Refreshing and uplifting yarn which goes above and beyond what is expected of it; a fine effort that hits all the marks for which it aims.

Rating: 7/10 (9 February 2012)

How often does a third entry to an American produced English language franchise, often worked to spin money irregardless of the critical consensus, sag and just generally disappoint? It is, in that case, a great credit to the team behind this, the third Indiana Jones film of 1989 entitled "The Last Crusade", and the fact they done what they've done in creating something as fun and as refreshing as what we've got. We've all been here before, what with the then-latest hijinks preceded by something like four hours of romping; globe trotting; intermittent Nazi-thwarting period-set archaeological causality, but Spielberg doesn't just tread ground: he offers fresh character dynamics; addresses some rather personal issues that affect those caught up in the film's adventure and does his utmost to include action sequences that are every bit as exciting as what preceded them without ever necessarily mirroring them. Where other franchises have in the past faltered through repetition by this stage, Spielberg's film offers fresh wit and flair towards what is essentially the same theme park ride gone again.
After the grim fatuity of 1984's Temple of Doom, The Last Crusade slots into a more carefree and relaxed approach to the "Jones" material by initially harking back to the man's youth for the opening in a dusty 1912 Utah. In doing so, the messy and misjudged series of bleak horror-shows that was the second entry are somewhat banished and there is this sense of the franchise thus reverting back to all the fun and frolics imbued within that of Raiders of the Lost Ark. The film makes a point to get across the tenaciousness and professionalism of Jones, covering the very first time the character happened upon the need for such characteristics with a delightful array of episodes set aboard a freight train hoarding varying circus acts. He looses a piece of treasure in '12, but gets it back again aboard a large ship on stormy waters in '38 - establishing his skills in combat in the process and how he doesn't necessarily let a loose end pass him by: he's willing to go to the ends of the Earth, it seems, if it means getting that 'just' cause settled.
Back home in the American present, life as a university lecturer is draining and the students are demanding. He stands in his class room understating his profession, telling his class that the majority of the pastime is the reading of books and that romanticism has no place in the subject, citing that "X never, ever marks the spot". After a series of loosely connected events, Jones is bumped back onto the track spawning adventure and danger thus essentially allowing him to undertake a quest which will go some way to quell these negative emotions through which he expresses about his living. In wanting to get away from his students, there is an opportunity to rekindle that 'spark' and this lies with taking up the challenge to go after The Holy Grail, within which the blood of Chirst was captured as he lay there on the cross at his crucifixion: a goal outlined to him by American Walter Donovan (Glover). The decision teeters over from being a professional one to a personal one when it's revealed his father, Sean Connery's Henry, was swiped by some rivals gunning for the Grail given his credentials in the Grail's makeup and ancient history.
Things begin in Venice where splashes of exposition and a good boat chase give way to some suspicions about who's on whose side when elegant German Elsa Schneider (Doody) pops up and seems very keen to guide Indiana through the initial mire. Around about this time, we're provided with a trademark series 'bit' involving rats and human-beings in a tight, centuries old underground place one cannot escape from. We've had bugs; spiders and snakes in the previous films: rats ought to do it this time. Charging across Europe to Austria, father Henry joins the quest and makes for what is probably the best sidekick so far; blowing the likes of the previous entry's Capshaw character and Short Round out of the water and probably topping Allen's from the first. Throughout, the Jones' aren't really on speaking terms and both Ford and Connery bounce off one another really well as these two scholars of archaeology acting as one another's foils: Henry being a man of a more refined and old fashioned sort therein the pastime but clashing head on with Indiana's serial-action hero approach to things.
Fleeting substance between the two of them begins in the form of a brief moment on an airship when some truths from years ago rear up, and how Henry was seemingly more in love with his finding of the grail than of his own family. Spielberg's insistence on shooting Connery in the way that he does during the 1912 prologue goes some way to emphasise his anonymity in Indiana's life at that specific time; and without wanting to give anything away, the key denouement in their relationship happens much later on when Henry is forced into uttering the words "let it go...." at a crucial time when the decision between putting family before what has since been revealed as a pipe dream plays out. The film is a winner, a franchise entry that sticks in the mind thanks largely to its central pairing; its humour; its action sequences and its off-piste scenes such as the one at a Nazi rally when a certain man's autograph is captured. In a sense, this is probably better than Raiders; the film cracks along at the same sort of pace but there just seems to be more stuff going on here with the capability of leaving a big grin on your face and not have you feel too bad about it. Where Spielberg has garnered praise in the past for his romping, B-movie inclined entertainments, he deserves a little more with this effort.