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Reviews Counted:39
Fresh:23
Rotten:16
Average Rating:6/10
Consensus: 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.
Theatrical Release:May 22, 2008 Wide
Box Office: $316,957,122
Synopsis: When we last saw Indiana Jones on screen, it was 1938, and the world stood on the brink of war as Dr. Jones chased down evildoers to find the Holy Grail. Nineteen years later, he’s cracking his... [More]
Starring: Harrison Ford, Ray Winstone, Shia LaBeouf, Cate Blanchett
Director: Steven Spielberg
Crystal Skull isn’t bad -- there are a few dazzling sequences, and a couple of good performances -- but the unprecedented blend of comedy and action that made the movies so much more fun than any other adventure series is mostly gone.
Top CriticThere’s nothing but entertainment value here.
Top CriticThe action is the movie’s raison d’être, of course, but the setups are wittier than the payoffs.
Top CriticEven as the movie occasionally trips over its nostalgias, it's still a likable, if unremarkable, entertainment, a pleasant echo of past delights.
Top CriticIt's not bad, exactly. It's not a desecration of the franchise. It's just . . . tired.
Top CriticNearly two decades after the last appearance, Indiana Jones is back, along with its diminishing returns and its aging principals and their trademark tools.
Top CriticUltimately, The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is instant artifact. It's a vessel with a great deal of pictorial images on its surface. But its contents are long gone.
Top CriticThe character and plot contrivances are dumber than ever, but this is basically vaudeville, not narrative, and the thrills keep coming.
Top CriticIt's romantic manliness at its purest, almost but not quite schmaltz, ideally calculated to please true believers and ironic snorters at once.
Top CriticIndiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is probably the worst of the Indiana Jones movies, but it's still pretty much a delight, from the beginning almost until the end.
Top CriticAt his best, Spielberg is certainly capable of tapping, to almost unnerving degree, collective moods and fears and longings, both emotional and cultural.
Top CriticThe action sequences are staged and edited sloppily, a far cry from the death-defying stuntman extravaganzas of yore.
Top CriticThere’s plenty of frantic energy in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, lots of noise and money too, but what’s absent is any sense of rediscovery.
Top CriticCrystal Skull is hit-and-miss like the clunky 1984 sequel, Temple of Doom. And instead of the elegiac tone that lifted 1989's presumptive valedictory, The Last Crusade, director Steven Spielberg and producer George Lucas have gotten sillier.
Top CriticIt’s as contrived and convoluted as all the other Indiana Jones movies, but not as much fun.
Top CriticSitting through Steven Spielberg's slog down memory lane means waiting for surprise, waiting for delight, waiting for daylight after turgid trudges through Peruvian caves, and waiting for an abstract story to coalesce.
Top CriticThe fourth chapter of the Indiana Jones chronicles feels repetitive and a little gassed, but it has too much bravura filmmaking, and just enough wit, to not recommend.
Top CriticSatisfying if not fully electrifying, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull offers fans all the familiar elements: bullwhip, fedora, ancient texts, hidden clues, obscure maps and cliffhanging moment atop cliffhanging moment.
Top CriticWhile the production values are top-notch, and the action artfully choreographed, in the end -- and quite well before the end -- a sense of tedium sets in.
Top CriticKingdom of the Crystal Skull is as joyless as its predecessors were blissful.
Top Critic
September 15, 2009:
Harrison Ford Waiting on Indy 5 Script 
Waiting for another Indiana Jones movie? Well, cross your fingers -- Harrison Ford says he's ready and waiting for the script for a fifth installment. More...
June 16, 2009:
Has Spielberg 'cracked' the story for Indy 5?
Talking with the BBC for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Shia LaBeouf -- aka Mutt Williams, heir to the Indy franchise -- said that director Steven Spielberg has "cracked"... More...
June 10, 2009:
Harrison Ford Tops Forbes' Highest Earning Actors
Thanks to the deal he shared with producers Steven Spielberg and George Lucas on Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Harrison Ford emerged from the wilderness to... More...
January 21, 2009:
Razzies Name 2008's Worst Movie Nominees
No awards season would be complete without the Golden Raspberry Awards (AKA The Razzies), awarded each year to the very worst movies to hit Hollywood. This year's winners will... More...
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