Preposterous Fun

Rating: 4/10 (7 December 2009)

To state the obvious strengths of the movie right off the top: it's a good action-adventure movie, light-hearted even when managing to deal with sinister Nazis, with a fun lead character. Those things in and of themselves score this movie a few points, and one has to give credit for the fact that it really did set the pattern for the modern genre of action-adventure movies. It also established Harrison Ford (who was primarily known for his supporting role as Han Solo from "Star Wars" at the time this was made) as an action-adventure leading man (he does these parts well; I find him perhaps a bit dry when he takes on more substantive roles) although it may not establish him as an "actor" per se, since the part of Indiana Jones really isn't a dramatic part that would stretch or test an actor's ability. It required "presence" rather than "talent" and Ford brought that presence to the part very well. So, yes, there's a lot of good material here, and yet I can't say that I really enjoyed this, in spite of the obvious fun contained within it.
The action-adventure elements are the key to this movie, and that being the case there's not enough, quite honestly. Between them, there are long stretches in which the story is told in a largely unconvincing and uninteresting manner - appropriate, I suppose, since the story itself is quite unconvincing. It might make for a good yarn, but someone still has to explain to me why Hitler would have been interested in finding the Jewish "Ark of the Covenant." I know it was explained at the outset that the Nazis wanted it because it contained great power and would make an army invincible, but one would have to believe the Jewish stories about it to believe that - and Hitler obviously didn't. Then as the movie reaches its climax, the power of the Ark is revealed in ridiculously supernatural terms. That aside, I found the romance between Indi and Marion (Karen Allen) uninteresting and largely unnecessary to the story, and the story itself to be such a wild ride that at times it just didn't seem to make sense to me.
Maybe I'm taking this too seriously. It is fun on a regular basis - even if it is somewhat preposterous. But I still just didn't really enjoy it. 4/10