaw is, as previously stated, annoying, and Alison Doody’s character turned out to be evil. But Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood is more of a partner – she shrieks, sure, but she also attempts to think and fight her way out of situations by herself. And I appreciate the tributes to Denholm Elliott (who played Marcus Brody – he gets referenced and a statue) and Sean Connery (who turned down the film because he’s retired; get over it already online reviewers).

However, it’s not a great movie. Normally I like Cate Blanchett, but she is so ridiculous in this. Her obvious wig and totally fake accent do not help things. And there are oh-so-many “Yeah right” or “You’ve got to be kidding me” moments ranging from Shia LeBeouf sliding his motorcycle along a library floor and getting out from under it without so much as a limp to Ray Winstone’s character’s true allegiances, whatever they might be, to, well, the whole crystal skull reveal. (Aliens? Really? Whose “treasure is knowledge”? Um…..okay.)

They also drop so many things. Like I said, it’s supposed to be based around this Mesoamerican culture, but the poison-dart-blowing representatives of that culture only show up, like three times, never speak, and even though there’s this myth about the crystal skull being guarded by the living dead or something like that, they’re never explained. And, the thing that distracted me the most, during the big chase scene where the evil Soviets are chasing Our Heroes, Marion just…..disappears. She’s driving one of the jungle tanks and I guess she falls behind or something, but she’s off-screen so long that I wondered if they’d forgotten that she was in that scene, or if I’d missed the part where she gets kicked out of the car.

But I liked it, and I would go see it again. I still love Harrison Ford, I enjoy Karen Allen and the relationship between Marion and Indy, and I have a good time watching the fight scenes and archaeology (yeah right) stuff. Everything else, I can ignore.

Fairy Tales

How do you define a fairy tale? The Webster’s Dictionary I have defines a fairy tale as either a story about fairies or an unbelievable/unreal story. The Macmillan Student’s Dictionary adds “a traditional children’s story in which magical things happen.”

So how do you define a fairy tale? My students tend to define it as any work of fiction, especially if it has been made into a movie or, especially, a cartoon. Common answers when I ask about their favourite fairy tales are “Tom and Jerry” and “Harry Potter.” When I ask about Slovak fairy tales, I get romance novelists and whatever they’re studying in literature class.

Some people use Disney movies as the go-to example of fairy tales, and many Disney movies are fairy tales. But I don’t think they all are, and the problem that I run into is that my students – not having the cultural brainwashing of the difference between movie studios – go from “Cinderella, Snow White, and Sleeping Beauty are fairy tales” to “Cartoon movies are fairy tales” to “Anything animated is a fairy tale.” Hence Tom and Jerry.

But where is the line? Why is Sleeping Beauty, with its fairy godmothers, a fairy tale but Mulan, with the talking dragon, not? Would you call Aladdin a fairy tale? Or The Lion King? Is Shrek a fairy tale? What about something like The Princess Diaries?

Personally I think of a fairy tale as a story, primarily but not exclusively for children, that has a lesson or moral, a happy ending or at least something that can be spun into a happy ending, and an unreal or magical element. Cinderella is a fairy tale. Harry Potter can be argued to be a fairy tale. Tom and Jerry – I don’t think so.

In my view of fairy tales, there are two reasons that Sleeping Beauty is a fairy tale and Mulan is not. First, Mulan is based on a (probably) true story and real events in a way that Sleeping Beauty is not. Second, the events of Mulan are not reliant on the magic element, whereas the story of Sleeping Beauty is completely dependent on unreal elements. Yes, Mulan has a talking dragon, but Mushu does not either start or resolve the plot. It is Mulan’s actions and Mulan’s ingenuity that defeat the Huns. Sleeping Beauty, on the other hand, doesn’t exist without magic. The main conflict and its resolution are both magically based.

Where I run into problems is with Harry Potter. I think I’m going to have to say that Harry Potter is not a fairy tale, at least not in the traditional sense. You can argue that it is, but right now I’m arguing that it’s not. For one thing, it’s complex. It’s an epic fantasy, not as simple as the fairy tales. For another thing, while there is magic, in Harry Potter, the magic is an integral part of the world. It’s not extra or special; it’s a talent like being a musician is a talent or athleticism is a talent. It’s a part of the construct, not a part of the plot. I will accept it when students name Harry Potter as their favourite fairy tale, but personally, I don’t think it is.

(Do we even need to discuss why Tom and Jerry is not a fairy tale? I didn’t think so.)

How I Met Your Mother

I have become addicted to the show "How I Met Your Mother." I blame iTunes. They had the "Sandcastles in the Sand" video for free. I also blame MySpace for having the first Robin Sparkles episode for free. Oh, who am I kidding. I'm a TV junkie.

But just because I live my life through popular entertainment doesn't mean that it's not a good show. It's a great show. In case you haven't heard of it, it's theoretically one character telling his kids how he met their mother - the very long version. It's just finishing the third season on CBS and, thanks to the magic of online viewing, I have now seen every episode.

There are two writing things that really make this show impressive for me. First is the realism. Characters tell jokes, but they're the types of jokes that normal people tell and they acknowledge that they're making jokes, or at least trying to. And there are conversations that aren't particularly jokey or witty, but are very real: either television real where they explicitly lay out their emotions, or real-real like when they get excited about going to Red Lobster or whatever. When I watch the show, I can see my own friends in these characters.

The other thing that impresses me is the continuity. It's an ongoing story in a way that shows like Friends were not. And it's the little moments, the little character things, that make it special. For example, there's a third season episode where everyone's complaining about everyone else's annoying habits. And someone mentions Marshall's habit of singing whatever he's doing. And in the first season, there's a scene where Marshall is doing just that - sing-narrating what he's doing. It's the little things like that which make the show wonderful. [Side-note: should it be which there? I was reading something about the difference between that and which the other day and now I'm all paranoid and doubting.]

The actors are good, too. Neil Patrick Harris has this deliciously twisted morality; Alyson Hannigan is quirky (although she's been getting on my nerves a bit in the third season). But I totally adore Josh Radnor as Ted. He looks like John Cusack, acts a little bit like early Zach Braff, and I just want to be his friend.

There are some actors who are so gorgeous and/or talented that you know if you ever met them you would be so completely starstruck that you wouldn't even be able to breathe. Stars that don't seem real. George Clooney, Brad Pitt, etc., fall into this category. But Josh Radnor's Ted and my other TV crush, John Krasinski as Jim Halpert, seem like guys who would actually talk to you. Guys you could be friends with. Guys you would WANT to be friends with. Guys that you wouldn't be intimidated to fall in love with. Not that you necessarily WOULD fall in love with them (although if either one of them wants to give me a call, I'm on the next plane to LA) but guys that you could hang out with without feeling inferior.

I'm really hoping that "How I Met Your Mother" comes back for another season. It's not even that I want Ted to meet "the mother" (even though that's the purpose of the show) but because it's so much fun to hang out with these characters.